Thursday, March 01, 2007

high fructose corn syrup

so, i have decided that high fructose corn syrup (hfcs) is the root of all evil. it's in absolutely everything and it appears to be really bad for you. the rise of the use of hfcs and the epidemic of obesity and diabetes in this country have happened at the same time. coincidence? i think not. ever the conspiracy theorist, i'll also point out to you the link between giant agribusiness (adm, cargill) and u.s. government corn subsidies and sugar tariffs that make sugar prohibitively expensive to import.

i'm really sick of being the victim of giant corporations' greed, so i have decided to give hfcs up for lent and see if i can stick with it after. the problem is, hfcs is in freakin' everything and lots of stuff you wouldn't expect. cokes and sodas, candy and off-the-shelf baked goods: it's pretty easy to guess that those items are loaded with the stuff and are pretty easy to avoid. but hfcs lurks everywhere, like in ketchup (which i discovered after eating some fries the other day) and in the mix for the cappuccino for my office's flavia coffee machine (realized that one several days into the process; very upsetting to have to give that up).

i'll be posting lists of products that i find it in as i go along and maybe some articles about hfcs. if i end up dead, you'll know it's the corn mafia and will avenge me, right?

4 comments:

Liz Wetterhahn said...

Wow. The root of all evil? I think that's a little strong. As far as the obesity epidemic, there's no way that can be pinpointed to any one thing - especially HFCS. There's no study out there that proves that HFCS as any effects on you that are different than consuming normal table sugar. In my opinion - it's the overconsumption of ALL sugars that's the root of the problem - so I think that eating or drinking HFCS in moderation is okay for you. Good luck with your lent quest, though...

Deborah Eley De Bono said...

Lent?

barb said...

ditto LENT?!?!???

your sweet husband has been singing the evils of HFCS for many years. Did he not share that info with you?

maltese parakeet said...

yes, lent. it's a nice defined period in which to try giving something up. and, yes i know he's been talking about it for years, but it takes a long time for stuff to get through my thick skull. you know that.

and, welcome, marylandbluecrab, to my humble little blog. the next post is for you!