"corn syrup" news and stories

Last Sunday, the Opinion section of the Boston Globe featured a rather passionate piece by Christopher Kimball, founder of Cook's Illustrated. Kimball rails against processed foods, saying that the often expensive and unhealthy products have infiltrated the food industry "like a cancer." The main points of Kimball's piece--trans fats, relentless marketing and the economic impact of obesity in America--won't come as a shock to most of us. Still, Cook's fans should appreciate hearing Kimball speak his mind about something a little more controversial than Dutch process cocoa. (Registration with Boston.com maybe required.)

[Via The Ethicurean]

October 30th is National Candy Corn Day and while we've talked a little bit about what it tastes like, we haven't talked at all about its history at all.

Candy corn was created in the 1880s by the Wunderlee Candy Company and, by 1900, was being produced by the Goelitz Candy Company (now Jelly Belly), which has continuously produced it for more than a century. Candy corns get their name from the fact that they are shaped like a kernel of corn. Although they are often shown point-up, the yellow end is really the "top" of the corn. The design apparently made it popular with farmers when it first came out, but it was the fact that it had three colors - a really innovative idea - that catapulted it to popularity.

Originally, candy corn was made of sugar, corn syrup (not HFCS), fondant and marshmallow, among other things, and the hot mixture was poured into cornstarch molds, where it set up. This original mixture is probably where the name of the candy corn-like Mellocreme Pumpkins comes from. The recipe changed slightly over time and there are probably a few variations in recipes between candy companies, but the use of a mixture of sugar, corn syrup, gelatin and vanilla (as well as honey, in some brands) is the standard.

A serving of candy corn has about 22 pieces and contains 140 calories, no fat. While it is just about all sugar, the sweet can still be a better choice than a couple of mini candy bars or other Halloween treats that are high in both calories and in fat. Additionally, 22 pieces of candy corn will last a lot longer than one mini candy bar will.

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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.

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Grenadine is the most popular fruit syrup used by bartenders. Unfortunately, the most popular and easy-to-find brand of grenadine, Rose's, has no acutal fruit in it at all. It's high fructose corn syrup with red food coloring in it.

Yum.

Grenadine is actually supposed to be a sweet syrup made from pomegranate juice, which lends it a distinctive color and flavor, though the corn syrup version has become so prevalent, that a straw poll I did revealed that many people believed grenadine was cherry flavored. It can be difficult to find a bottle of the real thing, but the Sonoma's Syrup Co sells an all natural, pomegranate grenadine that I was able to pick up at Williams-Sonoma, despite the fact that it is not listed on their website. The taste is worlds away from the corn syrup stuff and you can feel good about eliminating one more source of high fructose corn syrup in your diet.

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.

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