Known from the course high school. But the world and science do not stand still, technological progress finds many new sources of energy, one of which is sugar. The beginning of the new millennium was also marked by the fact that molecules were discovered in gaseous clouds in open space, not anywhere, but practically in the central part of the Milky Way.
There is nowhere to go - sugar destroys and helps to remove one of the most useful and necessary elements from our body -. Problems with teeth, bone tissue and red blood cells are slowly approaching lovers of excessive amounts of sugar and sweets, as well as all carbonated drinks in which the percentage of sugar is 90 and above.
- preservative and antiseptic. Not only jams and jams, but also many types of pickles and other preserves in their recipes certainly contain sugar. Extends the life of cut flowers by adding a few grains to water.
- Medicine. Sucrose stimulates the mental development of infants, and the drug Obecalp, almost entirely composed of sugar, has become an indispensable assistant for many parents with children who like to complain about fictitious sores. If you bring a mirror to the name of the pills, much becomes clear.
- Fuel. Motorists use sugar beet fuel already in many countries, now it's up to jet fuel. Work is underway.
- Construction material. Sugar is indispensable for building carbohydrates. Energy, one of the main sources of which is sugar, is necessary for important and useful things, as well as for the joy of life.
Of course, it’s not worth crushing with spoons and handfuls, but you can’t completely deny yourself the little pleasure of indulging in a cup of aromatic coffee with a crystal of caramel sugar.
Sugar is a sweet product that a person learned to extract from sugar cane quite a long time ago. This perennial herb of the genus Saccharum was cultivated in India as early as 3000 BC. When in 327 BC. e. Alexander the Great's warriors set foot on Indian soil, their attention, among countless miracles, was attracted by an unknown white solid substance of sweet taste - the first raw sugar in the history of mankind.
This was told to mankind by the Greek historian Onesikrit, who accompanied Alexander the Great on campaigns and was amazed by the fact that "in India, the reed gives honey without bees." The Indians called the sweet crystals, which were extracted from sugarcane juice, "sakkara", from the ancient Indian "sarkar" (literally: "gravel, pebbles, sand, granulated sugar"). The root of the word subsequently entered many languages: in Greek saccharon, in Latin saccharum, in Persian šdkdr, in Arabic sukkar, in Italian zucchero, in France first zucre, then sucre, in England sugar, in Spain azъcar, in Germany's Zucker and finally Russia's "sugar".
It is about this sweet substance, which is sometimes called the "sweet life", then the "white death" that will be discussed today. As expected, first we will plunge a little into Her Majesty's history.
Man has always had an instinctive attraction to the taste of sugar, so the history of sugar is intertwined with the history of nature, which generously gave us thousands of plants and fruits containing sugar.
Sugarcane and honey, in the several millennia that preceded the industrial age, established themselves as the favored suppliers of sugar to mankind. Sugarcane, indeed, contained a highly concentrated, easily extractable sugar, sucrose, which was fairly simple to produce artisanally and not difficult to store.
Sugarcane has been used since the primitive times and has been cultivated since ancient times. According to the most recent theories, the botanical origin of "sacharum robustum" originates in New Guinea and adjacent islands. From here, sugar cane first of all moved to the east, settling in the Hebrides, New Caledonia, and the Fiji Islands. Later, sugarcane moved west and northwest, reaching the Philippines, Indonesia, Malaysia, India, Indochina and China.
Sugarcane, brought by the Arabs from India, began to be cultivated in the Middle East as early as the 3rd century BC, and, most likely, it was the Persians who were the first to make a kind of refined sugar by repeatedly digesting raw sugar. It is quite natural that the enterprising Spaniards and Portuguese, who got acquainted with this sweet plant from the same Arabs, eventually founded its plantations in the Canaries, Madeira and Cape Verde. There was no need to talk about the benefits - at the beginning of the 14th century in England they gave 44 pounds sterling for 1 pound of sugar, which, in terms of modern prices, is about $ 1 per teaspoon. That is why in the Middle Ages sugar remained a curiosity and was even considered a medicine. However, a number of historians dispute this opinion, believing that, although sugar was sold in pharmacies in the Middle Ages, in this case, pharmacists acted as ordinary shopkeepers who were instructed to "supply fellow citizens with sweet gingerbread and sugar."
Indian heritage tells us that sugar cane has been known and used since antiquity by the inhabitants of the Bay of Bengal. Near Rajmahal, there are the ruins of the city, which bore the name Gur (Sugar) and even Bengal itself was called differently Gur or Gaura (country of sugar). In ancient Indian poems, the virtues of sugar are described, to which mythology ascribes a divine origin. In China, they learned about "cane sugar" for many millennia BC. Jews mention several times in the Old Testament cane sugar brought from India and China.
It seems thanks to Neark, admiral of Alexander the Great, that Westerners learned about the existence of sugar cane 325 years before Christ. Nearc, who explored the Indian Ocean, spoke of reeds that yield honey.
Despite the fact that the historical origin of sugar is surrounded by mystery and darkness, it is known for certain that the word sugar has an Indian etymology.
The Sanskrit term "sarkara" gave birth to all Indo-European versions of the word sugar: sukkar in Arabic, saccharum in Latin, zucchero in Italian, seker in Turkish, zucker in German, sugar in English, sucre in French.
Sugar caravans.
Around the 3rd century BC, Indian and Persian traders began to carry sugar to the coast of the eastern Mediterranean, to Egypt and Arabia. Many ancient writers wrote about white matter and its possible uses in medicine and nutrition.
In the first century AD, the historian Pliny, in his work on natural history, speaks of sugar as follows: “Arabia produces sugar, but that from India is more famous. It is honey obtained from cane. It is white………., breaks with teeth, the largest pieces are the size of a hazelnut. It is only used in medicine." (Historia Naturalis, Book II, 17). Based on this text, it can be concluded that sugar was now a solid product, which facilitated its transportation by caravans through Central Asia to the Mediterranean ports, from where he went on to Greece and the Roman Empire.
However, the use of sugar remains rather limited until the time when the Arabs invaded Asia in the 7th century, bringing sugar cane from there and attempting to acclimatize it in the Mediterranean countries they occupy. Thus, sugar cane was able to take root first of all in Egypt, then in the Nile Valley and Palestine, on the Jordan coast. The Arabs taught the Persians the art of making hard sugar. Under their influence, sugar cane soon conquers Syria, all of North Africa, Cyprus, Rhodes, the Balearic Islands, then the south of Spain.
Meanwhile, Christian Europe practically ignores this exotic product, which gradually appears in the royal courts and some pharmacists, arriving with caravans from distant Asia.
Thanks to the crusaders since the 12th century, sugar is gaining more and more fame and distribution. They open in Syria and Palestine sugarcane plantations cultivated by the Arabs. Thanks to their efforts, the precious cane is based on the Greek archipelago, Sicily, in southern Italy and France.
The new "spice" is sold by pharmacists at very high prices and in various forms: powdered sugar, cone-shaped, shapeless sugar heads.
The East remains the main supplier of sugar to Western countries, whose needs are constantly growing.
The sugar trade begins to develop and Venice, which exercises a monopoly of trade with the eastern Mediterranean, becomes the sugar capital of Europe. In the 14th and 15th century, Venetian merchants pick up sugar from India in Alexandria. This sugar is processed and refined in Venice, where, in the middle of the 15th century, the sugar processing industry was born.
After the sugar took on a cone shape, it was shipped throughout Europe. Documentary sources claim that from 1319 Venice supplied England with 100,000 livres of sugar at a time.
At the beginning of the 15th century, sugar cane reached the Atlantic Islands. Don Henri, regent of Portugal, in 1420 captures Madeira and cultivates sugar cane brought from Sicily there with great success. The Spaniards are also starting to grow cane in the Canary Islands. The products of the Atlantic Islands begin to compete with the East. In 1497, Vasco de Gama opened the Cape of Good Hope, which opened the way from India to the Portuguese navigators, who would soon force the Venetian merchants out of the sugar trade. Now Lisbon is becoming the capital of sugar processing and supplies it to most of Europe.
Sugarcane discovers America
The discovery of the New World marked a turning point in the history of sugar. After his second trip, in 1493, Christopher Columbus planted sugarcane originating from the Canary Islands in Saint Domingo.
Around 1505, sugar was made for the first time on this island, the cradle of sugar production in the New World. In 1518, there were already 28 sugar factories in San Domingo, the right to import sugar into Spain allowed Charles Quint to build a palace in Madrid and Toledo. From San Domingo, the sugarcane culture extended from 1510 to 1520 as far as Puerto Rico, Cuba, and Jamaica.
Simultaneously, sugar cane was introduced into Mexico by Fernando Cortes in 1519 and into Peru by Francesco Pizarro in 1533. The Portuguese, who conquered Brazil in 1500, planted sugar cane there after 1520.
The impetus was given and all the new countries discovered and colonized during the 16th century and at the beginning of the 17th century are covered with sugar plantations.
Describing his journey through the Spanish colonies in 1620, Antonio Vasquez de Espinosa notes that he met plantations equipped with factories for the production of sugar in almost all the countries he visited, from Mexico to San Juan and Chile, as well as in Venezuela, Colombia, Ecuador, Peru and Paraguay.
It was not until the first half of the 17th century that the French in Martinique and Guadeloupe, in their turn, made an attempt to grow sugar cane and produce sugar.
The British, who colonized Barbados (1627), set up a sugar industry there (in 1676, Barbados could export 400 ships of sugar to England, 150 tons each). The history of the colonization of the Antilles is colored by the ongoing struggle for it by several countries: Spain, Holland, England and France.
Martinique and Guadeloupe continue their sugar expansion: in 1790, Martinique's production was 11,300 tons and Guadeloupe's production was 10,600 tons. The French introduced sugar cane to Louisiana in 1751.
The Caribbean is a sugar granary.
For 3 centuries, the Caribbean islands have been a real world “sugar granary”. Meanwhile, sugarcane continued its world tour around the globe. He finds a surprisingly favorable site in the French Isles indian ocean. Lille de France (Mauritius) and Bourbon Island (Reunion) are covered with sugar plantations. Continuing its journey, sugarcane conquers Indonesia, Formosa, the Philippines and the Hawaiian Islands.
AT early XIX century, the sugarcane has completed its round-the-world journey. It lasted 2000 years. Starting from the islands Pacific Ocean, sugarcane has conquered all continents.
Many countries started sugar production, some stopped it, because its growth has always been subject to the laws of competition.
This first part of his story shows us that sugar is an international product, it is a food, like spices, that travels non-stop, and that is most often consumed by people thousands of miles from where it is produced.
Since that time, the European nations, the main consumers of sugar, have been trying to achieve self-sufficiency by creating sugar production in their colonies. They have their own trading network, transport and processing. Sugar factories appear in all major European ports. After Venice and Lisbon, Antwerp becomes in the 16th century the first sugar center in Europe. In England, the number of sugar factories grew, in Germany there were already several factories at the end of the 16th century (Dresden, Ogsburg), there were already 25 of them in late XVIII century. Rouen, Nantes, La Rochelle, Marseille become the main centers for the production of sugar for France.
On the eve of the revolution, France acquired the first place in the trade and production of sugar in Europe; most of the sugar, which she received mainly from the Antilles, was sent further to the north of Europe, to Holland, Germany, and Scandinavia. France also becomes one of the largest European consumers of sugar (about 80,000 tons in 1789).
Continental blockade breeds beet sugar.
The French Revolution of 1789 and the international conflicts it created paralyzed the French sugar trade, which was completely dependent on maritime transport. In 1792, France is at war with Great Britain, whose powerful fleet interferes with regular communication with the American colonies. From the first unrest there was a restriction in the consumption of sugar, the price of which in 1795 increased 10 times compared to the beginning of the revolution.
The situation worsens when Napoleon establishes the Continental Block (Berlin, November 21, 1806), which closes all continental ports to English trade. French islands in the hands of the British. In 1808, sugar could not be found in Paris or any other major European city. And so the idea was born to produce sugar in France, based on a plant growing on the continent, arousing the interest of numerous researchers. Sugar beet becomes the most suitable plant for sugar production.
Since 1575, Olivier de Serres has described the presence of sugar in this plant in his work The Theater of Agricultural Culture. Much later, in 1745, the German chemist Marggraf presented his chemical experiments to the Berlin Academy of Sciences in order to extract real sugar from various plants growing on the continent. In his scientific work Marggraf urged his compatriots to start growing sugar beets and producing sugar. In 1786, Marggraf's pupil, Frederick Ashard, built the first experimental factory, the results of which were so satisfactory that factories were built in Silisia and Bohemia in the following years. The fame of Ashard's works is enormous. In France, two small sugar factories were built in the Paris region, in Shelley and Saint-Coin. However, the results they achieved were mediocre, as the sugar they produced was inferior in quality to cane sugar and at a high cost.
Cane sugar began to successfully conquer Europe from here, having reached Russia around the 12th century.
Russian word"sugar" goes back to the Sanskrit "sarkara" (sarcara), "sakkara" (sakkara). These names refer to condensed juice, unrefined sugar crystals that have become the subject of trade. The basis of this name of sugar entered many languages of the world.
However, only in the 16th century did it first appear on the royal table as an “overseas commodity” in connection with the development of maritime trade through Arkhangelsk ....
What is sugar?
The entire range of sugar can be divided into groups depending on its appearance. It is white crystalline, unrefined (brown), and liquid sugar. There are various types of sugar produced specifically for the needs Food Industry, and many of them are not intended for sale in stores directly to the public.
crystal sugar
Crystalline sugar is the most familiar type of sugar to consumers worldwide. It is granulated sugar, consisting of white crystals. Depending on the size of the crystal, granulated sugar provides unique properties granulated sugar. These properties are in demand by food companies in accordance with their specific needs. In addition to the size of the crystals, special additives add variety to the types of sugar.
Regular Sugar. Sugar commonly used in household use. This is exactly the white sugar that most cookbook recipes have in mind. The same sugar is most widely used by food companies.
Fruit Sugar. Smaller and better quality than regular sugar. Used in dry mixes such as gelatin desserts, pudding mixes and dry drinks. The high degree of crystal homogeneity prevents smaller crystals from separating or settling to the bottom of the package, which is an important quality of good dry mixes.
Pekarsky (Bakers Special). The size of the crystals is even smaller. As the name already suggests, this type of sugar was created specifically for industrial pastry baking.
Ultrafine (Superfine, Ultrafine, Bar Sugar, Caster Sugar). The smallest crystal size. Such sugar is ideal for pies and meringues with a very fine texture. Due to its easy solubility, ultrafine sugar is also used to sweeten fruits and frozen drinks.
Confectionery powder (Confectioners Sugar, Icing Sugar). The basis of confectionery powder is ordinary granulated sugar, ground into powder and sifted through a fine sieve. Approximately 3% corn starch is added to prevent sticking. The powder is produced in various degrees of grinding. It is used for glazing, in the confectionery industry and in the production of whipped cream.
Coarse Sugar. Sugar with a crystal size larger than regular sugar. A special processing method makes this sugar resistant to changes at high temperatures. This property is important in the production of sweets, confectionery and liqueurs.
Sugar dusting (Sanding Sugar). Sugar with the largest crystals. It is used mainly in the baking and confectionery industries for sprinkling products. The facets of the large crystals reflect the light, giving the products a sparkling look.
Unrefined (brown) sugar
Brown sugar consists of sugar crystals coated in treacle syrup with a natural flavor and color. It is produced either by special boiling down of sugar syrup, or by mixing white sugar with molasses.
There are many varieties of brown sugar, which differ mainly in the amount of molasses (molasses) they contain. Dark brown sugar has a more intense color and stronger molasses flavor than light brown sugar.
Light brown sugar is used in the same way as white sugar. Dark brown sugar has a rich flavor that makes it a specific addition to various foods.
Liquid Sugar
There are several types of liquid sugar that have been used in the food industry. Actually liquid sugar is a solution of white sugar and can be used wherever crystalline.
Sugar with the addition of molasses is an amber-colored liquid. It can be used to give products a specific flavor.
Finally, invert syrup. Inversion or chemical breakdown of sucrose gives a mixture of glucose and fructose. Such sugar is used only for industrial purposes.
And now about the benefits and harms of this product.
One of the highest levels in the ranking of the most popular products is sugar. As a rule, many people add sugar to tea, coffee, or complete their meal with some kind of dessert. At the same time, when it comes to the benefits and harms of sugar, everyone confidently asserts that this sweet pleasure has a detrimental effect on human health. The people came up with sugar by no means attractive names: “the main enemy of mankind”, “sweet death”, “white death”. At the same time, during the war years or in difficult times of famine, people always stocked up on this sweet product.
Mother nature arranged it so that the human body cannot cope without providing sugar. Numerous fruits, vegetables, nuts contain an abundance of organic natural sugar fructose, which is quite easily absorbed by the body. From early childhood, if a person does not receive carbohydrates in their natural form from healthy foods, he automatically reaches for sweets, chocolate, cakes and gradually gets used to these far from useful sugar substitutes. As a result, excessive sugar dependence of many people, which is also called "sugarholism", involuntarily turns out. People who have grown up eating grapes, dates, dried fruits, sweet vegetables, and honey will not crave sugary foods.
What is the benefit and harm of sugar, why does a person simultaneously love and fear this sweet product? Despite the fact that sugar is the main source of energy for our body, the number of people suffering from diabetes has increased significantly in recent years.
Entering the body, sugar under the influence of digestive juices is broken down into glucose and fructose, and enters the bloodstream. Insulin, produced by the pancreas, normalizes blood sugar levels, distributing it throughout the cells of the body. Excess sugar accumulates in the body, turning into not quite aesthetic folds of fat on the abdomen, thighs and other places. After the excess sugar has been removed into the “repositories”, the blood sugar level decreases and the person feels hungry again.
A persistent increase in blood sugar levels can cause the pancreas to stop producing enough insulin. With a lack of insulin, sugar fills the blood, causing diabetes. If the patient does not adhere to a diet and does not control the amount of sugar eaten, the consequences can be the most severe, up to diabetic coma and death.
Considering the question of the benefits and harms of sugar, it must be noted that, despite the fear of the threat of diabetes, this sweet product is sometimes called the “joy vitamin”. When brain cells are significantly deficient in glucose, moderate sugar consumption will effectively increase performance, actively reduce fatigue and bad mood, and reduce headache. At the same time, this sweet product is the main cause of calcium burning, a huge amount of which is spent on the absorption of refined sugar. As a result, acid rises in the oral cavity, pathogenic bacteria develop, which leads to dental caries. This is considered an important factor when discussing the benefits and harms of sugar.
Excessive consumption of sugar leads to an imbalance in the amino acids of the diet, because the refining of this sweet product removes almost all the mineral salts needed by the human body. This causes a metabolic disorder that contributes to obesity, serious diseases of the endocrine glands, blood, and brain. And the B vitamins removed during sugar refining significantly increase the risk of mental and nervous diseases, polyneuritis.
But still, sweets are everywhere heavily promoted and advertised. Manufacturers of sweets, chocolate, caramel, soft drinks are extremely interested in selling them. Therefore, sugar is quite closely connected with the financial interests of many countries of the world. If you are not able to fight your own weakness, then replace the usual sugar with bee honey or marmalade, which will bring tangible benefits to your body. And it’s better to lean on fruits and dried fruits, because fructose is much more useful, talking about the benefits and harms of sugar. Try to lead an active lifestyle, find other sources of pleasure, then you will be less drawn to sweets.
So how much is Sahara Do you need to eat to keep fit? Scientists around the world have been trying to answer this question for many, many years. And only in April 2003, the most authoritative World Health Organization issued its verdict. According to pundits representing the Organization, a healthy person with sugar No more than 10% of calories from the daily diet should come. If you translate grams into pieces of refined sugar, it will come out quite decently - 10-12 pieces.
But the fact is that the daily norm includes not only sugar, which we add to tea, coffee or porridge, but also the sugars contained in the rest of the food we eat. Meanwhile, a can of soda, for example, can contain about 40 grams of sugar! After drinking such a jar in the afternoon and drinking sweet coffee with milk in the morning, we already exceed the quota in terms of quantity Sahara. But what if we are offered a cake at work, but it is inconvenient to refuse? That's it.
Tireless Americans have calculated that the average US citizen gets about 190 grams of sugar per day from food. This is an excess of the permissible norm by 3 times. As for the average Russian, then, according to Soyuzrossahar, on average, only in its pure form (sand and refined sugar) eats 100 g per day. Can you imagine?
Firstly, it was found that sugar substitutes, although not as high in calories as simple sugar, but significantly increases appetite. Thus, the person still begins to gain weight. Secondly, they should not be consumed in large quantities at all, since this can result in indigestion.
And finally, many doctors believe that sugar substitutes are, in principle, harmful to the human body. So, in many countries, the sugar substitute cyclomate is banned for use (30 times sweeter than sugar), because scientists fear that it can cause kidney failure. Other sweeteners have also been repeatedly accused of being harmful - some doctors, for example, believe that saccharin has carcinogenic properties. However, no hypothesis has yet been proven.
Is it true that now sugar is less sweet than before?
With the advent of sugar produced from raw sugar on the Russian food market, there is an opinion among buyers that raw cane sugar is less sweet than beet sugar. This opinion is erroneous and completely unfounded.
Commercial granulated sugar produced at sugar factories from raw cane and sugar beets meets the requirements of one State standard. Both of them are a product with the same content (at least 99.75%) of the same chemical compound - sucrose.
One and the same chemical compound has well-defined physical and chemical properties, regardless of origin. Therefore, solutions of cane and beet sugar that are identical in concentration, i.e. solutions of equal concentrations of sucrose cannot have different properties, in particular, different sweetness. So the sweetness of tea does not depend on the type of raw material from which the sugar is made, but on the number of spoons of sugar that you put in it.
Although there is another opinion:
Sugar is the common name for sucrose, which refers to water-soluble carbohydrates - valuable nutrients that provide the body with the energy it needs. The sucrose for the product called "sugar" is extracted from the juice of sugar beet and sugar cane. Is beet sugar different from cane sugar? If we are talking about white sugar that we are used to, and not about brown sugar, then no. The final product as a result of technological operations loses any taste differences.
In addition to sucrose, natural sugars also include fructose (found in fruits and honey), maltose (found in germinated grains, also called malt sugar), glucose (often called grape sugar, but found in honey, fruits and vegetables) and lactose ( milk sugar).
As a rule, two main types of sugar go on sale: regular and refined. We are accustomed to call refined sugar in the form of cubes, but granulated sugar can also be refined. Refined is the designation of the product of the highest purification, superior in quality to ordinary sugar. In Russia, there are currently two normative documents, regulating the requirements for product quality: GOST 21-94 for granulated sugar and GOST 22-94 - for refined sugar.
Features a product called "granulated sugar" - an increased content of impurities: coloring, mineral and other substances. Impurities cause the color of the sand and a reduced degree of sweetness compared to refined sugar. A variety of granulated sugar - icing sugar, these are crushed crystals of granulated sugar with a size of not more than 0.2 mm.
Refined sugar, unlike sand, contains fewer impurities removed during refining. It is sweeter, although, to be honest, this difference is not dramatic. But the color of refined sugar differs from the color of granulated sugar - it is pure white, without impurities, a bluish tint is allowed.
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What diseases does sugar cause?
Why do we have so many obese people who suffer from serious illnesses, including diabetes?
According to statistics, 40℅ people on the globe have this disease, and the number of such patients is growing exponentially.
Russia is in 4th place in terms of the number of patients with diabetes and obesity. This is especially dangerous for children who have been accustomed to sweets since childhood and have completely lost all metabolic processes in the body.
A terrifying figure: 42 million preschoolers in Russia are already obese! And every Russian on average consumes 40 kg of sugar per year, that is, 1 kg per week (that's 15 teaspoons per day)!
In America, for example, sugar consumption has tripled and the American Heart Association has recommended strict consumption rates: for women - 6 teaspoons a day, for men - 9.
In the 20th century, Dr. William Martin generally called sugar "sweet poison", it is a dead product that leads to serious diseases and shortens human life.
And the British psychologist and nutritionist John Yutkin in 1970 published the book Pure, White, Deadly, in which he predicted an epidemic of obesity and coronary heart disease due to an increase in the amount of sugar in human food.
He emphasizes that sugar is processed in the liver in the same way as alcohol and causes 8 serious problems, such as high blood pressure, liver dysfunction, high cholesterol, heart disease, obesity, pancreatitis, diabetes and addiction as with alcohol and drug addiction. , which was called "sugarism".
How Sugar Addiction Becomes
And the scheme here is this: sugar is a fast carbohydrate, it is immediately absorbed into the bloodstream and the glucose level rises rapidly, BUT!
The trap is that after a certain period of time this level decreases and attacks of hunger attack the person again and again.
It's like a vicious circle: the body is addicted to sweets, it requires more and more portions of sugar. This is called "sugar swing".
Princeton University scientists have proven: our body considers sugary foods to be a drug, like cocaine, but sugar addiction grows 8 times faster than cocaine! And although official medicine does not recognize that sugar is a real drug, in reality it is.
Sugar ranks first in the ranking of popular products. Yes, it is necessary for our body as a source of energy - this is its main purpose. Its glycemic index is very high - 399 kcal per 100 g of product, which makes it unhealthy.
Composition of sugar:
- Proteins - 0 g;
- Fats - 0 g;
- Carbohydrates - 99.8 g;
- Water - 0.1 g.
Eight facts about the dangers of sugar
First:
Sugar tends to weaken the human skeletal system, easily washing out calcium from the body, which increases the risk of fractures (osteoporosis). The fact is that for the absorption of sugar, the human body spends a large amount of calcium from human bones. Tooth enamel also deteriorates and caries develops, and it is sugar that is to blame. Entering the oral cavity, it is produced high level acid, which adversely affects the condition of the teeth.
Second:
Sugar leads to obesity, as already mentioned, it causes a false feeling of hunger, a person overeats and gains extra pounds. This is due to the fact that the cells are fully occupied with the processing of carbohydrates, and fats no longer have time to process, they remain, accumulating in the body.
Third:
Sugar leads to malfunctions in the cardiovascular system: muscular dystrophy of the heart occurs, the walls of blood vessels become inflamed, blood clots form, which at any time can block blood vessels, which is directly related to strokes and heart attacks.
Fourth:
Sugar is considered a “stress food”: after the production of serotonin, the hormone of joy, the mood temporarily rises, the tone of the nervous system, breathing quickens (the key word is temporarily) and, as a paradox, the reverse process starts: this is followed by depression, chronic fatigue, dizziness appears, worsens vision and sleep, a state of internal tension and devastation appears.
Fifth:
Sugar reduces immunity by 17 times. When sugar accumulates in the body in large quantities, the immune system fails, metabolism is disturbed, internal organs work for wear and tear, a person often gets sick.
Sixth:
The skin of those with a sweet tooth ages catastrophically due to the fact that sugar is deposited in collagen fibers (this is the basis of skin tissue) in reserve and the skin quickly loses its elasticity and wrinkles ahead of time.
Seventh:
Recent studies have shown a scary thing: Cancer cells feed on sugar! And this was proved by the German scientist Otto Warburg, who was awarded Nobel Prize in the field of medicine in 1933. With the help of sugar, cells mutate and glucose is directly related to the development of cancerous tumors. Sugar and white bread are the fuel that spurs the growth of cancer cells. In addition: the more insulin in the blood, the weaker the effect of chemotherapy on the patient.
All this confirms once again how dangerous sugar is to health.
One of the articles publishes catastrophic data on sugar - these are 76 serious blows to human health. Our ancestors did not know sugar, and we began to consume sugar 40 times more than they do.
The well-known nutritionist Aleksey Kovalkov wrote: Until this millennium, people did not know what sugar was and he lived well, great thinkers, philosophers, commanders were born - all this was without sugar.
It was sugar that changed the course of history - sugar created America, where slaves were brought in droves to grow sugar cane. Remember Uncle Tom's Cabin.
Now the American sugar-hater R. Lastig proves that we all have an overdose of sugar: 80% of products in supermarkets contain sugar.
The food industry is thriving: it loves sugar, because it is the easiest and cheapest preservative - it increases the shelf life of products. In addition, it has a strong addictive effect (stronger than heroin), and in combination with fat (doughnuts, ice cream) it kills us.
Think about it and take care of your health.
Doctors recommend consuming no more than 20 grams of sugar per day for women and no more than 36 grams for men. A typical can of cola contains at least 39 grams, which is equivalent to 10 cubes. Excess sugar consumption not only causes type 2 diabetes, but also has many unwanted side effects on the human body.
Is the pleasure worth the consequences to which you subject yourself? These 10 little known facts help you decide.
123RF/Olga Kriger
1. It's addictive
Sugar triggers the release of the hormone dopamine in your brain's pleasure center, which is why many people develop a real addiction, which is one of the main causes of childhood obesity.
Researchers at the James Cook Institute have found that sugary water is even more attractive to mice than cocaine. In humans, addiction may be unconscious, but it often leads us to buy sugary foods or overindulge in desserts.
2. It is the main cause of belly fat
It is widely known that the liver converts sugar into fat when it cannot process it. But what you may not have known is that most of this fat is concentrated in the abdominal region, rather than distributed evenly throughout the body.
3. Sugar feeds cancer cells
Excessive sugar consumption causes an increase in insulin levels, which leads to a higher risk of cancer. Malignant cells use more sugar, but this is not the only harmful effect. Excessive consumption of sugar leads to inflammation, which in turn leads to cancer.
123RF/Katarzyna Bialasiewicz
4. Sugar affects the skin
Elevated blood glucose levels negatively affect the condition of the skin, reducing its elasticity and increasing the likelihood of wrinkles. The process of the reaction of sugar molecules with collagen is called glycation.
5. You may be eating too much sugar, even skipping dessert.
Sugar is present in the most unexpected products, and in fairly large quantities. Ketchup and bread are quite high in sugar, as are many sauces in both traditional and international cuisines. Some popular sauces can contain up to 66 grams of sugar.
6. Added sugar is worse than naturally sweet food.
Natural sugar is made up of lactose and fructose. Few people know that sugar added to food is characterized by a disproportionately high content of fructose.
You can't overload your liver with fruit, but candy and artificially sweetened foods will cause your liver to turn excess fructose into fat.
7. Sugar is just as toxic to the liver as alcohol.
More often than not, the fat produced by the liver from sugar ends up in your waist, but sometimes it remains and causes the same damage to liver tissues as alcohol. The worst thing about fatty liver of non-alcoholic origin is that not only overweight people are affected by it. Liver damage can also occur in those who abuse sugar while remaining in a normal form.
123RF/ANTONIO BALAGUER SOLER
8. Sugar makes you overeat.
Excessive consumption of fructose disrupts the hormonal balance. It can cause leptin resistance by affecting the production of the hormone responsible for satiety. When a person develops this condition, he consumes more food, but at the same time does not feel satisfaction from eating.
9. Excess Sugar Affects the Brain
Studies in rats and humans have shown that consumption is too a large number Sugar affects the brain, potentially damaging memory and causing overall brain aging.
10. Sweet tooth may be hereditary.
Some people are more prone to overconsumption of sugar and becoming addicted.
Genetics can influence levels of the hormone ghrelin, which is responsible for bouts of hunger. This means people with natural sugar cravings need to be even more careful.
It's no secret that the abuse of sweet foods carries a lot of dangers: from excess weight before the development of serious diseases of the heart, liver and endocrine system of the body. Nevertheless, even the most vigilant adherents of a healthy lifestyle continue to exceed the daily intake of glucose every day. The reason for this is sweeteners and sweeteners, which are found in most familiar foods. Vinegret - about which names on the labels should be a stop signal when buying and why.
1. Hidden threat.
According to statistics, sugar is added to 74% of all finished products that end up on store shelves. If, when accounting for the sugar eaten per day, you counted only those few spoons that were added to food and drinks during the day, then this is self-deception. The norm of sugar consumption per day is 30 grams (6 teaspoons). But when you factor in snacks at work, desserts at lunch, and sweet yogurt for breakfast, the real figure is truly daunting: on average, each person eats a total of 100 to 140 grams of sugar a day. Monitor your own diet throughout the day, carefully recording all the sugar in your food. Most likely, the result will unpleasantly surprise you.
2. How would it be in Russian?
To confuse vigilant buyers, manufacturers use at least 61 synonyms for the word "sugar" on product labels. Some of the most popular sweeteners include glucose, dextrose, maltose, molasses, sorbitol, fructose, barley malt, and a variety of syrups from corn to cane.
3. Deceptive maneuver.
One of the main sweeteners that inspires confidence in almost everyone is fructose. Despite the harmless name, which evokes associations with healthy fruits, fructose has almost the same effect on the liver as alcohol does: it destroys it and causes pathologies.
4. Big races.
Claim that sugar helps to cope with bad mood, incorrect. The quick effect of a chocolate bar or cookie, whether it is an energy boost or an attack of euphoria, is associated with an increase in insulin levels in the blood, which is invariably followed by a sharp decline: after all, as a result, sugar drops below the norm, which leads to dizziness, apathy, fatigue, nausea, severe irritability and entails other symptoms of hypoglycemia.
5. Mathematical analysis.
Just one can of soda per day increases the likelihood of dying from cardiovascular disease by about a third. The reason is obvious: the very high sugar content. For example, half a liter of cola contains the equivalent of about 16 teaspoons of sugar.
One of these points may be the cause of poor health or problems with getting rid of extra pounds. Nobody talks about complete exclusion sugar and its derivatives from the daily diet. And yet, it is worth starting to closely monitor the amount of sweets eaten and competently limit the number of desserts and sugar-containing foods - then the result in the form of improved health, skin, hair, and therefore mood will not be long in coming.