It is very important for a newbie to learn how to read labels! The first and the most important step is to find the sugars within the never ending, awful long ingredients list! And that can become sometimes a real drudging adventure…
Not all the sugars will increase your Blood Sugar! However, they will influence in one way or another your general health! They can increase your appetite, your blood pressure, your cholesterol! They can attack your immune system, your microbiome, they can cause you diarrhea. One the long term, you can develop cancer, heart disease, chronic inflammation and so on! Some of them can be considered safe!
The most important fact is that all types of sugar have one and most dangerous effect: they make us addicted to the sweet taste! And this addiction is extremely profitable for the food industry, the pharmaceutical industry, healthcare institutions, insurances and finally for the funeral businesses.
The “fake” sugars list:
- Acesulfame potassium (Ace-K), Agave syrup, Agave nectar, Allulose, Aspartame, Bar syrup, Barley malt, Beetroot sugar, Brown sugar, Brown sugar syrup, Brown rice syrup, Candy sugar, Caramel, Caster sugar, Coconut sugar, Corn syrup, Corn syrup powder, Cyclamate, D-Tagatose, Date sugar, Demerara, Dextrin, Dextrose, Dulcitol, Erythritol, Evaporated sugarcane juice, Fructose, (Any) Fruit concentrate, (Any) Fruit extract powder, (Any) Fruit juice, (Any) Fruit puree, Galactose, Glucose, Glucose syrup, High fructose corn syrup, Honey, Hydrogenated starch hydrolysates, Icing sugar, Inulin, Invert sugar, Inverted sugar syrup, Isomalt, Isomaltooligosaccharide, Isomaltulose, Isomerase, Jaggery, Lactitol, Lactose, Levulose, Lucuma powder, Malt extract, Malt syrup, Maltitol, Maltodextrin, Maltose, Maltrin, Mannitol, Maple sugar, Maple syrup, Milk powder, Modified starch, Molasses, Monk fruit, Muscovado, Nib sugar, Oligofructose, Panela, Pearl sugar, Polydextrose, Rapadura, Resistant dextrin, Rice syrup, Saccharine, Saccharose, Sorbitol, Sorghun, Stachyose, Starch, Stevia, Steviol glycosides, Sucanat, Sucralose, Sucrose, Sucrose inversion, Sugarcane crystals, Treacle, Turbinado, Whey permeate, Xylitol, Xylose…
The list is non-exhaustive! Unfortunately, while there are some items that we can identify easily, many of them are just hieroglyphs for most of us! There are some clues that can be helpful: words ending in “-ol” are sugar alcohols. Words ending in “-ose” are a type of glucose. For the rest, we just have to read this list several times till we learn most of the denominations!
It is very important to get familiar with all these sugar names as you want to avoid as much as possible the products listing them among their ingredients.
Is there any sugar that is good for you? It’s a tricky question! I would rather prefer a plain, non-refined sugarcane sugar, a good quality of maple syrup or acacia honey than any other sweetening products. I do use one teaspoon of honey for my morning mug of coffee. As for my mom, we used xylitol and later we switched to stevia…