As childcare providers, you need to be concerned about sugar intake, for the children in your care and for yourself. But how can you be sure you are moderating sugar intake? Should you look for the term “sugar” on food labels?
What about other ingredients, like high fructose corn syrup--could they contain sugars? What food substances are classified as sugars? These and other questions are best answered when you understand the role of glucose in the body and the role of sugars in food.
Bodies Need Sugar
The body needs sugar, but the key phrase in the dietary guidelines is “to moderate.” The body uses a simple sugar molecule (glucose) as the preferred energy source for every function in all body cells.
In fact, glucose is the only fuel the brain uses under normal, healthy circumstances. Other body parts can use fat, but they prefer glucose. Therefore, glucose is essential and regularly circulates throughout the body in the bloodstream.
When you think about sugar in food, you may picture white table sugar (sucrose) derived from cane or sugar beets. But the term “sugar” includes much more.
There are four simple sugars in the food supply: glucose, fructose, galactose, and mannose.
Foods containing carbohydrates are the primary source of glucose, although some proteins also can supply it. Fructose is the sugar found naturally in fruits. Galactose is found in the lactose of milk and milk products. Mannose is not found in many foods and is not of nutritional importance.
The more complex forms of carbohydrates are found primarily in plant products as starches. When eaten and digested, starches are broken down into small fragments of glucose.
These fragments are further broken down into glucose itself. Starches supply much more glucose for energy and since they take longer to digest, eating starches does not give an immediate boost as when eating foods with sucrose (i.e., “table sugar”).
Adding Sugars to Food
Sugars are found naturally in many foods; they also are added to many products. In addition to improving the taste and smell of foods, sugars contribute to food quality and safety, especially in baked goods and other processed foods.
For example, sugars serve as an energy source for yeast for leavening baked goods. Sugars also give texture to these products, and as foods brown, sugars add color. Finally, sugars preserve foods by binding water so microbes cannot grow.
Read the Label
Rarely do you see the word glucose on food labels. If it is in a food by itself, it is listed by the name dextrose. Labels generally mention carbohydrates, corn syrup, and terms such as sucrose or fructose. Foods can include both naturally-occurring as well as added sugars. Some people think it is better to use one kind of sugar instead of another, such as raw sugar or molasses instead of white sugar. The body treats glucose the same no matter where it comes from.
Some of the terms for added sugar ingredients in processed and prepared foods include white sugar, brown sugar, raw sugars, corn syrup, corn syrup solids, high fructose corn syrup, malt syrup, maple syrup, pancake syrup, fructose sweetener, liquid fructose, honey, molasses, anhydrous dextrose (another name for glucose), crystal dextrose, and sucrose.
When reading the label to determine a product’s sugar content, you must consider any and all of these terms. The more the label lists, the more sugar in that product.
High Fructose Corn Syrup (HFCS)
Fructose is sometimes considered healthier because of its natural origin in fruits. Many people believe that high fructose corn syrup (HFCS) is nutritionally acceptable.
Fructose and glucose both supply energy to body cells. High fructose corn syrup is a mixture of glucose and fructose produced from corn. Years ago, HFCS was 80 percent fructose and 20 percent glucose, hence the term ‘High.’ Today, the most common form of HFCS has 55 percent fructose and 45 percent glucose, almost identical to the equal mix of 50 percent fructose and 50 percent glucose found in white sugar (sucrose).
Some people have suggested that HFCS might be contributing to the obesity problem in the U.S. It is true that HFCS is found in carbonated and other sweetened drinks and that our consumption of these beverages has increased.
However, Mexico also has experienced a rise in obesity rates, and HFCS is banned from their food supply. The increase in weight may be due to over consumption of calories and lack of exercise and not just use of HFCS.
Moderating the Amount of Sugars
Sugars are not bad--they just need to be consumed in moderation. One way to moderate the amount of sugar you serve children (and yourself) is to examine food labels, specifically the ingredients section and the Nutrition Facts Panel.
The ingredients section identifies what sugars are in the food. It also lists the ingredients in the order of how much is in the food. This helps you compare brands of the same food as well as different kinds of foods.
For example, one brand of baked beans may have brown sugar listed as the second ingredient, while another has it listed as the fifth ingredient. Therefore, it is more likely that the second brand has less brown sugar than the first one. But look out for other ingredients that might mean “sugar” as explained earlier.
The Nutrient Facts panel will provide the actual amount of sugars in one serving of the food. It is very important when comparing these panels to make certain the serving sizes of both foods are the same, and if not, do some calculations, so that you can tell which product has less sugar.
Here are other ways to moderate the amount of sugars in your diet:
Prepared breakfast cereals often contain added sugars. Avoid high-sugar cereals by using the WIC standard of six grams or less per serving to ensure you are choosing the healthier cereal.
Choose fruits canned in their own syrup instead of in sweetened syrup.
Serve water or skim/low-fat milk instead of soda, sweetened drinks, and juice. Even 100 percent fruit juices contain a lot of sugar (fructose).
Remember, the recommendation is to moderate sugar intake, not eliminate sugars entirely from the diet. A little good sense, planning ahead, and shopping carefully will help you meet the guideline and make the children in your care happy and healthful eaters.
Madeleine Sigman-Grant,PhD, RDProfessor and Area Extension Specialist
Resources
Sugar Association, 1300 L St., NW, Ste. 1001, Washington, D.C. 20005; 202-785-1122; http://www.sugar.org/
Internet Resources
10 Ways to Cut Sugar, yourtotalhealth.ivillage.com/top-10-ways-cut-back-on-sugar.html
Lower Sugar Intake, www.rd.com/living-healthy/lower-your-sugar-intake/article15980.html
My Pyramid, http://www.mypyramid.gov/pyramid/discretionary_calories_sugars.%20html
Sugar and Children’s Diets, www.drgreene.com/21_42.html
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