A Spoonful (or 12) of Sugar

I asked Ellen Miller of Isobreathing to give us the scoop on how food and drinks we consider healthy can be deceiving.

Read your labels!

The new year is upon us and many of us make our yearly resolutions to become healthier and lose weight. I was asked to write this article as an eye opener for many. Yes we have been told to read our labels but how many of you are actually doing this. While there are many components to reading labels I am going to focus on sugar for this article. I hope that the references below will help you be more aware before you purchase foods especially if you are feeding young children.

When reading labels do you know what ingredients are actually sugar?

Look for: malt, sorghum, sucrose, fructose, maltose, glucose, dextrose, high fructose corn syrup, maple, brown sugar, powered sugar, brown rice syrup, cane juice.

or sugar alcohols: mannitol, sorbitol, xylitol

Look there's sugar in my yogurt: A great article on how much sugar is in yogurt. We typically think of yogurt as a healthy option. The photo above shows 8 teaspoons!

Remember every 4 grams is equal to 1 teaspoon.

More Sugar Shockers:

Apple cider 81 grams (20 teaspoons),

Instant coffee with sugar cappuccino flavored 64 grams (16 teaspoons),

Fruit punch powdered mix 95 grams ( 23 teaspoons)

Sweet tea 95 grams,

Grape juice frozen concentrate sweetened 36 grams

Salad dressing for coleslaw reduced fat 38.4 grams

Canned fruit 77 grams

Dried cranberries sweetened 62.6 grams,

Carmel popcorn 64 grams,

Banana chips 25.7 grams

Granola bars oats fruits and nut 40 grams

Upon checking WebMD I found:

SoBe Energy or Elixir: 16 ounces = 52-54 grams sugar, 200-220 calories

SoBe Green Tea: 16 ounces = 50 grams sugar, 200 calories

Snapple Iced Tea, Peach, Lemon, or Raspberry: 16 ounces = 46-50 grams sugar, 200 calories

Arizona Iced Tea: 16 ounces = 48 grams sugar, 180 calories

Snapple Antioxidant Water, Agave Melon: 20 ounce bottle = 32 grams sugar, 140 calories

Glaceau Vitamin Water: 20 ounce bottle = 32 grams sugar, 125 calories

Gatorade Bring It, Shine On, or Be Tough: 16 ounces = 28 grams sugar, 100 calories

Instant Cocoa: You’d probably expect hot cocoa mix to have cocoa, or maybe powdered milk, highest on its list of ingredients. But for Swiss Miss Mocha Cappuccino and Marshmallow flavors, the first and second ingredients are sugar and corn syrup, with cocoa listed as the fourth ingredient.

Swiss Miss Mocha Cappuccino or Marshmallow flavors: 1 envelope made with 6 ounces water = 19 grams sugar, 120 calories

What can you do?

Read your labels, keep an eye out for the sneaky sugars and choose products without added sugar.

Make your own, to enjoy yogurt without the added sugar, make your own flavored yogurt starting with Greek Yogurt (it has 4.5g sugar per half cup and it is not from added sugars, but the sugar found naturally in the milk) and add in fruit.

Drink more Water, Hydration is very important in overall health and wellness add in a slice of lemon or lime to give your water flavor and save yourself the calories of the drinks listed above.

I scream, you scream, we all scream for no sugar in our ice cream!

Last August I was on vacation with my family and my mom told me that she changed her eating habits and as a result had less headaches and more energy. I had been plagued by migraines, exhaustion and eczema for years. I also had to take beta blockers for mitral valve prolapse and medication for the migraines. I thought changing the way I ate would allow me to feel better as well.

As soon as we returned from our trip I cut gluten and refined sugar from my diet (I have never really been a caffeine drinker so that was cut out as well). Within the first month I began to have a little more energy and most of the itching from the eczema was gone.

In October, for my birthday, I decided to splurge on gluten free brownies and ice cream. The result was awful as I spent the next two weeks with eczema on my neck, arms and legs. BYE BYE Sugar! I learned my lesson.

For Thanksgiving we visited my parents. At one meal I was eating oven baked french fries as part of the meal. Halfway through the meal I commented on how tired I was getting. My mom suggested that perhaps the white potato was the culprit. So bye, bye white potato and white rice. (Thank goodness for Brown Rice and Sweet Potato!)

The results over the last few months has been crazy... I am no longer on any medication and am like the energizer bunny. I have cleaned out and re-organized my house, expanded my dog treat business, created websites for two Artists and I have a full-time job. I feel great, I rarely get headaches, my skin is non-itchy and in great condition and my hair and nails are long and strong.

You may be thinking, what do I eat... In addition to fruits, veggies, chicken, fish and dairy, I have found some fantastic substitutes to help satisfy any food craving I have come across. First I highly recommend fruit leather. I always loved Twizzlers and fruit leather makes a great substitute. I even ventured to make my own (recipe below). I also found Agave nectar to be a great sweetener (artificial sweeteners like NutraSweet, Splenda, etc. have always given me headaches and are not an option for me) and used it yesterday to make chocolate ice cream (more info below)!! As for wanting bread, there are some decent Gluten free breads on the market and stores like Trader Joe's and Whole Foods are really helpful for people with dietary restrictions. Right now I am obsessed with Brown Rice Tortillas and use them for so many things.

The important part of making a change like this is to read labels. You can't begin to imagine where sugar and wheat hide. Did you know soy sauce contains wheat, or that some tomato sauces have sugar? Luckily there are brands out there that make them without.

You may want to know if I have lost weight... when I first started eating this way I lost a few pounds, but my body has stabilized and seems to be at a happy weight for my body type. I am also constantly asked if it is hard to watch other people eat what I can't and to avoid the things I can't eat. I always tell them if this was just a diet for me it would be really easy to cheat, but after what happened during my birthday and the way my body reacted to eating the sugar I know these are things my body can't process and is essentially allergic too. It is really easy to not want food when you know it makes you sick.

Recipes!

Apple Sauce/ Fruit Leather
1 bag apples (use your personal favorite)
3 Cinnamon Sticks
1 tbsp ground cinnamon
dash of vanilla

Start by coring and peeling the apples. Then cut them in large chunks. Place them in a pot with more than enough water to cover the bottom of the pot. Cover the pot and simmer the apples with the cinnamon sticks until the apples are soft. Remove the apples from the heat and allow them to cool. Transfer the apples to a food processor or blender and blend until smooth with the ground cinnamon and vanilla. Once everything is blended you can you as apple sauce (which I think is super tasty in Greek Yogurt) or transfer to a dehydrator to turn it into fruit leather!

Chocolate Ice Cream sweetened with Agave - I have to give all of the credit for this one to David Lebovitz. Follow the link for the recipe I used and mentioned earlier. Personally I added a bit more agave than was mentioned in the recipe, but that is just me.