High Fructose Corn Syrup To Get a Makeover 646
An anonymous reader writes "With its sweetener linked to obesity, some cancers and diabetes, the Corn Refiners Association (CRA) doesn't want you to think 'fructose' when you see high fructose corn syrup in your soda, ketchup or pickles. Instead, the AP reports, the CRA submitted an application to the FDA, hoping to change the name of their top-selling product to 'corn sugar.'"
Re:What the hell? (Score:4, Informative)
Funny thing is, it's not as if high-fructose corn syrup is actually worse for you than a similar amount of cane sugar. The problem is not HFCS as much as it is "foods loaded with sugar."
Maybe, maybe not. While your essential point is sound, from TFA:
When glucose (contained in sugar) enters the bloodstream, it stimulates production of insulin and of a hormone called leptin, which signals to the brain that the body has eaten enough. By contrast, the fructose contained in high fructose corn syrup doesn’t stimulate the production of leptin. Studies also show that fructose is processed into fat more quickly than is glucose.
A friend of mine made a related point, though. These days you see a lot of things like so-called "natural" sodas which claim to be sweetened with "evaporated cane syrup." I defy anybody to give me a scientific explanation why this is not merely sugar with another name. If sugar is too scary for "health" foods, it stands to reason that "high fructose corn syrup" should be too scary a name for junk food. Why should junk food makers be left out? (More to the point, why should the companies who sell their sodas at Whole Foods get away with it?)
Not the first time (Score:5, Informative)
Re:Evil stuff (Score:5, Informative)
No, its sugar lobbyists as much, if not more, than corn lobbyists. The US has import tariffs on foreign cane sugar to prop up the price of the domestic stuff, which makes it too expensive to use in wide-scale production here. That's why foreign versions of Coke and Pepsi products are made with real sugar, where as we get the cheap corn shit.
I was a lobbyist myself for a non-profit social organization in a past career. I was at a luncheon fundraiser in DC for a congressman from a midwestern, corn-raising state and was seated across from a sugar lobbyist, and in between a guy from Raytheon and a guy from Microsoft. The sugar lobbyist was the biggest asshole of the three, too.
Re:So.... (Score:3, Informative)
Can we start calling cigarettes, "All natural inhaled plant extracts"?
Probably not, since there's a lot of crap in there in addition to the tobacco that's probably not all that natural.
Re:Evil stuff (Score:3, Informative)
Why can't these guys do the right thing and stop making this evil stuff? Playing a shell game with the facts does not change reality.
Because Iowa hold their caucuses early in the presidential election cycle and a lot of candidates like to use that as a chance to get their campaign's momentum going. Many areas of public policy, particularly anything affecting corn farming, are dictated by the feelings of the corn farmers of Iowa.
Re:Real sugar soda (Score:5, Informative)
Kinda off topic, but is anyone else enjoying the "real-sugar" sodas that are in supermarkets? Man so delicious, I stocked up on it. I wish this was sold all the time.
Very much on-topic. I grew up on Coca Cola as a kid long before the switch to corn syrup, and I don't care what anyone says, high-fructose corn syrup is not the same as cane sugar. There was nothing quite like a tall glass bottle of Coke, ice-cold, on a hot summer's day. So yes, I have tried the "real-sugar" sodas (just for old time's sake) and yeah, it was good. Sad to say, thanks to the switch to corn-based sweetener, Coca Cola hasn't been "it" for some time now.
Re:I 100% Agree with them. (Score:3, Informative)
It's actually "High Fructose Corn Syrup" currently. This is because it is a liquid sugar (sugar + water).
Re:Not the first time (Score:4, Informative)
Penny Arcade had a great comic describing this very thing.
http://www.penny-arcade.com/comic/2010/4/7/ [penny-arcade.com]
Name already taken? (Score:5, Informative)
Per Amazon [amazon.com]:
Corn Sugar is the common name for dextrose.
and per Wise Geek [wisegeek.com]
Corn sugar is a natural sweetener that is made utilizing starch that is extracted from kernels of corn. The extracted cornstarch is then refined to create a solid sugar or to make another popular sweetening agent known as corn syrup...
The process for making corn sugar begins with the removal of starchy elements from the corn. The extracted elements are actually glucose, although the refining process will transform them into another form of sugar known as dextrose. With the production of syrup, the corn sugar becomes a high fructose corn syrup...
It sounds like "corn sugar" is already used to refer to a separate product. If they don't want to continue using "HFCS," then come up with another word, the same way they did with "Tilapia."
But I think they're shooting themselves in the foot. I mean, are they trying to give ammunition to the healthier foods? First, the other projects can continue to claim that they don't contain HFCS, and they can also make fun of the other brands for trying to hide what's in their foods.
I mean, it's going to be like a fucking field day for the health foods.
Re:Interestingly... (Score:3, Informative)
One problem is that corn sugar is a synonym for dextrose, which is used as an adjunct in brewing. I don't think fructose is as fermentable, which would result in a very different product.
Re:Interestingly... (Score:3, Informative)
It's an accurate name. It's called high-fructose corn syrup because it has a lot more fructose than regular corn syrup, which is what HFCS is made from.
To be fair, "corn sugar" is slightly deceptive, in that it's renaming an existing product to make it sound similar to a different, more-desired product, but it's entirely accurate. Glucose, fructose, and sucrose, along with many others, are all sugars.
Re:What the hell? (Score:4, Informative)
It's not fraud, technically it is sugar. Anyone who actually cares about it (apparently you think it gives you cancer) will realize the change.
I point-blank did not say that corn syrup causes cancer: nor, I might add, did the article I linked. Guess you didn't bother to read it.
... I really try hard to avoid the stuff.) Unsweetened foods are hard to find and often more expensive, but I know what they can do to me. Maybe I'm more aware of the risks than most, because my father died of complications from diabetes. But, if that study is correct and fructose does cause certain cancer cells to divide more rapidly, well that could (for example) be something for cancer patients to be aware of when planning their menu. It wouldn't surprise me to find that increased use of corn syrup in the past few decades has increased the prevalence of certain kinds of cancer, and we may very well find other significant differences between cane sugar and corn syrup: more research is needed.
I just said the two aren't the same. Yes, chemically they are all "sugars" but that doesn't mean we can't be specific, nor does it mean that all compounds in that family have the same effect on the human body. Considering that just about everything we eat in this country is over-sweetened with either "real" sugar or corn syrup, it would be nice to have some idea if one is worse than the other, and why.
I avoid all kinds of sugar on general principle (I use unsweetened ketchup, unsweetened fruit juices
Re:What the hell? (Score:5, Informative)
Re:Not the first time (Score:1, Informative)
Mostly bovine and mostly osseous... yumm-O!
Re:What the hell? (Score:4, Informative)
I'm neither a Chemist nor a nutritionist, so corrections are welcome!
According to Wikipedia [wikipedia.org]:
As soon as I saw your comment, I knew something was wrong with that. Table sugar is pure sucrose, for all intent and purpose. Fructose is also very different than High Fructose Corn Syrup, which itself is around 55% fructose. The fructose isn't the problem (it occurs in nature) its the process that is used that creates products that are NOT found in nature. Just as hydrogenation turns good old fashioned corn oil into artery clogging transfats. There is some credible evidence that it screws up your appetite and makes you crave even more, which isn't good.
Re:What the hell? (Score:2, Informative)
The stuff that comes out of the plant is starch, apparently it is converted to glucose using enzymes.
Re:That'll help (Score:5, Informative)
I don't know, but maybe it was made by Altria Group [wikipedia.org].
(Hint to editors: Altria Group changed their name because of the negative connotations of their previous name, Philip Morris.)
Re:What the hell? (Score:1, Informative)
In my opinion it is a good thing, because then we can lump all sugars together and say they are all bad, which they are
No, they are not. Glucose - a simple sugar - is a basic building-block of life, usable by every cell in your body.
instead of giving people some kind of false 'feel good' that they get because they drink soda with real sugar. Sugar is bad.
You seem to have a serious reading comprehension problem. In addition to misinterpreting Screwmaster's (scientifically proven) statement that fructose causes cancer cells to multiply, you seem to use "sugar" and "sucrose" interchangeably. Sucrose is table sugar, and is unhealthy, however not all sugars are sucrose, which is what you seem to be implying. Soft drinks made with glucose (actual corn sugar) are not unhealthy, because they contain no fructose.
You might want to work on your reading comprehension, as it makes you look like a fool.
Re:What the hell? (Score:4, Informative)
The stigma was so bad that the famous cereal Sugar Pops [google.com] dropped the word from its name and was renamed to the Corn Pops that we enjoyed with our Thundercats and G.I. Joe. Another example is Sugar Smacks, [google.com] which was renamed to Honey Smacks.
Also: Kentucky Fried Chicken successfully pushed to be known as just "KFC" because of the stigma surrounding the word "fried."
Re:What the hell? (Score:4, Informative)
You must not have been around before the switch to corn syrup. Coca Cola was awesome back then.
And Pepsi Throwback and Heritage Dr Pepper are awesome today. It's unfortunate that they only make them in occasional limited batches.
I don't much care for Mt Dew Throwback, though. The HFCS version is my favorite soft drink and the real sugar I guess just doesn't taste artificial enough.
Re:I 100% Agree with them. (Score:3, Informative)
Then they should pick another name. Corn Sugar means dextrose.
Re:Not the first time (Score:3, Informative)
Take a gander at wikipedia or youtube and search for newscasts about this kind of thing.
All I see is
The neutrality of this section is disputed. Please see the discussion on the talk page. Please do not remove this message until the dispute is resolved. (March 2009)
Re:Ask a doctor... (Score:3, Informative)
The first thing I focused on was the ingredient that was most pervasive--corn syrup.
That's extremely unlikely. The most pervasive ingredient is high fructose corn syrup, not corn syrup (they are *extremely* different things.) Corn syrup (which is nearly impossible to find - even in bottles labeled "Corn Syrup") is 100% glucose, whereas HFCS is a solution of fructose and glucose (at least 42% fructose, usually 55%, but sometimes as much as 95% fructose.)
I now avoid it like the plague. Within a month of removing it from my diet (as much as possible, the shit is in everything), the heartburn stopped entirely.
You should check to see if it's a sensitivity to corn, or if it's the fructose. To test: go to a brewer's supply and buy a bottle of glucose (this is 100% corn syrup.) From a health food store, buy a jar of brown rice syrup (70% maltodextrin, 30% glucose). Try each one for a few days and see the result. If both cause heartburn, it's a sensitivity to glucose. If the corn syrup does but the rice syrup doesn't, it's a sensitivity to corn. If neither one does, it's probably a sensitivity to high fructose corn syrup.
The only logical conclusion I can come to, considering the stuff (corn syrup) has been in HEAVY use for decades now, is that the medical "industry" knows, but cannot monetize the solution--removing corn syrup from ones diet. Telling people to stop eating it would actually cut into their business. Corn syrup makes them money in the form of direct medical symptoms that need to be treated and the inherent medical problems associated with obesity. LOTS of money.
If this was true, how is it that the medical industry says to cut out saturated fat and sodium for other ailments?
The actual reason is much simpler: the research on high fructose corn syrup is just beginning, and there is a *lot* of effort from the corn industry to block or obscure it. For some interesting viewing (it's quite long, and relatively heavy on the biochem) you should watch this: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dBnniua6-oM [youtube.com]
Re:Name already taken? (Score:1, Informative)
The extracted elements are actually glucose, although the refining process will transform them into another form of sugar known as dextrose.
Um... dextrose *is* glucose. (Or rather, dextrose is D-glucose, but there isn't any appreciable amount of L-glucose in corn.)
It's either ignorance, or a deliberate attempt to pull in the "evils" of technology.
"This chemical plant draws in only pure stream water, but discharges large amounts of dangerous dihydrogen monoxide!"
Re:Evil stuff (Score:3, Informative)
Actually you get the expensive corn shit since our cane sugar is cheaper than your HFCS.
A lot of cane sugar is also bad since half of it breaks down into fructose anyway and huge amounts of glucose isn't much better for you anyway - so a bit beyond half as bad.
Re:What the hell? (Score:4, Informative)
Nobody has a legitimate legally protected interest in deception. Unless they are willing to let us pay for the food with "dollurs", I say they should use the non-confusing name people already recognize.
They're required to call it high fructose because it is NOT unadulterated corn syrup (glucose and dextrose). It tastes different and works differently in food. Evidence suggests it behaves differently in the body as well. In commonly used formulations, it's not even mostly corn syrup (In soft drinks they use 55% fructose 45% corn syrup).
Re:What the hell? (Score:5, Informative)
Cane sugar is 50% fructose, in exactly the same way that baking soda (NaHCO3) is 50% lye (NaOH).
PROTIP: if you want to retry this troll, replace "sugar" with "honey". Honey is ~40% fructose, ~30% glucose. Bonus credit if you start calling honey "medium fructose bee syrup".
HTH.
Re:What the hell? (Score:2, Informative)
It's not HFCS vs Sugar. It's Sugars vs Stevia. (Score:4, Informative)
HFCS-55 is 55% fructose. Cane sugar is sucrose, which is one quick reaction (which happens in the stomach before absorption of the sugar into the bloodstream) away from being 50% fructose. If the enemy is fructose, cane sugar is almost as bad as HFCS.
The enemy is our high-sugar diet in general. We should have switched over to Sweetleaf / Stevia [wikipedia.org] 30 years ago, as it would have let us continue with our current taste in foods, only healthier.
But someone (corn or sugar lobby is the obvious culprit, but don't count out the artificial sugar guys, most of them are made by huge chem companies) had a friend in high places place a ban on the stuff [owndoc.com] back in the early 90s.
No doubt because you can replace sugar (and all artificial sugar) with processed Stevia at something like a 30 to 1 ratio -- I use 1/4th a teaspoon to make an entire pitcher of KoolAid, as opposed to a cup or whatnot of sugar. In other words, if we had switched to Stevia, all three of the HFCS, the Cane Sugar, and the cancer causing alternatives would have been rendered obsolete, incredibly rapidly. There's an interesting dynamic going on -- the sweetener industry uses something that's incredibly unhealthy but dirt cheap, and when that starts to go south they also sell us (equally if not worse) alternatives under the guise of "health food". All while ignoring an actual healthy alternative cause they can't control it.
The complaint was that "we just don't know if this Stevia thing is OK", and after banning they... promptly refused to study it to see if it WAS ok. It's a really common tactic, really.
Meanwhile, Japan's been using the stuff for 30 years with no ill effects. At all.
Oh, and they recently unbanned it (Maybe. They might have just "unbanned" the fake-but-patentable alternatives. See the Owndoc link above), but only after huge chemical company Cargil [wikipedia.org] and artificial sweetener company Merisant [wikipedia.org] -- aka the GM seed jerks and makers of Roundup, Monsanto -- found a way to make cancer-causing, but patentable, alternatives -- Truvia (Coke/Cargil) and Purvia (Pepsi/Monsanto).
Since Stevia's an incredibly easy to grow herb (you almost definitely can find a powdered or liquid version at your local store in the health food section, or a live plant the gardening section when it's that time of year), well, they couldn't compete with THAT.
Meanwhile, if you do grow it yourself, tossing a leaf or two in with one's tea sweetens it up quite perfectly. Enjoy.
You have things backwards. (Score:5, Informative)
Cane sugar has essentially no free-form fructose. Refined cane sugar is nearly pure sucrose, a disaccharide. Admittedly, it is composed glucose and fructose structures, they are chemically bonded and is not metabolised the same way as either one of the monosaccharides (glucose and fructose).
HFCS is an engineered product that takes regular corn syrup (essential pure glucose) and turns it into a mixture of free form glucose and fructose in order to produce a substance that tastes the same (sweetness-wise) as table/cane sugar.
"Corn Sugar" would actually be distinctly incorrect if used to refer to HFCS, as that term is already used to refer to crystalline glucose (Commonly known in the food world as dextrose).
Re:Evil stuff (Score:3, Informative)
(You know, fructose, the principal form of sugar found in those well-known health-wreckers, apples.)
Apples are actually pretty nutritionally devoid. It's almost as if they're pure sugar. In many, many fruit drinks, you'll see Apple juice as the number one ingredient as it is used as filler. Even if you are drinking something like Strawberry+Blueberry Juice, the chief ingredient is Apple juice. The same is true of the watermelon juice I like to buy. It's mostly Apple juice.
SUGAR!
Re:Not the first time (Score:3, Informative)
I was actually going for 'funny' with a South Park reference to the episode where Stan, Kyle, Cartman and Butters kidnap a bunch of veal cows and hold them hostage until the FDA changes the name of veal to 'tortured baby cows,' but apparently that was lost on people, which is sad because the episode featured Mr. Warf who they made the FBI get to drive them and the truck full of veal cows to the airport.
Re:It's not HFCS vs Sugar. It's Sugars vs Stevia. (Score:3, Informative)
Re:What the hell? (Score:3, Informative)
Re:What the hell? (Score:3, Informative)
That was an old study in Discover, or something, that claimed that because Asian countries didn't drink that much milk nor consumed other animal proteins, their prostate cancer and morning sickness levels were much lower.
Everything is bad for if you concentrate a diet on it.
Re:In other news (Score:3, Informative)
Yup. What makes it different is it is a combination of glucose and fructose in a single molecule, which means it must be broken down first. This ever-so-slightly moderates the effects of fructose, but not much. It's nearly as bad as HFCS.
Even starches aren't that great, they are simply easy to break down chains of glucose, and ultimately do similar things in your body in large quantities. Starches are better than the others because they take slightly longer to digest, which means the effects are slightly moderated, and they contain no fructose, which has its own special nasty effects.
Re:What the hell? (Score:4, Informative)
My college biochemistry texts caught on fire while I was reading this thread... yours is the only even nearly-correct post.
Fructose is just fruit sugar, or half of a sucrose (table sugar) molecule. Fructose takes an extra step to get broken down down to glucose so is not as efficiently used by the body, but this is nothing different from the fructose half of sucrose.
If you think fructose is bad, stop eating fruit, cuz it's the sugar you'll find therein. You could just as well call it "fruit sugar" as "corn sugar" -- both are correct.
Honey is chemically indistinguisable from HFCS-55. In fact HFCS is sometimes used to illegally "stretch" honey, and the only way to tell HFCS from honey is by the pollen-protein contaminants found in honey. Amazingly, the people who are first to condemn HFCS are usually also the first to tout honey as a "natural replacement" for sugar... when in fact it's six of one, half a dozen of the other. (Where DID you think the bees got the sugars in honey, anyway??)
HFCS is only "high fructose" in comparsion to regular corn syrup.
HFCS use in foods has been declining, yet obesity continues to rise ... kinda kills that as a direct correlation, eh?
Most of the other, uh, fructose-cake arguments are so biochemically nonsensical that I don't even know where to start.
My own objection to HFCS is that food doesn't taste quite right when fructose is used as a substitute for sucrose, and this irritates my supertaster senses. However, corn syrup is perfectly good for use in certain candies, where its flavour is expected.
Re:The problem is anything that raises blood sugar (Score:5, Informative)
Whole Wheat Bread will raise your blood sugar but lesser & slower than White Bread or HFCS or regular sugar because of
the difference between complex & simple carbohydrates.
Eating an Orange will raise your sugar less than drinking Orange Juice because the Orange has more fibre in it.
Consuming any carb will raise your blood sugar, but complex carbs & carbs with fibre are a little better.
Re:It's not HFCS vs Sugar. It's Sugars vs Stevia. (Score:3, Informative)
Uh... Cancer causing? Do you even KNOW what's in Truvia/Purevia?
Stevia Rubandia A extract and Erythritol...
If what they're making is cancer-causing, then you're plugging cancer-causing. The only reason they pressured the FDA to allow it, had nothing to do with "cancer-causing" stuff, but rather that they found a patentable way to make big piles of cash cleanly producing sweetener out of an unpatentable plant.
Re:It's not HFCS vs Sugar. It's Sugars vs Stevia. (Score:3, Informative)
Heh... Depends on if you're using "SweetLeaf" or if you're using Truvia/Purevia. If you're using pure stevia, yeah, it's got this "nifty" licorice aftertaste if you've gotten carried away. The aftertaste isn't QUITE as bad with Stevia blended with Xylitol or Erythritol- and it's actually not as bad as most of the other stuff. Your mileage may vary, but I've had less issues with Stevia than with the other stuff- and I can't do anything with Nutrasweet, so much of the stuff out there is not available to me.
Re:What the hell? (Score:5, Informative)
On another note, I'm from Europe and find the US debate over HFCS somewhat fascinating. Here, the "health food" industry will sell you fructose telling people that it is a "more natural and healthy" sweetener. My conclusion is nonetheless that if you want to eat something sweet and stay healthy, eat fruit or something such - don't screw around with candy.
Re:What the hell? (Score:4, Informative)
This is much like the news from earlier this year about Aspartame being renamed as AminoSweet, by its manufacturer Ajinomoto. There has been a growing awareness of the dangers of Aspartame, so renaming their product is presumably an attempt to confuse the public.
So now the same thing is being done by renaming high fructose corn syrup as "corn sugar," also presumably because of its bad reputation. I will be sure to watch for either of those new names when shopping, so that I can avoid products that contain either "corn sugar" or AminoSweet.
Here are a couple of articles about the renaming a Aspartame as AminoSweet:
Re:What the hell? (Score:4, Informative)
Re:What the hell? (Score:3, Informative)
Because we've spent so much time bitching about government and so little time organizing to change it, the Feds believe they are doing their jobs-- they're ensuring a lucrative future for themselves in lobbying or industrial consultancy.
Unless and until we continue to tell elected officials through the ballot box and their ears that blind allegiance to industry is unacceptable, they will continue to do whatever it takes to get rich in Washington.
Re:What the hell? (Score:3, Informative)
"when that stuff hits your stomach bam the acid denatures the enzymes."
A large majority of your gastric juices are enzymes.
Not all enzymes solve in acidic solutions.
This is like basic biology AND basic chemistry.
Re:What the hell? (Score:5, Informative)
If you only focus on the biochemistry part of the process, you are missing out on the biological ones. The fact that two molecules can be nearly indistinguishable from a chemistry point of view does not mean that their biological impact can not be radically different. For a simple example:
Lactic acid comes is present in two stereo-isomer configurations. Chemically, they are identical during an oxidation process. However, the body metabolizes both differently.
That extra step that you mention to break down Fructose can have an impact on where in the body the molecule is being processed. Also, don't forget that before the fructose and glucose enter the metabolic cycle, a large number of processes have already taken place in the body, and those processes might have a different effect on the body. (Reaction to insulin, etc)
So, just because fructose might be (bio)chemically similar, this doesn't mean that biologically it is similar.
Sugar: The bitter truth (Score:2, Informative)
Re:What the hell? (Score:5, Informative)
There is no doubt that ingesting sugar could lead to a "sugar spike" in the bloodstream, but it's unlikely to cause any harm in a healthy individual. Your post implies sugar spikes cause Type II Diabetes. While sugar spikes can be a symptom of Type II Diabetes, there is no evidence that they are a cause of the disease. In fact, there is quite a lot of evidence suggesting sugars do not contribute directly in any way. They do, however, contribute to obesity which is a considerable factor. One could ingest large quantities of fruits for a quick fructose rush immediately followed by sucking down pixie stix for their sucrose topped off with several spoonfuls of honey (which is similar to HFCS) daily and not develop diabetes from it.... unless they got fat from it & lack of exercise.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Diabetes_mellitus_type_2 [wikipedia.org]
It's a bit odd that you attribute Type II Diabetes as being caused by a sugar spike b/c the body couldn't produce enough insulin -- when type II diabetes is generally caused by insulin resistance. The pancreas pumps out enough insulin just fine -- just not enough relatively b/c the body resists using it. It's the body's cells that resist absorbing the sugar with the help of the insulin that is the culprit.
The most prescribed treatment for type II diabetics is to avoid fatty foods and start exercising regularly b/c more than half the cases are caused, at least in part, by being overweight. People generally know that diabetes is a sugar-related disorder, so it's easy for people to get confused and mistakenly link the intake of sugar with being one of the many contributing factors that causes the disorder.
Re:What the hell? (Score:3, Informative)
I think it does. Good thing that it combines immediately with the hydrochloric acid that causes the breakdown to form table salt and water.
H+ reacts directly with HCO3-, forming H2CO3, which reacts to give H2O and CO2 (that reaction might be acid-catalysed, I don't know). No OH- is involved. Your description was the understanding in the early 1800's, and formally, it is correct, but it is nowhere near what happens.
Also I'm not too convinced that the hydrolysis of sucrose in the stomach is immediate. Doing it in a pan (making invert sugar) involves boiling with acid and water for about 20 minutes. At body temp this would take even longer.
Luckily, the body makes enzymes that work as catalysts to make the reaction run much faster.
Re:What the hell? (Score:1, Informative)
Judging from your name, you are probably form the Netherlands or Belgium. European Coca-Cola does not typically contain HFCS, but is sweetened with sugar, probably beet sugar. In some regions cane sugar is used, which tastes even better. The Americans are an unfortunate lot, however, since almost all Coca-Cola sold in the U.S. is sweetened with HFCS and therefore tastes like crap.
Which sweetener is used mostly depends on cost and availability. The U.S. effectively protects domestic maize (corn) growers, whereas the EU and their member states protect sugar beet growers. Both have the effect of outcompeting better-tasting and, according to some studies, healthier cane sugar from elsewhere in the world.
Re:What the hell? (Score:5, Informative)
The argument against fructose has to do with the way the GLUT transporters are regulated. Glucose uptake into the liver is regulated by insulin mediated GLUT4 translocation and GK etc preventing too much of it from going into the liver and getting converted to FA/VLDL and so forth. Fructose can only be metabolised in the liver (unlike glucose) and its uptake into the liver is not insulin mediated as it is transported in by GLUT2.
On the other hand, you could make the argument that sucrose is at least half as bad as fructose since it has about half amount of fructose by weight but fructose is sweeter than sucrose by weight so if one uses the proper proportion it isn't that much worse..
Wrong (Score:4, Informative)
No, sucrose is split immediately into glucose and fructose, which from that point is metabolized exactly the same as that in HFCS. There is reasonable evidence that fructose may be bad for you, but you get about the same amount of fructose from typically used HFCS as you do from sucrose. HFCS contains slightly more fructose relative to glucose than does sucrose, but it is also sweeter, so less of it is used. It ends up being pretty much a wash. Details and references to primary scientific literature can be found here [sciencebasedmedicine.org].
Re:Agreed (Score:4, Informative)
HFCS is used in virtually every sweetened store-bought product in the US, except for organic and some high-end foods. Most American processed foods are very sweet, and even products that wouldn't traditionally have much or any sweetening are sweetened with HFCS, such as bread and pasta sauce.
Foods and drinks sweetened without HFCS are available, but generally these are more expensive or organic items.
HFCS is only used because corn syrup is significantly cheaper than cane/beet sugar in the US (pretty much uniquely in the world). This is because corn is highly subsidized and because there are relatively few domestic sugar producers and there are prohibitive tariffs on imported sugar, plus the fact that there is an embargo on the closest large sugar-producing country, Cuba
Generally, HFCS is considered to have an identical or worse taste compared to real sugar, though it would be hard to actually measure this. Anecdotally I do find imported Coke from Mexico (with real sugar) to taste somewhat better than domestic HFCS Coke, though I don't drink either enough to really compare.
Re:Agreed (Score:4, Informative)
HFCS is generally used in everything here, thanks to corn subsidies. It actually costs more (pre-subsidy) to make HFCS than it does to use real sugar, but thanks to subsidies it is actually cheaper to use HFCS. As a result EVERYTHING has HFCS, and real sugar is vanishingly rare outside of niche products (organic labels, etc...) that cost around twice as much.
Judging from the Buzz surrounding Mexican and Passover Coke (which use cane sugar, instead of HFCS), I would say a large portion of the population, or at least a vocal population, prefer the real sugar variety over the HFCS variety. Though this might have something to do with age, since older people grew up with sugar sweetened beverages, while the younger generation (sometime in the mid-80s) grew up with the HFCS types.
I'm personally more annoyed with people adding sweeteners to EVERYTHING. I feel like I might be one of the few people in the world who lack a sweet tooth. I'm especially annoyed with them ruining tomatoes and sweet corn, both are now so sweet that they make my jaw hurt.
Americans have the palette of a two year old. The sweeter the better.
It does help explain why we are so damn fat, though.
Re:Going Down Like Tobacco (Score:3, Informative)
There's no "global conspiracy". There are, however, increasing amounts of data showing HFCS increases cancer, diabetes and other disease risks. My wife has worked in the beverage business, in labs, for many years, and she agrees that the execs probably have research documenting the risks, based on her actual experience of what goes on, and how the beverage industry has been moving to reduce HFCS for several years, even though it's very profitable and easy.
You call a myth what people in the industry expect will be fully documented when there are more studies, which have been lacking due to resistance by the HFCS industry. You are the one who obviously doesn't understand science. And you're an obnoxious, hyperbolic strawman jerk.