How and why to steer clear of high-fructose corn syrup, trans fat, saturated fat, and

[Captainhowie175]

I came across this article this morning and I thought it had alot of good info, just wanted to share.

By: David Zinczenko & Ted Spiker
Even if you spend about as much time with comic books as Ron Howard spends with hair gel, you know the story line of every superhero tale -- whether it involves Superman, Underdog, or the Incredibles. It's hero vs. villain, good vs. evil, bat wings vs. unsolvable riddles. At stake: a city, a woman, the world, box-office rankings.

Inside your body, the same kinds of battles take place with the same kinds of heroes and villains (minus the underwear worn over the tights). At stake: your body.

See, food has the power to either save your body or destroy it, and by choosing what you eat, you determine the ultimate nutritional fate: whether the good powers prevail and the bad ones are vanquished.

The Villain: The Sweet Masquerader
Given Name: High-Fructose Corn Syrup (HFCS)
Primary Evil Powers: Identity theft; inflicts intense hunger pains.
Nutritional Crimes: This artificial sweetener that masquerades as sugar is twice as sinister as the sucrose it impersonates. Bearing primary responsibility for the collective weight gain in our society, the Sweet Masquerader hypnotizes eaters into thinking they're always hungry.

Here's how this little bugger was born: About 30 years ago, food manufacturers figured out that they could make sodas, cereals, yogurts, and some 40,000 other manufactured foods taste sweeter -- for a lot less money than with simple sugar. They did it by developing HFCS (which is derived from corn).

Sounds fine in theory, but here's the problem: When you eat any type of carbohydrate (like bread or fruit), your body releases insulin to regulate your body weight, pushing those carb calories into your muscles to be used as energy or storing them for later. Then it suppresses your appetite. Those carbs are the signal for you to stop filling your tank.

But the Sweet Masquerader doesn't stimulate insulin, so your body doesn't register it the way it registers simple white sugar. (That's why you can drink a few Big Gulps and never really feel full.) So what are you left with? You eat the HFCS-containing foods that are high in calories, but, like a band that stops after one set, those foods leave you wanting more. So you eat more foods with HFCS, stockpiling those calories like they're savings bonds, and the cycle of eating -- and storing fat -- continues.

Attack Plan: Today, you can find HFCS in things like ketchup, pasta sauce, and crackers -- it's everywhere. Now, you don't need to eliminate it completely (though that's the ideal), but you do need to treat it like a manipulative ex and find ways to kick it out of your life. If HFCS is listed first or second on an ingredients list, see how many grams of "sugars" (HFCS is lumped in that category) the food product contains. If there's just a gram or two, that's okay. But if a food has 8 or more grams of sugars and HFCS is prominent on the list of ingredients, ditch that grub.

The Villain: The Blob
Given Name: Trans Fat
Primary Evil Powers: Turns fat in foods into fat on your belly.
Nutritional Crimes: "Trans fats" may sound like the name of a cross-dressing pool hustler, but the reality is even more bizarre. Artificially made fats, trans fats are like wigs in shower drains -- mammoth cloggers. They gunk up the works by increasing the amount of bad cholesterol in your body. (Trans fats have been linked to an increased risk of heart disease and diabetes.)

You can understand why when you realize how they're made. Trans fats are created by combining vegetable oil (a liquid) with hydrogen to create partially hydrogenated oil, or trans fatty acids. Once infused with the hydrogen, the liquid vegetable oil turns into a solid at room temperature.

And the food industry loves trans fats, because they are cheap and seem to stick around forever. Plus, you can add trans fats to all kinds of foods in a way you can't add regular oil (for instance, normal vegetable oil in a cookie recipe would ooze out when the weather gets warm; with trans fats, the treats stay crisp and solid). So now trans fats -- like HFCS -- get added to chips, fries, muffins, and all sorts of on-the-shelf products.

But the real evil is what the Blob does to you on the inside. Remember, these fats are supposed to be liquid but have turned into solid. So instead of melting, like they would in their natural state, inside your body, they try to revert to their waxy, solid makeup -- inside your arteries.

Attack Plan: Scan the label and eliminate. Like hotel bars on business trips, little good can come from them. Some tips for total avoidance:
• Check ingredients lists for aliases like "hydrogenated" or "partially hydrogenated." The higher these ingredients are on the label, the more trans fats they contain.
• Pick high-protein breakfasts like eggs and Canadian bacon over waffles. If you have toast, skip the margarine. Processed bread products and margarine are two of the most common forms in which trans fats find their way into our bodies.
• At a restaurant, ask what kind of oil the chef uses. You want to hear olive oil, not shortening (another code name for the Blob).
• When eating out, stick to soup or salad and avoid the bread, which can be filled with trans fats.

The Villain: The Belt Buster
Given Name: Saturated Fats
Primary Evil Powers: Hangs around your midsection, refusing to be burned.
Nutritional Crimes: In a way, saturated fats and trans fats are partners -- they're both more likely to be stored than to be burned. While your body likes to burn some kinds of fats as energy (see the Hero on page 24), it would rather save saturated fats around your belly and use them for energy at a future date when food sources are scarce.

Problem is, food is never scarce. Since we're lucky enough to live in a time and place where we don't experience famines, droughts, or lack of convenience stores, we don't need that fat, but our bodies still store it. Worse, saturated fats raise cholesterol levels and have also been shown to increase your risk for heart disease and some types of cancer.

Attack Plan: Since saturated fats are usually found in meats and dairy products, you should always choose the leaner forms of protein and the low-fat forms of dairy. Throughout the book, we'll show you ways to find the foods that contain the good stuff (muscle-building protein and fat-fighting calcium) without the bad.

The Villain: White Fright
Given Name: Refined Carbohydrates
Primary Evil Powers: Nutritional apathy -- they don't do a thing.
Nutritional Crimes: Considering that they've gotten more bad press than James Frey, you'd think that we'd have torn all our carbohydrates into a million little pieces by now. But it's a mistake to eliminate all carbs from your diet. You can't survive without carbohydrates, because grains -- just like fruits, vegetables, and other food groups -- provide crucial energy to feed your brain, muscles, and metabolism, not to mention the fact that they also contain loads of minerals, vitamins, and fiber.

The problem really is in refined carbohydrates, such as white sugar, white bread, bagels, white pasta, and waffles. Most of these products are made from grains that have had all their nutrients refined out of them. If you eat the carbs with the grain, the fiber takes up room in your belly and sends you the signal that you're full. But if all the grains are taken out (as is the case with refined carbs like white bread and white rice), you experience the highs and lows that contribute to storing fat: You get a rush of blood sugar as the carbs are quickly digested, followed by a quick burst of energy, and then a letdown as insulin stores the blood sugar. In turn, your body craves more food -- and then eats more.

Attack Plan: Simple. Sub in slow-moving darks for all your fast-acting whites: Choose whole grains and whole wheat products over any made with white flour or refined carbohydrates.

[IraHays]

His take on sat fats range from baseless to absurd. He also neglected to mention that sat fats raise both types of cholesterol evenly.

[Captainhowie175]

His take on sat fats range from baseless to absurd. He also neglected to mention that sat fats raise both types of cholesterol evenly.

see. i agree with you there, I just really liked his take on refined carbs

[IraHays]

His take on refined carbs seems to be on the money. Allthough I disagree with his statement that "you can't survive without carbs."

[rob86]

His take on refined carbs seems to be on the money. Allthough I disagree with his statement that "you can't survive without carbs."

I like this article by Lyle Mcdonald..

http://bodyrecomposition.com/Articles/howmanycarbs.html

Physiological requirement: 0 g/day

Practical minimum to avoid excessive muscle breakdown: 50 g/day Practical minimum for individuals who function poorly in ketosis: 100 g/day

Note: all above values assume no exercise.

Additional amount to sustain low intensity exercise: minimal approaching zero

Additional amount to sustain weight training: 5 grams carbohydrate/2 work sets

Typically recommended amounts by bodybuilding experts: 1-3 g/lb (160-480 g/day)

Typically recommended amounts by mainstream nutritionists: 2-3 g/lb (320-480 g/day)

Average intake for endurance athletes: 5 g/kg or a little more than 2 g/lb (320 g/day)

Recommended intake for endurance athletes: 7-10 g/kg or 3-4.5 g/lb (480-720 g/day)

Practical maximum for non-carb loading individuals: 8.8 g/kg or 4 g/lb (640 g/day)

Maximal intakes for carb-loading: 16 g/kg or 7 g/lb (1120 g/day)

[rotarnomore]

The explanation of trans fat is incorrect. What you are describing is a partially hydrogenated oil. A "trans" fat is a fat with a trans bond instead of the normal "cis" bond. Without going into too much chemical detail (or writing a full two page report), I will just say this. Your body cannot fully process a trans fat because enzymes are extremely particular in nature. What happens is that the enzyme that would normally break down the "cis" fat and tranport it from the blood stream gets "stuck" trying to digest the trans fat. The enzyme is now preoccupied with the trans fat and will not be able to process any of the cis fats. Therefore, more fat ends up in the bloodstream unprocessed which is bad. Very simple and broad overview without having to describe what a cis and trans means chemically.
Chris