Don't add it to foods. This is the easiest and
most basic way to immediately reduce the amount of sugar you're
eating. Biggest targets: cereal, coffee and tea.
Don't be fooled by "healthy sugar" disguises.
Brown sugar, turbinado sugar, raw sugar ... it's all pretty much
the same thing as far as your body is concerned.
Make a real effort to reduce or eliminate processed
carbohydrates. Most processed carbs -- breads, bagels,
most pastas and snacks -- are loaded with flour and other
ingredients that convert to sugar in the body almost as fast as
pure glucose. That sugar gets stored as triglycerides, which is a
fancy way of saying fat.
Watch out for "fat-free" snacks. One of the
biggest myths is that if a food is fat-free it doesn't make you
fat. Fat-free doesn't mean calorie-free, and most fat-free snacks
are loaded with sugar.
Shop for color. The more your grocery basket
looks like a cornucopia of color, the better. It usually means
you're getting more fresh vegetables and low-glycemic fruits such
as berries and cherries.
Become a food detective. This tip is from the
wonderful author and nutritionist Anne Louise Gittleman, who adds
that "To reduce sugar, you have to know where it is first." Start
reading labels.
Beware of artificial sweeteners.
Unfortunately, they can increase cravings for sugar and
carbohydrates. According to Gittleman, they also deplete the body's
stores of chromium, a nutrient crucial for blood-sugar
metabolism.
Do the math. Look at the label where it says
"total sugars" and divide the number of grams by four. That's the
number of teaspoons of sugar you are ingesting. This exercise alone
should scare the pants off you.
Limit fruit. (Notice I didn't say
"eliminate.") Fruit has sugar, but it also has fiber and good
nutrients. Just don't overdo it. For weight-loss purposes, two
servings a day maximum.
Eliminate fruit juice. It's a pure sugar hit
with none of the fiber and less of the nutrients that are found in
the fruit itself.
/DF_scale_ricochet_89.jpg "Can Surgery Cure Obesity?")
