Do you avoid all foods that contain High Fructose Corn Syrup?

I try to BUT, I will never give up my Yoplait Light yogurts no matter how much HFCS they put in them. I love them way too much!

I try to, but like you, some things I like too much to give them up.

Not on purpose. Although I tend to cook for myself from scratch and avoid processed foods so I guess I kind of am?

UD

I do try to minimize HFCS and partially hydrogenized fat.  Can't totally avoid it unless you grow your own food though. Wish it (and its many spin offs) would just become too expensive for corporations to use in their products.

I read labels like books (takes a long time to shop!) and try not to buy things that have 6 inch long ingredient lists. In one of his books, Andrew Weil said that if the ingredient list contains many things you would not use in preparing the food, then don't buy it. Most of it is one of the many corn reduction syrups or fats anyway which are not good if you don't want to be fat.

Yes, I do. I go to stores like Trader Joe's, and Whole Foods, where there are other options, better tasting options.

No. Whenever it's in food, that food always tastes pretty good. Yay for HFCS!

I avoid it when I can (as well as other things where fructose alone is added as a sweetener) and hydrogenated fats. And I've found that avoiding it goes hand-in-hand with making healthier diet choices. No more pop, no more "juice" punch drinks or popsicles or fake ice cream or "wheat" bread... more water and whole grain bread (the import shop by my house sells a really good hempseed whole grain with sunflower seeds and honey... delicious!)

I too avoid it, and hydgrogenated oils, like the plague. For me, it's not all about staying thin but rather staying healthy. That's really what matters in the end.

It's super easy for me to avoid it because I just never buy foods with it in it... and tonight when I got soy sauce packets with my sashimi... it had high-fructose corn syrup... so TRASH CAN it went! Good thing I had my own! ha ha. I don't buy packaged foods unless I REALLY ANALYZE the package ingredients... and they have to have only natural ingredients! 

I avoid it where I can, but honestly doubt that having it once in a while could be too harmful. Hydrogenated oils are much scarier anyway. My weakness is soda - I almost never drink it anymore, but occasionally just want a couple sips of root beer to wash down a delicious slice of pizza, you know?

Original Post by theholla:

I avoid it where I can, but honestly doubt that having it once in a while could be too harmful. Hydrogenated oils are much scarier anyway. My weakness is soda - I almost never drink it anymore, but occasionally just want a couple sips of root beer to wash down a delicious slice of pizza, you know?

Yes. :) Although when I do drink regular cola it's with sugar. It tastes so much better then with HFCS that they usually sell here!

I've heard that soda tastes awesome with sugar, but it's hard to find. I think the key is to get it in the spring during Passover, when the companies switch to sugar to make the sodas kosher for Passover (grains and grain derivatives are forbidden during the holiday). It would be interesting to do a side-by-side taste test...

I would be willing to be that major companies like pepsi/coke do not make any changes to their product that involves any additional expenses as the result of a religious holiday. Keeping kosher would mean they'd need to have separate plants that did not use grain products.

Pepsi and Coke used cane sugar in their products until the late 1970's.

Pepsi does claim that a "limited release" product is now made with "natural sugar". Now the ad does not say it has cane sugar, it says "natural sugar". They know that people will assume they mean regular old white cane sugar like they used to use. I have not read an ingredient label, but unless it specifies cane sugar, it's most likely still some form of chemical reduction of a type of corn my farmer family in Illinois calls "feed corn" because people don't knowingly eat it. It would not taste like corn anyway. People do eat it constantly in a reductionist state - as things like HFCS or other chemical type names. They can call it "natural" because before it was separated from all its chemical parts and restructured into a new form, it was once part of a plant.

Signed,

an old curmudgeon

Original Post by jannid:

I would be willing to be that major companies like pepsi/coke do not make any changes to their product that involves any additional expenses as the result of a religious holiday. 

I don't know about Pepsi, but Coke actually is capable of offering sugar sweetened product in the US where there is a significant demand.  

In addition, if you purchase Coca Cola in Mexico, it is sweetened with sugar cane as well.  One of the main reasons why Coca Cola switched to HFCS production in the US us because of cost - HFCS is insanely cheap because of government subsidies, and the price of sugar is artificially inflated.  Sugar is more affordable in Mexico, so that's what they use.   

Yep. Local Costco sells Coca Cola made in Mexico that is made from sugar cane.

UD

You know what would be awesome? if they made low fat yogurt with fruit. No HFCS. No sugar. No splenda. No aspartame. No (whats the stuff in sweetnlow?)

just yogurt. and fruit - THAT would be convenient.

GRRR!!! I don't WANT it to taste so sweet!!! /rant

I have been using a brand of Greek yogurt called Oikos. It's 0% fat and incredibly tasty. They specify that they use Organic Sugar in the label and then not too much as even the vanilla flavor has only 11 grams. I like the plain and I mix it with berries.

Original Post by crazydiamondchrysalis:

just yogurt. and fruit - THAT would be convenient.

 

The only product I've been able to verify on line that comes close to this is Nancy's Fruit on Top yogurt, but the fruit is still sweetened with honey, and it's probably not available everywhere.

That being said....is purchasing a separate container of plain yogurt and then adding your own fruit all that inconvenient?

Original Post by jannid:

I would be willing to be that major companies like pepsi/coke do not make any changes to their product that involves any additional expenses as the result of a religious holiday. Keeping kosher would mean they'd need to have separate plants that did not use grain products.

I should have been more specific - Coke and a number of other sodas actually do release a sugar-sweetened version for Passover. The Coke has a special yellow bottle cap with the words "kosher for Passover" on it in Hebrew - check it out!

There must be some sort of economic incentive for the companies to release the special version, but I have no idea what it is.

Original Post by santonacci:

Original Post by crazydiamondchrysalis:

just yogurt. and fruit - THAT would be convenient.

 

The only product I've been able to verify on line that comes close to this is Nancy's Fruit on Top yogurt, but the fruit is still sweetened with honey, and it's probably not available everywhere.

That being said....is purchasing a separate container of plain yogurt and then adding your own fruit all that inconvenient?

 Yes. it is a waste of money because the fruit goes bad before it is all gone. I ususally go with raspberries. I will try frozen berries. but carrying salad and chicken and premixed dressing and yogurt to work is already taking enough fridge space, now i have to add a box of fruit. Or prep it at home. I'm too busy.

so yes. I work full time, I have **** to do, and it is hard to stay good when I'm prepping food instead of laundry or cleaning or taking kid to scouts or any of the bazillion other things I HAVE to get done.

That little convenience means a lot.

Or maybe I'm just a lazy whiner with PMS. Is it that hard to just NOT put the aspartame in? Really?

I'd like to try nancy's but its not where I usually get groceries so again, an additional trip in my already overpacked schedule.

maybe I should just give up already.

Original Post by theholla:

There must be some sort of economic incentive for the companies to release the special version, but I have no idea what it is.

The economic incentive is that people who keep kosher for passover will buy it.