With Halloween behind us, I am sure if you have kids or live in a neighborhood with kids you have candy left over in your house. And you might be wondering how to handle how you control the candy consumption afterwards. You may be tempted to just throw it all out or be super restrictive, but a study done earlier last year by the Journal of the Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics may have you thinking other thoughts.
Deprivation can lead to the opposite action of what we are trying to accomplish, whether it be a healthier lifestyle, weight loss, or just to feel better. The Journal of the Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics’ article entitled “Sugar Restriction Leads to Increased Ad Libitum Sugar Intake by Overweight Adolescents in an Experimental Test Meal Setting” addresses just this concept. The results of the study discussed in the article had very interesting conclusions that are important to keep in mind, especially during the delicate adolescent years. The study used 87 overweight participants that were of Latino and African-American descent. The participants engaged in two 8-hour laboratory visits in which one group was given high sugar/low fiber meals and the other group was given low sugar/high fiber meals. The results were that the low sugar/high fiber participants ate more sugar when they were later given access to high-sugar foods. [1]
So, what is the take away message from this study? Perhaps it is that to be successful in overcoming a sugar addiction one must make gradual changes in the diet rather than quitting sugar “cold-turkey”. A gradual reduction of high sugar foods will give the taste buds time to adjust to a lower-sugar diet and increase the likelihood of maintaining those dietary changes.
Knowledge is power especially when it comes to knowing how to read a food label. For instance, sugar is found in many foods that are not as obvious as things like cakes, candies, chocolate, and cookies. It is in things like breads, cereals, crackers, condiments, granola, juices, peanut and nut butters, salad dressings, smoothie drinks, yogurt, etc. If ingredients such as agave nectar, cane sugar, corn syrup, fruit juice concentrate, honey, malt syrup, molasses, sucrose, and turbinado sugar (to name a few) are listed among the first ingredients in a product, it likely has too much added sugar. The American Heart Association (AHA) recommends limiting the calories from added sugar to 100 calories or less daily. A single teaspoon of sugar contains 4 grams of sugar and 16 calories. To follow the AHA’s recommendation, one must limit added sugar to 6 teaspoons daily.
Below are a few examples of easy food swaps you can make in your diet to lower your daily total sugar consumption and boost the nutrients you are getting in each day.
- Swap a sugar-sweetened cereal like Frosted Shredded Wheat, which has 12 grams sugar (3 teaspoons of sugar) per 1 cup serving for plain Shredded Wheat, which has 0 grams of sugar per 1 cup serving. Adding a ½ cup of berries and ½ cup milk will add 13 grams of sugar but also adds fiber, calcium, and vitamin C.
- Swap a sugar-sweetened yogurt like Yoplait Original French Vanilla Yogurt, which has 26 grams sugar (6 teaspoons of sugar) per 6 oz serving with a 5.25 oz container of Dannon Oikos Plain Greek Yogurt, which contains only 6 grams of sugar (1.5 teaspoons of sugar). Adding a dash of cinnamon and a handful of walnuts will add a source of fiber and healthy omega 3 fatty acids without any added sugar.
Limiting sugar doesn’t mean giving up all things that contain sugar. Some foods have natural sugars that are full of beneficial nutrients that can help keep you healthy. For example, fresh fruit, yogurt, and grains all contain natural sugar but are not necessarily bad for you just because they contain sugar. It’s the added sugar in those foods that are bad. However, if the sugar containing food has no nutritional value besides the calories it provides, then look for a source that has less added sugar and is more nutritionally dense.
[1] Gillian O’Reilly et al., “Sugar Restriction Leads to Increased Ad Libitum Sugar Intake by Overweight Adolescents in an Experimental Test Meal Setting,” Journal of the Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics 117, no. 7 (27 March 2017): 1041-48.
Photo by Tucker Good on Unsplash
