From delicate and tempting cake desserts to sweet and delicious ice cream, from cola known as "fat house happy water" to modern people's "milk tea for life", "sugar" in modern life makes delicious desserts. All kinds of "added sugar" are successfully invading people's lives through the dazzling array of food on store shelves.

The melting of sugar in drinks and food often leads to the illusion that "I didn't consume too much sugar". Even if we don't like sweet food, almost all snacks we usually eat, such as pork jerky, beef jerky and potato chips, contain added sugar. Although we can't eat sweet food, it is because the sweet taste is covered by more important salt and other additives.

Sugar in diet is the most important risk factor for dental caries. Excessive intake of added sugar will affect the oral flora and cause dental caries, dental plaque and other oral diseases. Excessive intake of added sugar will cause unbalanced diet and increase the risk of chronic diseases such as overweight, obesity, cardiovascular and cerebrovascular diseases and diabetes.

Under the influence of health awareness, "sugar free" seems to be a way of life, and the number of consumers who choose sugar free drinks is gradually increasing. The wave of "sugar free" has promoted food and beverage enterprises to strengthen the research and development of "sugar free" food and beverage, and launched various "sugar free, zero calorie" drinks, which makes some people feel that they can finally enjoy themselves, but does "sugar free" drinks really contain no sugar? Is it true that drinking this kind of drink can satisfy the appetite and keep healthy?

   What is sugar added?

Added sugar refers to the sugar artificially added to food, which has sweet characteristics, including monosaccharide and disaccharide. Sucrose, fructose and glucose are common. The white granulated sugar, soft white sugar, rock sugar and brown sugar in daily life are sucrose.

The key words representing added sugar in the food ingredients list mainly include: white granulated sugar, brown sugar, sucrose, corn syrup, edible glucose, fructose, fructose syrup, maltose syrup, etc.

All kinds of people should reduce the intake of "added sugar", excluding sugar in natural fruits and natural carbohydrates in staple foods. In daily life, we should scientifically control sugar intake, manage how much sugar we should eat, be careful of "hidden sugar", reduce "added sugar", and avoid the harm of "high sugar".

  What is the intake standard of added sugar?

The Dietary Guidelines for Chinese Residents (2022) advocates controlling the intake of added sugar. It is suggested that the intake of added sugar by healthy adults should not exceed 50g per day, and it is better to control it below 25g.

The sugar content of most sugary drinks is about 8% - 11%. Although the sugar content is within a certain range, due to the good taste of added sugar, the drinkers will unconsciously exceed the maximum daily intake of 50g of added sugar, leading to overweight, obesity, dental caries, etc.

For children and adolescents, sugary drinks are the main source of added sugar. It is recommended not to drink or drink less. When drinking sugary drinks, pay attention to the sugar content in the nutrition composition table, evaluate and calculate the sugar content of a bottle of sugary drinks, and control the daily intake of added sugar to be no more than 50g, preferably less than 25g.

   Is sugar free beverage really sugar free?

According to the requirements of General Principles for Nutrition Labelling of Prepackaged Food (GB28050-2011), the standard of sugar free food is that the sugar content per 100g or 100ml of solid or liquid food is not more than 0.5g. It can be claimed that the product has no or no sugar. So not all so-called sugar free drinks are completely sugar free. As long as the sugar content is lower than the national standard, businesses can call themselves "sugar free drinks" on the package.

The popular sugar free "zero calorie bubble water" and other products on the market claim to be "sugar free", "zero calorie" and "zero calorie", but the taste is sweet, just without added sugar such as glucose and sucrose, but added sweeteners as "sugar substitutes".

Sweeteners refer to food additives with the purpose of giving sweet taste to food. According to its source, it can be divided into natural sweeteners and synthetic sweeteners.

Natural sweeteners mainly include sugar alcohol sweeteners and non sugar natural sweeteners.

Sugar alcohol sweetener is one of the natural sweeteners widely used in the world, which is made by the corresponding hydrogenation of sugar. It mainly includes erythritol, mannitol, sorbitol, xylitol, maltitol, etc.

Non sugar natural sweeteners are substances extracted from fruits, leaves, roots and other tissues of some plants, and are also currently being actively developed in food science research. It mainly includes: stevioside (stevia rebaudiana extract), momordica grosvenorii glycoside (momordica grosvenorii extract), liquorice sweeteners (liquorice extract), somartan (African arrowroot fruit extract), etc.

Synthetic sweeteners refer to artificial sweeteners with different characteristics obtained by chemical synthesis, modification and other technologies. Synthetic sweeteners mainly include aspartame, sucralose, saccharin sodium, sodium cyclamate, acesulfame, etc.

At present, common sweeteners on the market are shown in the figure below. For example, sugar substitutes such as steviol glycoside and sucralose produce sweetness hundreds of times higher than ordinary sucrose. Therefore, only a small amount of sugar substitutes need to be added to make the beverage reach the ideal sweetness and greatly reduce the calories brought by sugar.

0 sucrose ≠ sugar free

Now many businesses like to claim that the drink "zero sugar" or "zero white granulated sugar" is actually changing the concept, because 0 sugar ≠ no sugar. If we look carefully at the ingredient list, we will find that some products marked "0 sucrose" in the drink promotion are marked "maltose syrup or fructose syrup" in the ingredient list. Although they are not sucrose, they are also added with sugar. If we see "zero sugar" or "zero white granulated sugar" in the future, we should carefully check the ingredient list and nutritional ingredient list to see if there is any other added sugar. Don't fall into the trap of "word game" of merchants.

Sugar free=healthy?

Compared with the sugared beverage containing 10g added sugar per 100mL, the sugar substitute in the sugarless beverage has low calories. Some sugar alcohol sweeteners are beneficial to oral health and can prevent dental plaque and caries.

Although the calories of sugar substitutes are low, the long-term health effects of regular consumption of sugar substitutes are still controversial. Some studies have shown that regular consumption of sugar substitute food can easily disturb the balance of intestinal flora; To some extent, sugar substitutes can stimulate appetite, increase diet and lead to indirect obesity; Most sugar free drinks also contain additives and food flavors. For example, sugar free carbonated drinks contain a large amount of phosphoric acid, which will increase the risk of osteoporosis.

Therefore, sugar free drinks should be moderate. It is better to eat less sweet food and drink less sweet drinks, and use boiled water instead of drinks. Drink water, absolutely 0 sugar, 0 calorie, and healthy!