Our taste for sugar may go way back to our days as hunter-gatherers, when sweet, ripe fruits were an essential source of calories. So it’s hardly surprising we find the sugar habit hard to kick!

But not all sugars are created equal. If we’re going to reduce the sugar in our diets, refined sugars are first on the hit list.

Simple v refined sugars: What’s the difference?

Sugar, in all its forms, is a simple carbohydrate that our bodies convert into glucose and uses for energy. But the effect it has on your body and overall health depends on the type of sugar you’re eating - natural or refined.

Natural sugar

Natural sugars are found in fruit as fructose and in dairy products as lactose. Eaten in moderation, foods with natural sugars have an important role in our diet.

Refined sugar

Refined sugar comes from sugar cane or sugar beets, which are processed to extract the sugar. It is typically found as sucrose. Food manufacturers add this chemically produced sugar to food and drink, often to an alarming degree.

Many of the processed foods we eat contain sugar with little nutritional value. We should try to cut refined sugar from our diets because it interrupts so many of the body’s important functions.

A hidden danger

We know the dangers of drinking alcohol and smoking, but ignore the dangers of sugar abuse. But sugar has caused a desperate increase in obesity and diabetes. And it doesn’t stop there - the list of dangers attributed to refined sugar is extensive. Here we take a look at some of the reasons you should cut refined sugar from your diet.

What are the different forms of sugar?

Raw Cane Sugar

Sugar crystals derived from sugarcane that are coated with a thin film of molasses.
Note: Organic molasses is the preferred option as many informed nutritionists recommend against molasses consumption as they often contain excessive residues of pesticides.

Granulated White Sugar

Raw cane Sugar (i.e. from sugarcane) that has been washed to remove its film of molasses or raw beet sugar; that have been dissolved into a water syrup and then crystallized.

Granulated white beet sugar

Indistinguishable from granulated white cane sugar as both varieties are almost 100% sucrose. Granulated white sugar is further classified according to the size of its crystals, but all grades are identical in terms of sucrose content.

The hard truth

It is abundantly clear that refined sugar is one of the most harmful foods that we consume, and we are well advised only to eat sugar the way nature has created it in fruits and other natural food sources.

We need to remember that this refined sugar is not in a form that nature intended us to receive it. So many pre-packed and processed foods contain sugar.

Children are most at risk from inadvertently consuming sugar, so please be under no illusion: sugar is highly addictive. McDonalds understand the value of this addiction, which is why the combined sugar content of a Big Mac and a large Coke is 32 teaspoons!

Why Foodstate Supplements?

98% of so-called “natural” supplements are made from the same synthetic chemicals which our bodies can’t easily recognise. We turn to these supplements to fill a nutritional void without realising we can’t properly absorb, recognise and use them.

We can only benefit from food nutrients, and that is exactly the form we provide with our Foodstate supplements. Click here to find out more.