Is Stealth Sugar Ruining Your Diet?

Is Stealth Sugar Ruining Your Diet?

Eating too much sugar raises your blood sugar levels dramatically, causing your body to store away all that unnecessary sweet stuff in your fat, liver, and muscle cells.  It’s easy to steer clear of sugary foods when you can recognize them in the form of a doughnut, a candy bar, or an ice cream cone. But what about all that sugar that lies hidden in processed foods?

Many times I have been nutritionally side swiped while label reading after I have eaten a food product. Here a few sneaky sugar-filled items to be on the lookout for:

• Tomato soup
• Granola—cereal and bars
• Salad dressings
• BBQ sauces, marinades
• Frozen and takeout meals…Asian varieties are especially suspect (i.e. Thai, Chinese, Japanese)
• Honey flavored cereal, nuts, etc.
• Craisins, and other dried fruits
• Vitamin-type waters

Another form of stealth sugar to be wary of is found in fruit juices which we’ve been led to believe are actually good for us—because of all the vitamins and anti-oxidants they contain. Yes, I know that I am calling into question fruit sugar, or fructose. But the reason I am is that your body doesn’t know the difference. It responds to fructose just the same way it does when it gets flooded with table sugar. Here are a few eye-opening facts about some of the fruit juices you might regularly enjoy:

# of teaspoons of sugar per 8 oz. glass

Orange juice = 6 tsp

Apple juice= 5 ½ tsp

Grape juice= 8 tsp

So if you are counting calories, be on the lookout for caches of sugar that are trying to sneak their way into your diet. Life is much sweeter without them!