Carbohydrate Addiction is Epidemic........Part3 Conclusion
Novel Flavor-Enhancers May Also Contribute to Food Addiction
Another guiding principle for the processed food industry
is known as “sensory-specific satiety.” Moss describes this as “the
tendency for big, distinct flavors to overwhelm your brain, which
responds by depressing your desire to have more.” The greatest
successes, whether beverages or foods, owe their “craveability” to
complex formulas that pique your taste buds just enough, without
overwhelming them, thereby overriding your brain’s inclination to say
“enough.”
Novel biotech flavor companies like Senomyx also play an important role.
Senomyx specializes in helping companies find new flavors
that allow them to use less salt and sugar in their foods. But does that
really make the food healthier? This is a questionable assertion at
best, seeing how these “flavor enhancers” are created using secret,
patented processes. They also do not need to be listed on the food
label, which leaves you completely in the dark. As of now, they simply
fall under the generic category of artificial and/or natural flavors,
and they don’t even need to be tested for safety, as they’re used in
minute amounts.
How to Combat Food Addiction and Regain Your Health
To protect your health, I advise spending 90 percent of your food
budget on whole foods, and only 10 percent on processed foods. It’s
important to realize that refined carbohydrates like breakfast cereals,
bagels, waffles, pretzels, and most other processed foods quickly break
down to sugar, increase your insulin levels, and cause insulin
resistance, which is the number one underlying factor of nearly every
chronic disease and condition known to man, including weight gain.
By taking the advice offered in the featured study and cutting out
these high-glycemic foods you can retrain your body to burn fat instead
of sugar. However, it’s important to replace these foods with healthy
fats, not protein—a fact not addressed in this research. I believe most
people may need between 50-70 percent of their daily calories in the
form of healthful fats, which include:
1. Olives & Olive oil
2. Coconut and Coconut Oils
3. Natural whole fat butter
4. Organic raw nuts, especially macadamia nuts, which are low in omega-6 fat.
5. Organic pastured eggs and pastured meats
6. Avocados
A growing body of evidence also suggests that intermittent fasting
is particularly effective if you’re struggling with excess weight as it
provokes the natural secretion of human growth hormone (HGH), a
fat-burning hormone. It also increases resting energy expenditure while
decreasing insulin levels, which allows stored fat to be burned for
fuel. Together, these and other factors will turn you into an effective
fat-burning machine.
Best of all, once you transition to
fat burning mode your cravings for sugar and carbohydrates will
virtually disappear, as if by magic... While you’re making the
adjustment, you could supplement L-Glutamine (1,000MG) before each meal
and 3,000-6,000 MG at bed time. This will help reduce cravings.
Other tricks to help you overcome your sugar cravings include:
Exercise: Anyone who exercises intensely on a regular basis
will know that a significant amount of resistance exercise is one of
the best "cures" for food cravings. It always amazes me how my appetite,
especially for sweets, dramatically decreases after a good workout. I
believe the mechanism is related to the dramatic reduction in insulin
levels that occurs after exercise.
Organic black
coffee: Coffee is a potent opioid receptor antagonist, and contains
compounds such as cafestrol -- found plentifully in both caffeinated and
decaffeinated coffee -- which can bind to your opioid receptors, occupy
them and essentially block your addiction to other opioid-releasing
foods. This may profoundly reduce the addictive power of other
substances, such as sugar.
Carbohydrate Addiction is Epidemic........Part 1
And the Food Industry Promotes it right along with the FDA & the AMA!
A staggering two-thirds of Americans are now overweight, and one in four are either diabetic or pre-diabetic.
Obesity rates in children in several states are now above 30%!!!!!!
Carb-rich processed foods are a primary driver of these statistics,
and while many blame Americans’ overindulgence of processed junk foods
on lack of self-control, scientists are now starting to reveal the truly
addictive nature of such foods.
Most recently, researchers
at the Boston Children's Hospital concluded that highly processed
carbohydrates stimulate brain regions involved in reward and cravings,
promoting excess hunger.
As reported by Science Daily:
“These findings suggest that limiting these 'high-glycemic index' foods could help obese individuals avoid overeating.”
While I don’t agree with the concept of high glycemic foods, it is
important that they are at least thinking in the right direction. Also,
the timing is ironic, considering the fact that the American Medical
Association (AMA) recently declared obesity a disease, treatable with a
variety of conventional methods, from drugs to novel anti-obesity
vaccines...
The featured research is on the mark, and shows
just how foolhardy the AMA’s financially-driven decision really is.
Drugs and vaccines are clearly not going to do anything to address the
underlying problem of addictive junk food.
Brain Imaging Shows Food Addiction Is Real
The study, published in the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition
examined the effects of high-glycemic foods on brain activity, using
functional magnetic resonance imaging (MRI). One dozen overweight or
obese men between the ages of 18 and 35 each consumed one high-glycemic
and one low-glycemic meal. The MRI was done four hours after each test
meal. According to the researchers:
“Compared with an
isocaloric low-GI meal, a high-glycemic index meal decreased plasma
glucose, increased hunger, and selectively stimulated brain regions
associated with reward and craving in the late postprandial period,
which is a time with special significance to eating behavior at the next
meal.”
The study demonstrates what many people experience:
After eating a high-glycemic meal, i.e. rapidly digesting
carbohydrates, their blood sugar initially spiked, followed by a sharp
crash a few hours later. The MRI confirmed that this crash in blood
glucose intensely activated a brain region involved in addictive
behaviors, known as the nucleus accumbens.
Dr. Robert
Lustig, Professor of Pediatrics in the Division of Endocrinology at the
University of California, a pioneer in decoding sugar metabolism,
weighed in on the featured research in an article by NPR:
“As Dr. Robert Lustig... points out, this research can’t tell us if
there’s a cause and effect relationship between eating certain foods and
triggering brain responses, or if those responses lead to overeating
and obesity.
'[The study] doesn’t tell you if this is
the reason they got obese,' says Lustig, 'or if this is what happens
once you’re already obese.' Nonetheless... he thinks this study offers
another bit of evidence that 'this phenomenon is real.'”
Previously, Dr. Lustig has explained the addictive nature of sugar as follows:
"The brain's pleasure center, called the nucleus accumbens, is
essential for our survival as a species... Turn off pleasure, and you
turn off the will to live... But long-term stimulation of the pleasure
center drives the process of addiction... When you consume any substance
of abuse, including sugar, the nucleus accumbens receives a dopamine
signal, from which you experience pleasure. And so you consume more.
The problem is that with prolonged exposure, the signal
attenuates, gets weaker. So you have to consume more to get the same
effect -- tolerance. And if you pull back on the substance, you go into
withdrawal. Tolerance and withdrawal constitute addiction. And make no
mistake, sugar is addictive."
Nutrition 101
What are carbohydrates?
A couple of days ago I defined what a calorie was and that it did not display
nutritional value, calorie measurement marks the energy units in foods.
Once you break foods down they go into 3 categories Fat, Proteins and
Carbohydrates. Within each of these three groups there are a numbers of
subset groups in each. Today we will focus on one category and that is
Carbohydrates.
The simplest way
to understand carbohydrates is to break down what they do for us. Our
bodies break down carbohydrates in order to make glucose. Glucose is a
sugar that our body uses to give us energy. Carbohydrates generally
provide us with fiber, vitamins and minerals.
What Are the Different Kinds of Carbohydrates?
There are two kinds of carbohydrates: simple and complex. We get our
simple carbohydrates from foods such as milk, milk products, fruit or
table sugar. Complex carbohydrates, on the other hand, come from
starches like cereal, bread, beans, potatoes, and starchy vegetables.
As I stated before there are subset categories in each of the three
nutrient groups. Simple and complex is a basic subset yet we can further
break these groups down into the types of sugars these foods contain.
We can also measure them on a ratio scale like the Glycemic Index Ratio.
This scale measure the speed at which the carbohydrate is broken down
into fructose and glucose in the body. The higher the number the faster
the carb converts to sugar in the body. The lower the number the slower
the carb converts into usable energy. Too high of a number is typically
found in simple carbs and the lower numbered carbs are typically found
in the complex carbohydrates.
The trick to staying lean is to
keep your blood sugar normal all day long by eating complex carbs based
on your activity levels for the next 3 hours. By keeping blood sugar
levels in normal range your body can not store fat and makes it
difficult to burn muscle fiber.
That is why it is so important to understand what type of carbs you need throughout the day.
As I have already mentioned there are many subsets in carbohydrates so I
will briefly give you the description of these different catagories.
Carbohydrates may be classified into monosaccharides, disaccharides,
oligosaccharides, polysaccharides, and heterosaccharides. The most
fundamental type is the simple sugars called monosaccharides, such as
glucose, galactose, and fructose. These simple sugars can combine with
each other to form more complex type. The combination of two simple
sugars is called disaccharide whereas carbohydrates consisting of two to
ten simple sugars are called oligosaccharides, and those with a larger
number are called polysaccharides.
Carbohydrates are produced
in green plants by photosynthesis and serve as a major source of energy
in animal diets. They also serve as structural components, such as
cellulose in plants and chitin in some animals. Their derivatives play
an essential role in the working process of the immune system,
fertilization, pathogenesis, blood clotting and development.
Bottom line is understanding carbohydrates can be made very complex.
Each and everyone of us eat or have eaten carbohydrates on a daily
basis. However simple carbs have become the general populations worst
enemy. The introduction of fructose and in particular high fructose
corn syrup (HFCS) has become societies number one problem. You see our
bodies are not designed to eat high amounts of the sugars and the proof
is in the population. HFCS can be compared to crack rock cocaine in its
ability to cause addiction. It triggers L-Dopamine response in the
brain the exact same way as cocaine or a number of illegal and legal
prescription drugs do. HFCS triggers the pleasure center in the brain
and it shuts down the production of Leptin (a protein hormone that
controls hunger). The more HFCS you consume you more damage you do to
your body and its functions. The list of damage HFCS is far too long to
list here in this article, I will be discussing this in detail at our
seminar this Saturday May 18 at 7:00PM at the Studio at 118 Shenandoah
Dr.
Come and learn all about HFCS and how it is damaging your body.
Fact: Obesity is at an all time high, diabetes and cancer are also at
epidemic levels. 50% of all Americans are now overweight! Obesity rates
in some states are passing 30% of the population.
Fact: Look
back in history and you will see a distinct relationship between disease
and sugar consumption. The history goes back several hundred years.
However HFCS is the new kid on the block and disease and obesity have
exploded since it entered our food supplies.
In closing there
are good carbs and there are bad carbs, there are even good sugars but
that is another story. I will discuss that at our seminar as well. Learn
to read labels on the foods you eat. In fact avoid eating foods that
need labels if at all possible. Processed foods are the problem because
almost every processed food contains HFCS. Eat whole foods, fresh
veggies, grass fed beef, hormone free chicken and eggs. Avoid canned
foods and eat frozen veggies it its place.
Carbohydrate Addiction is Epidemic........
And the Food Industry Promotes it right along with the FDA & the AMA!
A staggering two-thirds of Americans are now overweight, and one in four are either diabetic or pre-diabetic.
Obesity rates in children in several states are now above 30%!!!!!!
Carb-rich processed foods are a primary driver of these statistics,
and while many blame Americans’ overindulgence of processed junk foods
on lack of self-control, scientists are now starting to reveal the truly
addictive nature of such foods.
Most recently, researchers
at the Boston Children's Hospital concluded that highly processed
carbohydrates stimulate brain regions involved in reward and cravings,
promoting excess hunger.
As reported by Science Daily:
“These findings suggest that limiting these 'high-glycemic index' foods could help obese individuals avoid overeating.”
While I don’t agree with the concept of high glycemic foods, it is
important that they are at least thinking in the right direction. Also,
the timing is ironic, considering the fact that the American Medical
Association (AMA) recently declared obesity a disease, treatable with a
variety of conventional methods, from drugs to novel anti-obesity
vaccines...
The featured research is on the mark, and shows
just how foolhardy the AMA’s financially-driven decision really is.
Drugs and vaccines are clearly not going to do anything to address the
underlying problem of addictive junk food.
Brain Imaging Shows Food Addiction Is Real
The study, published in the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition
examined the effects of high-glycemic foods on brain activity, using
functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI). One dozen overweight or
obese men between the ages of 18 and 35 each consumed one high-glycemic
and one low-glycemic meal. The fMRI was done four hours after each test
meal. According to the researchers:
“Compared with an
isocaloric low-GI meal, a high-glycemic index meal decreased plasma
glucose, increased hunger, and selectively stimulated brain regions
associated with reward and craving in the late postprandial period,
which is a time with special significance to eating behavior at the next
meal.”
The study demonstrates what many people experience:
After eating a high-glycemic meal, i.e. rapidly digesting
carbohydrates, their blood sugar initially spiked, followed by a sharp
crash a few hours later. The fMRI confirmed that this crash in blood
glucose intensely activated a brain region involved in addictive
behaviors, known as the nucleus accumbens.
Dr. Robert
Lustig, Professor of Pediatrics in the Division of Endocrinology at the
University of California, a pioneer in decoding sugar metabolism,
weighed in on the featured research in an article by NPR:
“As Dr. Robert Lustig... points out, this research can’t tell us if
there’s a cause and effect relationship between eating certain foods and
triggering brain responses, or if those responses lead to overeating
and obesity.
'[The study] doesn’t tell you if this is
the reason they got obese,' says Lustig, 'or if this is what happens
once you’re already obese.' Nonetheless... he thinks this study offers
another bit of evidence that 'this phenomenon is real.'”
Previously, Dr. Lustig has explained the addictive nature of sugar as follows:
"The brain's pleasure center, called the nucleus accumbens, is
essential for our survival as a species... Turn off pleasure, and you
turn off the will to live... But long-term stimulation of the pleasure
center drives the process of addiction... When you consume any substance
of abuse, including sugar, the nucleus accumbens receives a dopamine
signal, from which you experience pleasure. And so you consume more.
The problem is that with prolonged exposure, the signal
attenuates, gets weaker. So you have to consume more to get the same
effect -- tolerance. And if you pull back on the substance, you go into
withdrawal. Tolerance and withdrawal constitute addiction. And make no
mistake, sugar is addictive."
The Extraordinary Science of Addictive Junk Food
Previous research has demonstrated that refined sugar is
more addictive than cocaine, giving you pleasure by triggering an innate
process in your brain via dopamine and opioid signals. Your brain
essentially becomes addicted to stimulating the release of its own
opioids.
Researchers have speculated that the sweet
receptors located on your tongue, which evolved in ancestral times when
the diet was very low in sugar, have not adapted to the seemingly
unlimited access to a cheap and omnipresent sugar supply in the modern
diet.
Therefore, the abnormally high stimulation of
these receptors by our sugar-rich diets generates excessive reward
signals in your brain, which have the potential to override normal
self-control mechanisms, thus leading to addiction.
But it doesn’t end there. Food manufacturers have gotten savvy to the
addictive nature of certain foods and tastes, including saltiness and
sweetness, and have turned addictive taste into a science in and of
itself.
In a recent New York Times article, Michael
Moss, author of Salt Sugar Fat, dished the dirt on the processed food
industry, revealing that there’s a conscious effort on behalf of food
manufacturers to get you hooked on foods that are convenient and
inexpensive to make.
I recommend reading his
article in its entirety, as it offers a series of case studies that shed
light on the extraordinary science and marketing tactics that make junk
food so hard to resist.
Sugar, salt and fat are
the top three substances making processed foods so addictive. In a Time
Magazine interview discussing his book, Moss says:
“One of the things that really surprised me was how concerted and
targeted the effort is by food companies to hit the magical formulation.
Take sugar for example. The optimum amount of sugar in a product became
known as the 'bliss point.' Food inventors and scientists spend a huge
amount of time formulating the perfect amount of sugar that will send us
over the moon, and send products flying off the shelves. It is the
process they've engineered that struck me as really stunning.”
It’s important to realize that added sugar (typically in the
form of high fructose corn syrup) is not confined to junky snack foods.
For example, most of Prego’s spaghetti sauces have one common feature,
and that is sugar—it’s the second largest ingredient, right after
tomatoes. A half-cup of Prego Traditional contains the equivalent of
more than two teaspoons of sugar.
Novel Flavor-Enhancers May Also Contribute to Food Addiction
Another guiding principle for the processed food industry
is known as “sensory-specific satiety.” Moss describes this as “the
tendency for big, distinct flavors to overwhelm your brain, which
responds by depressing your desire to have more.” The greatest
successes, whether beverages or foods, owe their “craveability” to
complex formulas that pique your taste buds just enough, without
overwhelming them, thereby overriding your brain’s inclination to say
“enough.”
Novel biotech flavor companies like Senomyx also play an important role.
Senomyx specializes in helping companies find new flavors
that allow them to use less salt and sugar in their foods. But does that
really make the food healthier? This is a questionable assertion at
best, seeing how these “flavor enhancers” are created using secret,
patented processes. They also do not need to be listed on the food
label, which leaves you completely in the dark. As of now, they simply
fall under the generic category of artificial and/or natural flavors,
and they don’t even need to be tested for safety, as they’re used in
minute amounts.
How to Combat Food Addiction and Regain Your Health
To protect your health, I advise spending 90 percent of your food
budget on whole foods, and only 10 percent on processed foods. It’s
important to realize that refined carbohydrates like breakfast cereals,
bagels, waffles, pretzels, and most other processed foods quickly break
down to sugar, increase your insulin levels, and cause insulin
resistance, which is the number one underlying factor of nearly every
chronic disease and condition known to man, including weight gain.
By taking the advice offered in the featured study and cutting out
these high-glycemic foods you can retrain your body to burn fat instead
of sugar. However, it’s important to replace these foods with healthy
fats, not protein—a fact not addressed in this research. I believe most
people may need between 50-70 percent of their daily calories in the
form of healthful fats, which include:
1. Olives & Olive oil
2. Coconut and Coconut Oils
3. Natural whole fat butter
4. Organic raw nuts, especially macadamia nuts, which are low in protein and omega-6 fat.
5. Organic pastured eggs and pastured meats
6. Avocados
A growing body of evidence also suggests that intermittent fasting
is particularly effective if you’re struggling with excess weight as it
provokes the natural secretion of human growth hormone (HGH), a
fat-burning hormone. It also increases resting energy expenditure while
decreasing insulin levels, which allows stored fat to be burned for
fuel. Together, these and other factors will turn you into an effective
fat-burning machine.
Best of all, once you transition to
fat burning mode your cravings for sugar and carbohydrates will
virtually disappear, as if by magic... While you’re making the
adjustment, you could supplement L-Glutamine (1,000MG) before each meal
and 3,000-6,000 MG at bed time. This will help reduce cravings.
Other tricks to help you overcome your sugar cravings include:
Exercise: Anyone who exercises intensely on a regular basis
will know that a significant amount of resistance exercise is one of
the best "cures" for food cravings. It always amazes me how my appetite,
especially for sweets, dramatically decreases after a good workout. I
believe the mechanism is related to the dramatic reduction in insulin
levels that occurs after exercise.
Organic black
coffee: Coffee is a potent opioid receptor antagonist, and contains
compounds such as cafestrol -- found plentifully in both caffeinated and
decaffeinated coffee -- which can bind to your opioid receptors, occupy
them and essentially block your addiction to other opioid-releasing
foods. This may profoundly reduce the addictive power of other
substances, such as sugar.
