I like to have a sweet treat from time to time, especially if it is a homemade cookie or a lavish dessert made from scratch in one of my favorite New York City restaurants. But even if you don't splurge every day on dessert, you might be getting a lot more sugar than you should.

But how much is too much? And is sugar really bad for you as they say?

Historically, sugar consumption is on the rise -- here are some sugar shock stats (PDF). In 1970, each American was eating on average 123 pounds of sugar a year and today that number is up to 152 pounds -- which means three pounds in just one week, a little under one cup a day. Nutritionists say to limit sugar to around 13 teaspoons a day so we are getting almost four times the recommended daily amount from a variety of sources.

A lot of people are wondering if there is a healthy form of sugar: Since most of the sugars trigger the same rise in blood sugar, there is no real difference between them except for how quickly that sugar spike hits the system. This is where eating more complex carbohydrates and beneficial fruits is a great way to slow that blood glucose change and deal with the daily crave for sweets.

As in my last post, I still think it's OK to enjoy other forms of sugar in moderation; we all like our treats from time to time, especially on holidays and special occasions. But if you're looking for low-sugar treats, try my recipes for avocado chocolate milkshake, brown sugar ice cream or rugelach.

After the jump -- chewing the fat on "diet" food.

Gourmet's Barry Estabrook finds that the latest nutritional studies are at odds with what some manufacturers' campaigns might have us believe. The following is an excerpt of his findings published on Gourmet.com.

Nothing spoils a good marketing campaign as surely as solid, scientific facts. So I imagine the folks over at the Corn Refiners' Association-who have recently spent a fortune on PR and advertising to convince "moms and healthcare professionals" that high fructose corn syrup (HFCS) was no better or worse for us nutritionally than sweeteners such as table sugar and honey-were shocked when they opened the latest issue of the Journal of Nutrition.

It contains a paper by a group of researchers at the University of Texas who report that fructose, the primary sugar in HFCS (which finds its way into just about every non-diet soft drink sold), made subjects of a study fatter than glucose, another sugar.

"Our study shows for the first time the surprising speed with which humans make body fat from fructose," said Elizabeth Parks of the Southwestern Medical Center.

It also may explain why the current obesity epidemic in this country dates back to 1980, the year HFCS entered our diet. Starting from zero, Americans now gulp an average of 66 pounds of the stuff each year.

And it shows.

The story continues at Gourmet.com: Politics of the Plate: How Sweet It Isn't

About three years ago, my wife and I decided to stop eating high fructose corn syrup. At the time, it seemed like a minor step; however, looking back, I realize that, in that one moment, I transformed from a regular consumer into an insane health freak. While cutting out any type of food is a major step, HFCS was particularly difficult. Unlike meat, cheese, peanuts, or any of the other easily-detectable foods that people cut out of their diets, HFCS lurks in literally thousands of foods. Within a few days of quitting, I found myself obsessively reading labels and cutting out dozens of other foods that I had always taken for granted. I suddenly became one of those people, the ones who read the ingredients on blister packs of preserves at the diner, then sigh and eat their toast with just butter.

I don't mean to make it look like cutting out HFCS has been nothing but misery. In the months following our decision, my wife and I lost a lot of weight, discovered tons of new foods, and ended up enjoying the opportunity to reconsider our diet. While I'm sure that cutting out HFCS isn't responsible for all the health benefits that we experienced at that time, it seems more than coincidental that my nasty headaches went away, we' started getting sick a lot less, and we stopped experiencing major energy crashes. Nowadays, I occasionally notice a stale taste in foods when I eat out, generally followed by extreme sleepiness about an hour later. While I haven't done a double-blind taste test, trial and error has convinced me that HFCS is the culprit.

Recently, the Corn Refiners Association announced that they are launching a $30 million advertising campaign that is aimed at convincing consumers that HFCS is a natural compound, fundamentally the same as honey. Of course, unlike honey, HFCS is the product of a complex, chemical-intensive refining process that takes place in an industrial setting, but why quibble? Strangely, the FDA has agreed with them. Unfortunately, rather than convince me that HFCS is all-natural, the FDA's stance has made me seriously question the integrity of the federal government when it comes to food purity.

Starting on January 1st, Jones Soda will be pushing its canned sodas to consumers instead of the bottled sodas that it is known for. They will continue to package the soda in bottles, but the switch to cans is intended to make the product more accessible as the company expands. Coinciding with that launch, Jones Soda has announced that they will be sweetening their sodas with pure cane sugar, rather than the high fructose corn syrup that they use now (the diet flavors are made with sucralose/Splenda). All of their canned sodas will use cane sugar and, by mid-2007, so will all of their bottled drinks.

Jones Soda says that the change is being made with consumer health in mind, even though nutritionists say that it is not any more harmful than other forms of sugar. The reality is that the switch is being made because shoppers are interested in anything that they think is good for their health. Neither sugar nor corn syrup is all that good for you, especially in large amounts, so claiming that it is healthier to drink the sugar-sweetened soda at the same time as they are trying to push sales seems to be a bit contradictory. That said, the taste is really the most important factor in soda selection and if the change improves the flavor of their sodas, which is already excellent (with a few exceptions), then it sounds like a good one.

High fructose corn syrup is something that we commonly hear we should avoid. When we ask why, we're told that it's bad for us. But is it really that bad? The New York Times takes a look at that question by going straight to the source and talking to the scientists who put out some of the first research linking HFCS to obesity, as well as many other members of the scientific and medical community.

Basically, the upshot of all this hype is that high fructose corn syrup isn't that bad - certainly no worse than other forms sugar. In fact, it is only high in fructose when compared to regular corn syrup and actually has less than table sugar. This doesn't mean that the medical community isn't saying it is health food, but experts like Dr. Walter Willett, the chairman of the nutrition department of the Harvard School of Public Health, say '"There's no substantial evidence to support the idea that high-fructose corn syrup is somehow responsible for obesity," and seem to believe that we would still have an obesity problem if all the HFCS in food disappeared overnight.

More recent medical studies, instead of focusing on HFCS specifically, have looked at products that have added sugar in any form and recommend that they all be consumed minimally, whether the sweetener comes from corn, cane, beet or other sources.

When reading about New Seasons Market in the New York Times, I came across a reference to Rockstar energy drinks and their highly conservative provenance. According to the Times, "Rockstar's chief executive is Russell Goldencloud Weiner, who developed the company with the help of his mother and his father, Michael Savage, the far-right talk radio host." Because of this, New Seasons won't sell the beverage.

I don't drink it because of the high fructose corn syrup, but now I'm considering changing my view to not drinking because of the politics. I did a little surfing and found several references to the "anti-immigrant, gaybashing, intolerant, hate-filled" rhetoric of Savage ("Facism Cola") and the connection between New Season's decision and that of my neighborhood co-op, People's, to stop carrying Oregon Rain water because Lars Larson was their pitchman ("Radio-Active Fallout").

I've been fiercely opposed to the chemically-altered and highly sweet high fructose corn syrup for years, and it's amazing to me that, as long as it's been known to have serious affects on health, contributing to rising obesity and diabetes rates, it's still ubiquitously available in foods. It's super sweet, and it's cheap.

Kate Hopkins from the Accidental Hedonist is, like me, a long-time member of the anti-HFCS camp. She's developed an exceedingly well-researched answer to a reader's question on how to argue the HFCS case when many corn industry marketing folks rave about how "natural" the product is.