#114 - HFCS breakdown.

a few weeks back, i decided that i was going to cut high fructose corn syrup (HFCS) out of my diet. i'd been vaguely hearing a consistent rumble of "HFCS is horribly bad for you" chatter recently. HFCS will eat you & your children & your children's children if you keep consuming it. i guess that chatter built up inside of me to a level where i was all "i should not be eating this." i mean, if starbucks is capitalizing on the trend, it must be true. it was a feeling i got about fast food after watching super size me, one that resulted in a ban on fast food that i eventually gave up on & the net effect of changing my overall dietary habits & eating fast food less...so i've been reading a lot of labels recently, selecting juices over sodas, fruits over yodels, hippie chips over doritos.

...but if i was going to bother changing my dietary habits, i wasn't going to do so without finding out a little bit more about HFCS & why it sucks so bad. those on the pro-HFCS side argue that it's made from corn, which the indians gave to us when the pilgrims first arrived here, so it's totally good for you. in reality, HFCS is produced by milling corn into starch & then processing that into syrup before adding enzymes that turn it into a fructose, which results in something pretty far removed from corn.

those against HFCS consumption link it to obesity, diabetes & a range of health problems. one study found that almost half the HFCS-containing products they tested also contained mercury, which is all toxic & whatnot...so it's sort of a problem when it's in friggin everything. humans & mercury in most quantities don't mix. as a sf chronicle article from 2004 about HFCS notes, "the theory goes like this: the body processes the fructose in high fructose corn syrup differently than it does old-fashioned cane or beet sugar, which in turn alters the way metabolic-regulating hormones function. it also forces the liver to kick more fat out into the bloodstream. the end result is that our bodies are essentially tricked into wanting to eat more and at the same time, we are storing more fat." i knew there was someone to blame!

anyway, it's fun to see the pro-HFCS and anti-HFCS folks battle it out. the corn refiner's association has launched a website called "a sweet surprise" to give the corn-inhaling public the true facts about HFCS. they even have a page that debunks all the"myths" about HFCS. there's this sweet HFCS propaganda ad. love that top! it's spawned a bunch of spoofs, including this hilarious one & this one, which features a conversation between two livers. there's even a crude two-part short film called "HFCS ninjas," which focuses around ninjas plotting to take over by implanting HFCS in the food supply. part two apparently contained something owned by warner music group & they hate youtube, so the audio track on that part's been disabled. oh to be a young with a camera & a love of ninjas & swearing.

#114 - HFCS breakdown.
snack: caramel chocolatey chunk rice krispie treat
drink: turkey hill pomegranate lemonade



so...after a few weeks HFCS free, i slipped & then eventually broke down. not thinking, one night, i poured a bunch of ken's french dressing with applewood smoked bacon onto my luscious salad & said dressing totally had HFCS in it. then, last week i was "hanging" around my apartment with my roommate, feeling a bit parched & peckish, so i took off for the preferred local bodega. i only had a few bucks in my pocket when i arrived, so in the interest of both economy & my desire for maximum sweetness, i decided to set the HFCS ban aside with a caramel chocolatey chunk rice krispie treat.

snap, crackle & pop manufacture their tasty rice krispie treats in a laboratory seven strata beneath the earth's surface out of HFCS & approximately fifteen other ingredients melded together from across the periodic table of elements. the result is the most unnaturally chocolatey caramel deliciousness possible. growing up, my mom used to make the slightly more natural peanut butter version for us (a brave move given her peanut allergy), so i grew up only occasionally trying the homemade marshmallow or caramel versions, but to this day, still have a warm spot in my heart for all things krispie treat.

my roommate had a bottle of turkey hill pomegranate lemonade that he was tearing through & he offered some up to wash down my rice krispie treat. i've had turkey hill's beverages in the past & one word comes to mind every single time i have them--"crack." seriously. i used to spend time at my ex's place out in jersey & we'd make trips to the pathmark supermarket that'd often end with me purchasing & consuming an entire half-gallon of their lime iced tea in a single evening. it's just that flavorful & crackalicious.

the pomegranate iced tea is no exception. since it's jacking up pomegranate & iced tea with a bunch of HFCS, it's as sweet as a monkey knife fight & very hard to resist downing all quicklike. as my roommate commented, "i'll definitely finish that entire bottle tonight." when i woke up the next morn, i found that he was a man of his word. since that night, i've had a couple glasses of coke, but managed to keep the HFCS consumption mostly at bay. one thing i've definitely noticed since i first started cutting out HFCS--the belly/waistline area has gone through some reduction. now if i could just find some way to be motivated enough to tone that area up, i could knock people around with my abs. anyway, starting tomorrow...back to the ban. F-U-C-K- H-F-C-S.