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Fructose – the sugar that makes you fatA study recently cast fructose as the arch-villain in the expansion of your waistline. The research showed that fructose dramatically enhanced lipogenesis - the process in which your body converts sugar into fat People in the study who drank a fructose-based breakfast drink produced twice as much body fat as those who had a glucose-only breakfast drink. This was measured during the four hours after breakfast Fructose is mainly a fruit sugar. Sweet fruits and fruit juice are high in fructose. But by far the worst culprits are processed foods, because most of them contain fructose in the form of high-fructose corn syrup (HFCS) (2). Virtually everything that has been sweetened – biscuits, breads, cereals, crackers, juices, soups, salad dressings and other beverages all have it. HFCS is a cheap way for food manufacturers to sweeten their products and make them more addictive A small glass of fruit or vegetable juice that you squeeze yourself is a great part of a meal. But remember that orange, carrot and beet juice is high in fructose, and not helpful if you are trying to lose weight (1) Dietary sugars stimulate fatty acid synthesis in adults. Parks, E. J. et al., Journal of Nutrition
2008 Jun;138(6):1039-1046 |