Unboxing sugar

Watch your sugar consumption!

Sugar is the main source of energy for the body, but too much sugar is unhealthy and aids in the development of many chronic diseases such as diabetes mellitus and arteriosclerosis. Even neurodegenerative diseases like Alzheimer’s and Parkinson’s are associated with high sugar consumption.

What does the term “sugar” comprise?

And how do you recognise foods that are high in sugar?

In everyday usage, sugar is understood to mean sucrose. It is available in the form of normal household sugar, powdered sugar, brown sugar or rock candy. if “sugar” is among the ingredients listed on food packaging, it means sucrose.

Sucrose is obtained from sugar cane or sugar beets. But it is also found in other sweet fruits. Sucrose is a compound sugar consisting of glucose and fructose. There are different types of sugar. All of them belong to the nutrient group known as carbohydrates.

Energy

The body gets its energy mainly from three nutrient groups: carbohydrates, proteins and fats. They are also known as macronutrients because they are found in large quantities in our diet.

The calorie content for each group is different: One gram of carbohydrates has four kilocalories (Kcal), one gram of protein likewise. The calorie content of fat is more than double that of carbohydrates or proteins: (nine Kcal per gram). But the calories only define the calorific value and do not explain the influence on hunger and fullness, the need for certain nutrients or the occurrence of inflammatory processes in the body.
 

The World Health Organisation also recommends not consuming more than five percent of the daily energy requirement in the form of sugar industrial sugar. That’s an average of 25 grams, about six to eight sugar cubes, five pieces of chocolate or 250 milliliters of lemonade.

In order to evaluate food with confidence, you need to be able to recognise sugar and the various names it’s called on food packaging.

How does one recognise sugar on food packaging?

The types of sugar:

Read the list of ingredients carefully. They are listed in descending order of their proportion in the food. That means if sugar is listed first, the food is high in sugar. Beware! There are many types of sugar and additives that are high in sugar.

The following terms refer to sugar: sucrose, dextrose, raffinose, glucose, fructose syrup or fructose-glucose syrup, glucose syrup, glucose-fructose syrup or starch syrup, caramel syrup, lactose, maltose or malt extract / barley malt extract, maltodextrin, dextrin or wheat dextrin, honey or syrups.

You should also take into account that starch (white flour products!) also basically consists only of glucose.

Sugar content in food

Look at the table displayed on food packaging. This is the nutritional label, aka the best place to find out about the sugar content. Here, sugar is defined in accordance with the Food Information Ordinance (LMIV).

This means that sugar doesn’t only mean sucrose, but includes all simple and compound sugars. It includes all the types of sugar mentioned above. In the table, they are included among the carbohydrates (“of which sugar”). This is very helpful, because if no sugar was added to the food, it won’t appear in the list of ingredients.

If the foodstuff contains only one ingredient, there won’t be an ingredient list. A juice with 100% fruit content would be an example. However, the table will show you how much sugar the juice contains.

How many teaspoons of sugar does your food contain?

Use this calculation for a clear indication of how much sugar you eat. Just divide the sugar content on the nutritional table by four, because a level teaspoon of sugar weighs about four grams.

Example:
Nutritional information for 100 g (or ml)
Carbohydrates, of which sugar: 40 g
Calculation:
40 : 4 = 10 teaspoons sugar

The information provided is usually for 100 g. You should then calculate the quantity that you actually consume

Homework: Set a sugar target for the next week!

Your sugar target for the next week!

Concentrate on added sugar to start with. The recommended maximum for added sugar is 25 g. In the list of ingredients the added sugar, as already mentioned, are identified by various names such as “sugar”, “glucose-fructose syrup”, “dextrose” and many others.

Write down the sugar content of all of the foods that you have eaten in a day. You’ll find the sugar content in the table under “Carbohydrates, of which sugar”.