That's Funny, but isn't it Easier to Just Count Carbs?

Have you seen the trailer for That Sugar Film? It's funny and smart, and I'm glad the film is being made, but it talks up reducing or eliminating added sugars. If you're going to try this at home, how do you know how much added sugar a product contains--unless it doesn't contain any? For example, the almond butter I buy lists as ingredients dry roasted almonds, honey powder (sugar, honey), palm oil, sea salt. My 80% dark chocolate is made of organic chocolate liquor, organic raw cane sugar, organic cocoa butter, organic ground vanilla beans. They both list total carbohydrate and fiber content, but how in the world are you supposed to distinguish how many carbs came from the sugar and how many came from the other ingredients? Without knowing the amounts of all the ingredients, you can't.

By the way, at nine grams net carb per half a chocolate bar and five grams net carb per two tablespoons of almond butter, these products with sugar added come in at a fraction of the net carbohydrate load of one cup of oatmeal (28 grams), a food that the trailer touts. All those lovely complex carbohydrates in the oatmeal are broken down by your digestive system into sugar.

Comments

Galina L. said…

May be it is easier to count carbs, but blaming added sugar is more convenient for the genre of "investigative reporting" - more drama, suspense, easier to get 100% of audience to get totally outraged (almost as good as "food in the box").

September 03, 2013

Lori Miller said…

Yes, a villain is a useful literary device.

September 03, 2013

Unknown said…

I don't think the trailer shows the full story. I think Eddie posted another link to the story in an earlier post:

http://thelowcarbdiabetic.blogspot.co.uk/2013/08/underbelly-star-damon-gameau-seeks.html

And the article:
http://www.news.com.au/lifestyle/health-fitness/underbelly-star-damon-gameau-seeks-truth-behind-sugar/story-fneuzkvr-1226699963975

It's more about raising awareness about the hidden sugars in processed foods marketed as "healthy".

I happen to agree re. the carbs, but then I'm diabetic and read a lot on the subject - unfortunately most Australians don't and all our health bodies are pushing this stuff as if it's fine for people to eat. The inroads of the GI index here is probably a lot stronger too, because the HQ of it is Sydney University and Prof. Jenny Brand-Miller. You only have to use a glucometer to know how utterly useless GI is for diabetics, yet it's also still used to push carbs on diabetics.

September 04, 2013

Lori Miller said…

Thanks for the links. If it gets some people to avoid crap-in-a-box or sugar-in-a-can, many of them should see some improvements in their health. In my case, though, I started a LC diet because of GI problems, and the foods that gave me the most problems turned out to be wheat and fruit. I'd stopped drinking soda years before and wasn't eating a bunch of sugar.

September 04, 2013

Lowcarb team member said…

Yes, its always a good idea to avoid "crap-in-a-box or sugar-in-a-can,"

All the best Jan

September 04, 2013

Lori Miller said…

Especially if you replace it with meat-on-the-bone and greens-from-the-garden.

September 04, 2013

Gym Influencer Doubles Down and Should Have Regretted It

Jennifer Picone isn't the most abusive gym influencer--far from it--but she may be the most annoying. In a video she posted that went viral, she was working out in a gym when another member appeared in the background by the free weights. The member was minding her own business, not looking in Picone's direction, when Picone got up and told her to move. After filming, Picone edited the video with a note about "Gym etiquette lesson #47" and accused the other gym member of "[doing] that 💩 on purpose." Shaming other gym members has gotten to be such a big genre that Joey Swoll has a YouTube channel, with half a million subscribers, dedicated to calling out these content creators. Just for Picone, he took a break from his vacation to tell her to mind her own business. This may be the first time that Joey Swoll has taken one of his followers to task. The fact that she follows him and still doesn't know better than to treat the gym like her personal studio sh...

Stay in your car!

If there's ever a lunatic outside your vehicle, do not engage. Stay in your vehicle. Drive away or call the police. Drive over the curb, lawn or median if necessary; just avoid putting innocent bystanders at risk.* Save yourself from lunatics like a boss. Screen grab from video by Fredrik Sørlie on Youtube . That advice might have saved a 69-year-old delivery driver from being attacked by former NFL player Mark Sanchez, who for unknown reasons was in an alley after midnight in downtown Indianapolis and decided to pick a fight over a parking space. I say might have because I haven't seen any video of the attack. But other incidents over the years bear out the safety of staying in your car. A neighbor was assaulted and robbed after she got out of her car after someone followed her home and blocked her driveway. And remember Reginald Denny from the LA riots? The victim maced and stabbed Sanchez, but suffered a bad cut to his face and tongue and looks like he was badly beaten. Bo...

1972: Carole King, MAS*H and...Food for 2014?

I feel well enough to try Atkins induction again. The palpitations are gone, even without taking potassium. My energy level is back to normal--no more trucking on the treadmill early in the morning to burn off nervous energy or emergency meat, cheese and mineral water stops after yoga. It's back to lounging around to Chopin and Debussy in the morning and stopping at the wine bar for pleasure. I'm using the original Atkins book: Dr. Atkins' Diet Revolution from 1972. While looking in the book for a way to make gelatin (which is allowed on induction, but Jello(TM) and products like it have questionable ingredients), I felt the earth move under my feet : those recipes from 42 years ago look delicious and they're mostly real food. It makes sense, though: the cooks who wrote the recipes probably didn't have had a palette used to low-fat food full of added sugar or a bag of tricks to make low-fat food edible. Anyone who writes a recipe called "Cottage Cheese and...

The Under-the-Radar Ointment for Hard-to-Heal Wounds

Imagine looking in the mirror one morning and finding the side of your head black and your ear twice its normal size. That's what happened to Brad Burnam, who caught a deadly superbug at the hospital where he worked. Sometime after having emergency surgery--one of 21 surgeries over the next five years--he set out to cure himself. The result he created was a fusion of PHMB, an antibiotic common in Europe but little known in the US, in a petroleum jelly base (like Vaseline), held together with a stabilizer/emulsifier. It sticks to wounds, keeps them moist, and provides a barrier. It cured his antibiotic resistant superbug. After getting FDA clearance, he formed Turn Therapeutics, and Hexagen is now available by prescription. Screen shot from https://turntherapeutics.com/about/ Millions of Americans suffer from open wounds--chronic issues like diabetic foot ulcers. Readers probably have their blood sugar under control and avoid this condition, but might have parents, partners o...

No-carb "cider" and Halloween videos you haven't seen

In time for Halloween, here's a recipe for no-carb "cider" to sip while you watch scary (or mildly spooky) videos. Photo from Pixabay . Ingredients: Hot water Constant Comment tea Doctor's Best magnesium powder in sweet peach flavor Steep a bag of Constant Comment tea in hot water for a few minutes and remove the bag. Add one scoop of magnesium powder (sweet peach flavor). The combination tastes surprisingly like hot apple cider, but with zero carbs. Only have one, or at most two, cups at a time--too much magnesium at once will have you running to the bathroom. Constant Comment tea tastes good on its own if you've maxed out your magnesium dose for the day. You can find both the tea and the magnesium powder at Vitacost.com. Kroger and other grocery stores carry Constant Comment tea, but I've never seen the magnesium powder at a grocery store. With a hot cup of ersatz cider, enjoy a video in the spirit of the season. The Amazing Mr. Blunden Family friendly; mild...

Pain, Pain, Go Away!

Search This Blog