Calories = Calories = Calories?

[Gibsons]

Originally posted by: Trygve

Originally posted by: IonYou

Originally posted by: vi_edit
Fructose is the sugar naturally found in fruits. 5 Servings of fruits and veggies is recommended for the avg. person. So how is fructose so bad?

High Fructose Corn Syrup. HCFS. It's what they use to sweeten many beverages and candies.

If HCFS is so high in fructose, then why the distinction between HCFS and fructose naturally found in fruits?

Fructose is fructose, no matter what the source. What matters is simply the quantity. The "primary" metabolic pathway for fructose metabolism is enzymatically limited to about 50g/day; it's only when the amount consumed spills over into the alternate pathway that it has deleterious effects on health and energy balance.

You have to eat a *lot* of fruit to get 50g of fructose (bear in mind that fructose is only one of the sugars found in fruits), but it doesn't take much soda pop (or fruit *juice*) to get far more than 50g.

Most fruit juices aren't *too* bad; they're just far easier to consume lots more calories and sugar in that form. The two notable exceptions are apple juice and pear juice which are much higher in fructose than other fruit juices. Trouble is, when you buy almost any other kind of fruit juice, it's usually pear juice with a little of whatever's on the label added.

(Note, btw, that most sugar alcohols--including sorbitol and maltitol--are metabolized into fructose, so those count, too.)

I think you're thinking about ketoses (fructose etc) vs aldoses (glucose etc) rather than alcohols.

although they're actually hemiketals and hemiacetals in solution, but that's another story...

 

[Gibsons]

Originally posted by: BD231

Originally posted by: Gibsons

Originally posted by: AbAbber2k
The Omnivore

Good independant site that seems to backup everything he says with research. Just found it recently so I haven't had much a chance to verify his validity myself, but most of what he says seems to fall in line with my own personal experience and information digging.

Edit: Oh, and to hit the HFCS thing... apparently HFCS is made of equal parts Fructose and Glucose+Higher Sugars. ie: Fructose isn't bad for you, but consuming lots of high glycemic sugars is. Glucose = 100, Fructose = 20.

Fructose induces very little insulin response (it has a very low GI) but it's more fattening than other sugars. It has a metabolic shortcut (two actually, but one is predominant) to being turned into fat.

Fructose spkies insulin just as much as table sugar dose. The difference in natural fructose is that it comes combined with fiber if you get it where you're suppose to. Fruit, berries, ect, all have quite a bit of fiber, which slows digetion considerably.

The body has to break down all that fiber which takes times. Much like the difference between digestion of complexcarbo hydrates vs. sugar.

Sucrose has about three times (or more) the glycemic index of fructose, according to this website. Text

Sucrose (50 g test portion) 65
Fructose (50g test portion) 21