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Fatty Foods May Cause Cocaine-Like Addiction
WrongSizeGlass writes "A new study in rats suggests that high-fat, high-calorie foods affect the brain in much the same way as cocaine and heroin. The rats that gorged themselves on the human food quickly became obese."
How about the HFCS question?
For fuck's sake, there's HFCS in just about everything we eat these days. After the recent study, I went through my pantry. Wanted to see precisely how much of the stuff it was in.
- Hot dogs? CHECK.
- Oscar Mayer "deli meats" for sandwiches? CHECK.
- Breakfast cereals? Almost universal. If it has "modified corn starch", that's HFCS under a disguised name.
- Salty-type snacks? Check. Even the supposedly all-natural pita chips.
- Anything from Chef Boyardee. Check.
- Frozen pizzas waiting to be heated up? Check. Turns out they add HFCS to the goddamn tomato sauce.
The list goes on but I think you get the picture. We're being fed HFCS EVERYWHERE and we just saw a major study done showing an effect on HFCS, either by brain chemistry or satiety reflex, causing obesity. If they were feeding rats the same stuff in their "fatty foods" (and cheesecake is OMG FUCKING FULL OF IT)...
Yet the news article says it's "fatty foods..." when in reality, it's sugary foods the rats were being fed, that fat being incidental.
No, it's sugary AND fatty foods that the rats were being fed. The summary ignores the sugar, but you're not being any better by ignoring the fat. When the rats get addicted to plain bread or just piles of granulated sugar, then we can talk about your theory.
Just because you sold your soul to the devil that needn't make you a teetotaler. --The Devil and Daniel Webster
>>>the sugar [and fructose-added corn syrup] lobby is strong...
Fixed. So-called "sugar free" foods that substitute sugar alcohols like sorbitol aren't much better. It's still all sugar and still has fattening properties. (Also gives you lots of gas due to the alcohol.)
More specifically: The fructose half of the sugar is the problem, not the glucose. Plain-old corn syrup (pure glucose) is not harmful to the body, since it's glucose that the body's cells need.
"I disapprove of what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it." - historian Evelyn Beatrice Hall
Sugar is also high fructose and therefore also fattening.
Chemistry fail. Fructose is a sugar, but not all sugars are fructose. Glucose is not fructose.
Well, here ya go. Sugar is as addictive as cocaine
"However beautiful the strategy, you should occasionally look at the results" - Winston Churchill
Here ya go.
Nope, HFCS is worse than sugar. http://www.themoneytimes.com/featured/20100326/high-fructose-corn-syrup-worse-sugar-id-10105392.html
"However beautiful the strategy, you should occasionally look at the results" - Winston Churchill
How about the HFCS question?
For fuck's sake, there's HFCS in just about everything we eat these days. After the recent study, I went through my pantry. Wanted to see precisely how much of the stuff it was in.
- Hot dogs? CHECK.
- Oscar Mayer "deli meats" for sandwiches? CHECK.
- Breakfast cereals? Almost universal. If it has "modified corn starch", that's HFCS under a disguised name.
- Salty-type snacks? Check. Even the supposedly all-natural pita chips.
- Anything from Chef Boyardee. Check.
- Frozen pizzas waiting to be heated up? Check. Turns out they add HFCS to the goddamn tomato sauce.
The list goes on but I think you get the picture. We're being fed HFCS EVERYWHERE and we just saw a major study done showing an effect on HFCS, either by brain chemistry or satiety reflex, causing obesity. If they were feeding rats the same stuff in their "fatty foods" (and cheesecake is OMG FUCKING FULL OF IT)...
That's a major reason why I limit the amount of processed foods I eat. I've been doing this for a long time and cook most of my food from scratch. It does not really take a lot of time and the quality of my meals has improved greatly.
A while back, I came across this article by Michael Pollan and I agree with it:
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/01/28/magazine/28nutritionism.t.html
"Eat Food. Not too much. Mostly Plants."
Avoid processed/prepackaged stuff as much as possible.
>>>the sugar lobby is weak (USA). That's why there is so damn much HFC in everything.
Bzzzz. The sugar lobby is STRONG and have erected protective tariffs that raised cane sugar's cost to artifically-high levels. Therefore companies look for cheap alternatives (HFCS). This is a classic case of how government laws, which appear good on the surface to protect American sugar workers/farmers, actually cause unintended and harmful consequences.
The sugar tariffs should be removed, so we can import cheap sugar from elsewhere (like Brazil) and therefore make HFCS too expensive to use.
"I disapprove of what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it." - historian Evelyn Beatrice Hall
The link was to an article about a assemblyman who wants to BAN salts in NY, and cut salts in manufactured products.
This is not the same as requiring proper and correct food labeling.
When people complain about the nanny-state, they aren't complaining about companies having to tell you, correctly, what's in their products, it's when the state says you can't do something as opposed to making the decision yourself based on correct labeling.
Stupid, sexy Flanders.
The difference between "Fructose" and "Sucrose" (table sugar) is significant, biochemically.
Sucrose is a Glucose + Fructose molecule, linked by a glycosidic (read: "Oxygen atom") bond. The body uses an enzyme, Sucrase, to split up that sucrose into its glucose and fructose componenets.
Sucrase acts, indirectly, as regulator of sorts -- when a whole lot of sucrase is being used, the body observes that change and reacts accordingly, "Hey, we're good on sugar!"
But with High Fructose Corn Syrup, the need for Sucrase is bypassed, leaving that regulatory system out of the loop.
The Sugar lobby may be big, but the Corn lobby is much, much, bigger. And it's heavily subsidized. The main reason HFCS is cheaper than sugar is because of government subsidies.
The one thing about these foods that I don't agree with is that the poor need to eat them because they can't afford food that is good for them. That's a load of rubbish.
It's not because they're cheap. It's because they're cheap and easy. Poorer people generally need to work longer hourers to earn enough to get by. If they're part of a family, then both parents generally need to work in order to support it. It's hard to come home after ten hours on the job to face preparing and cooking a fresh meal.
Also, canned vegetables are generally artificially sweetened.
Just because you're paranoid doesn't mean there isn't an invisible demon about to eat your face
I'm pretty sure you've got that backwards. The primary fat storage mechanism the body uses is the release of insulin to drive excess glucose out of the blood to be stored as fat. Your body likes to burn fat as fuel and is very well-evolved to do so.