Pour Some Sugar On Me!

Today's Fast Facts focuses on Sugar.

American's Love Sugar! Whether we're aware of it or not, there's sugar of some sort in almost every mass-produced food item available. Have you checked out those food labels like we talked about? (check out the entry entitled, "How to Read a Label" if you haven't already). Sugar is everywhere, and in everything.


Here's a quick test. Pull out five random items from your pantry right now. Check the ingredients listed on the item. I'd bet beans to bacon that Sugar is listed as one of the top five ingredients in almost every product you pulled out.

Oh, they might not call it "sugar," so look again. There are over a dozen words that manufacturers will use instead of the word "sugar," so be careful when you're looking. ("Sugar substitutes" I call them). The most commonly used include high-fructose corn syrup, sucrose, dextrose, evaporated cane syrup, maltose, sorbitol, or corn sweetner.

And what about fresh produce? Most vegetables contain minimal amounts of sugar, but watch out for fruit. Whether you call it glucose, fructose, or sucrose, it's still sugar to the body. And many people chug down great amounts of fruit juices, thinking they are getting vitamins and minerals and powering up their bodies. And they're right, they are, but...just one 8 ounce glass of orange juice contains the sugar equivalent of 9 oranges! That's close to 25 to 30 grams of sugar, which is the same as a 20 ounce soda! Remember that your children under 12 only need about 6 to 8 ounces of fruit juice per day. That's one small juice box. One. Singular. Box.


And Gatorade is NOT A HEALTH DRINK! A 32 ouce sports drink is often times downed by one child all by themselves, even though it is meant to be enough for four people. The entire bottle can contain upwards of 14 teaspoons of sugar.

Most sports drinks like Gatorade or Powerade or Diabetes-ade or whatever you want to call them, are basically blends of sugar water that replenish electorlytes and nutrients that the human body looses when it sweats. They are great for athletes, or people who sweat a lot. But they are NOT great for children who do not indulge in less than 60 minutes of vigorous activity each day. No, the Wii video games do not count. I'm talking about sports and activities that get your kids outside and activitely breathing heavily and sweating profusely for extended periods of time on a continuing and frequent basis. Whew!

Here are some Sweet Fast Facts:

• In the 1800’s, the average American consumed only 2 pounds of sugar per year. That was roughly 4 ½ cups of sugar per year per American.


• Today, the average American consumes 156 pounds of sugar per year, or almost an entire cup of sugar each and every day. There are 48 teaspoons in one cup.


• A measuring cup of granulated sugar weighs a little over 7 ounces, or 200 grams.


• A pound of sugar is right around 2-1/4 cups.


• The World Health Organization and the USDA both recommend we consume no more than 13 teaspoons of sugar each day.


• Currently, every American averages a daily intake of more than 44 teaspoons.


• One 20 oz. soda contains 18 teaspoons of sugar.


• One orange contains just more than 2 teaspoons of sugar. You would have to consume 9 fresh oranges to consume the sugar in one 20 oz. soda.

I'd love to hear your questions and comments! Feel free to contact me via e-mail at ScottSaidSo@yahoo.com. Tell your friends about FactsOnFood.blogspot.com! See you soon!