A Question Asked and Now Answered

HFCS additives to our food are helping make us fat. What is HFCS you ask? It is something you can find in almost every processed food product in the United States and many food products in Canada as well.

High Fructose Corn Syrup(HFCS) is a sweetener used in place of many other forms of sugar due to its high sweetness and low relative cost. Oh, and if you are eating low fat anything I can almost guarantee that your intake of this substance has gone up as you eat less fat.

The question which I refer to in the title is, "Why are we becoming so fat?"

The answer is never just the obvious and oft repeated, “Cause you are lazy!” Give me a break. An entire generation of your children are getting fat and that is the best you can come up with? You don’t think something might be going on? It may not be as obvious as boys getting big ol’ breasts but come on people!

I'm okay with carrying an extra 20-30 pounds above my BMI (currently at 36.3) as the weight at which I'm supposed to be sounds just a trifle unhealthy. I also do not do sports or a lot of heavy aerobic exercise although I take the stairs everywhere, walk the dog three times a day and make an effort to exercise without wasting an hour on the treadmill.

Along comes a new study in rats,found here, which shows that if you eat HFCS, even if you eat less of it calorie-wise than regular sugar, you will put the weight on by eating more in other ways!

The answer is that we are making ourselves fat not through inaction, our bodies should be able to self regulate, but by eating the cheapest crap we can put into our bodies. That is really the only reason to use HFCS, cheapness.

Oh, and modified milk ingredients, CBC MarketWatch did an expose "Product of Canada, eh?" on October 24, 2007 and one little tidbit I picked up about modified milk ingredients:

Others[ice creams] use only cheaper imported butteroil-sugar blend (modified milk ingredients mixed with sugar)...

What is butteroil-sugar blend? It was invented to get around tariffs on imported milk ingredients. Because it is 51 percent sugar, it is legally classified as a confectionery product, not a dairy one. There is no limit to the amount of butteroil-sugar blend that can be imported into Canada.

MarketWatch Story.

The news story from the Business Insider is embedded below for your reading pleasure.