Generally speaking, that is; not when it comes to junk food. We don’t need it and it does us more harm than good, yet we are persuaded by these misguided masters of opportunity that something as ludicrous as pancake mix is desirable. Yesterday was pancake day, or Shrove Tuesday if you prefer. Now, I have no problem with festival foods that wouldn’t ordinarily fit the health bill. Pancakes are pretty basic things – quick and cheap and if done well a real treat. Traditionally they are made from flour, eggs, milk and butter, with sugar and lemon to taste. They require minimum preparation time and little in the way of culinary experience. Children enjoy making them, because they can. Pancakes don’t have much to commend them in the health department, but festival food is soul food, as is all shared food which is central to a group celebration.

But these plastic bottles containing dried pancake mix, which only came to my attention yesterday, are a source of despair. I examined the ingredients, and the instructions. The powdered mix contains all things dried – egg white, egg yolk, skimmed milk powder. Even the ubiquitous, odious ‘vegetable fat’ has managed to insinuate itself into the ingredients list. I don’t know why; there is probably a food technology explanation for this, albeit one I can’t summon any interest in. Your task is to take off the lid and fill the bottle with water, up to the line, shake, pour into a frying pan and surrender your soul.

This product of the R&D department of some nondescript factory somewhere in the UK removes all joy from the act of pancake-making and strips us of our last vestige of culinary creativity, of human participation. Unless of course we choose not to.

Only a dietitian could state, without a trace of irony, that crisps ‘can be part of a healthy balanced diet.’ I did a double take when I heard just that on the recent BBC programme Britain’s Favourite Supermarket Foods, presented by the immensely likeable but utterly guileless Cherry Healey.

What a strangely uninformative programme it turned out to be. If it’s edible, or drinkable, then it’s good for you, seemed to be the expert opinion on virtually every food or drink item discussed. We started with tea. Tea contains antioxidants and antioxidants can help prevent cancer, heart disease and stroke. We drink gallons of the stuff every day, it was established, but nobody spotted the obvious paradox that the three biggest killers today in Britain are .. cancer, heart disease and stroke.

We got round to crisps. It was generally agreed that crisps are full of salt, and salt is bad. But hang on – it turns out that crisps don’t have all that much salt after all! Well they do, but everything being relative, you could say they hardly have any. Our sanguine dietitian pointed out that you’d have to eat five whole packs of crisps to get the salt equivalent of a mere six slices of white bread. Comparing one junk food item with another does not a clear picture paint. But what truly redeemed our crisps was the revelation that, despite all the salt, they also contain potassium – just like bananas and broccoli! This elevated the previously reprehensible crisp to superfood status.

This disingenuous, reductionist approach is unhelpful and misleading. Isolating single chemicals in a food or drink and finding something good to say about those chemicals does not make the whole food worthy of a healthy diet. You could be forgiven for believing that eating crisps and drinking tea all day was all you needed to do to guarantee a long and healthy life. No matter how tasty or moreish crisps may be, and what lovely nibbles they make at drinks parties and other social gatherings, and how we all have our favourite flavours (cheese & onion), we shouldn’t kid ourselves. Healthy they are not, and you really do not want to be eating them on a regular basis, in my opinion. When carbohydrate foods such as potatoes are fried at high temperatures, chemicals called acrylamides are produced – if it’s oily and crunchy, that’s the acrylamide experience for you. Acrylamide is one of the chemicals that make up cigarette smoke and is believed to be carcinogenic, as it has been found to be associated with ovarian and endometrial cancer. Acrylamide is also an industrial product, used for various purposes such as construction grouting, sewage treatment and paper making. It is also known to cause nerve damage (peripheral neuropathy) to humans exposed in the workplace. Crisps are usually fried in polyunsaturated oil such as sunflower, which is another disaster area in terms of health and one which I previously covered in my post on breakfast bars (Jan 16). Believe me, there are better ways of getting a good intake of potassium.

Britain’s Favourite Supermarket Foods – a great boost for the industry. Bewildering for the rest of us.

Wilson, K., Mucci, L.A., Rosner, B.A. & Willett, W.C. (2010) A prospective study on dietary acrylamide intake and the risk for breast, endometrial and ovarian cancers. Cancer Epidemiology, Biomarkers & Prevention, 19:2503

Could anything look or taste anything less like a real food than bran? It’s dark brown, hard and brittle. It tastes as bad as it looks. It smells of dried cereal, which is partly what it is. I remember being forced to eat bran flakes for breakfast as a small child – for the good of my health – and I’ve not forgotten it either.

Bran is the hard outer layer of a grain, usually wheat but oats or rye may also be used. It is the by-product of the milling process which creates refined grain and is not to be confused with the whole grain. There’s a lot of profit to be had from breaking down a whole food into its constituent parts and selling them off separately.

Wheat bran is coarse, concentrated insoluble fibre which in my view is too harsh for the digestive system. Oat bran is more gentle but the principle is still the same, although as an ingredient it does lend itself well to some recipes. Bran is touted as a ‘health’ food, especially for those with digestive problems. However it has been found to exacerbate the symptoms of irritable bowel syndrome in some cases, and I know from experience with clients that they almost always report feeling better when they stop eating bran, on my suggestion. They are usually also grateful for the opportunity to halt this punitive dietary measure.

So bad does bran taste that brands such as Kellogg’s lace it with sugar, barley malt flavouring, salt and honey, just to make it palatable. Life really is too short for that sort of thing, no matter how old you are.

Mammerle, C.W. & Surawicz, C.M. (2008) Updates on treatment of irritable bowel syndrome. World Journal of Gastroenterology, 14(7):2639-2649.

Have you ever lain awake in bed wondering how it is that all plant life on earth does not burn to a crisp shortly after sunrise? All that vegetation quietly growing in full exposure to the relentless sun directly overhead. But nothing burns.

I covered vitamin D and the effects of sunlight in previous posts but there’s one more sun-related issue I feel compelled to mention, and it relates to the above question. The answer, in a word, is carotenoids. Plants have their own built-in protection mechanism which they kindly bestow on us when we eat them. It is a beautiful example of the unified, circular nature of life, of which we are an integral part.

Carotenoids are plant chemicals which take the form of an orange pigment, so foods which contain them are easily identifiable: sweet potato, carrots, bell peppers, pumpkin, squash, cantaloupe melon, mango and apricots are fine examples. Less identifiable are the carotenoid-rich dark leafy greens whose green pigment predominates: kale, spinach, greens and the like. There are many different types, the best known being beta carotene (carrots), lycopene (tomatoes), alpha carotene (pumpkin and carrots), lutein and zeaxanthin (kale and spinach). Carotenoids protect the plant from damage from UV light and this protection is attributed to their antioxidant properties: they are able to absorb the harmful oxidative chemicals produced during photosynthesis, the process whereby plants make energy from sunlight.

Both animal and human studies have consistently shown that eating carotenoid-rich foods protects against damage from ultraviolet irradiation from the sun. In humans sun damage causes not only burning (known as erythema) but also premature ageing of the skin and cancer. A diet rich in lycopene in particular has been found to significantly lower the risk of burns to the skin.

So carotenoids are effective against burning – what about skin cancer? Well, animal studies have confirmed that carotenoids protect against skin cancer, but as far as humans go we don’t know. Randomised, controlled trials of humans are lacking, not surprisingly.

Animal studies are good enough for me. Clearly we have to exercise common sense when it comes to sun exposure, but we should equally ensure a regular supply of dietary carotenoids, and not just the day before the summer holidays. Studies which have demonstrated the protective effects of carotenoids have also shown that they have to be consumed regularly, in high amounts over weeks and months, not just days. The odd tomato or carrot is not going to cut it. The carotenoids that you eat from fruit and vegetables are distributed around the body, with higher concentrations found in the skin and the eye. Sometimes you can tell when you’ve eaten a lot as they affect skin colour, making it appear more yellow.

It is possible – just possible – that the alarming increase in skin cancer rates in the UK and Ireland is related to the equally alarming low level of fruits and vegetables, and therefore carotenoids, in the average diet. Data from the latest National Diet and Nutrition Survey for adults reveal that in Great Britain just 7% of girls and 22% of boys aged 11 to 18 years, and 33% of women and 37% of men are meeting the five-a-day guidelines for fruit and vegetable consumption. With so little carotenoid consumption we really are at risk, especially the fair-skinned whose defences are already down.

We are regularly exhorted to slather ourselves in sunscreen to protect ourselves from the sun’s rays, but never to eat more carotenoids. These sunscreens contain an unnerving mix of chemicals whose safety is always the subject of doubt and which even within the scientific community remains a matter of opinion.

So get eating your carotenoids now. And here’s an extra tip. Carotenoids are fat soluble so put some butter on those carrots, and extra virgin olive oil on those tomatoes to improve your absorption. Cooked is better than raw, as the cooking process releases the carotenoids from the vegetable, making them more readily available.

Stahl, W. & Sies, H. (2002) Carotenoids and protection against solar UV radiation. Journal of Pharmacological and Biophysical Research, 15(5).

Stahl, W. et al (2000) Carotenoids and carotenoids plus vitamin E protect against ultraviolet light-induced erythema in humans. American Journal of Clinical Nutrition, 71(3):795-798.

Bates, B., Lennox, A. Swan, G. (eds) 2010 National diet and nutrition survey: headline results for year 1 of the rolling programme (2008/2009). Food Standards Agency.

Sies, H. & Stahl, W. (2004) Nutritional protection against skin damage from sunlight. Annual Review of Nutrition, 24:173-200.

Jensen, J.D., Wing, G.J. & Dellavalle, R.P. (2010) Nutrition and melanoma prevention. Clinics in Dermatology, 28(6):644-649.

When in doubt, shock or trouble, we put the kettle on. Unfortunately, making tea is a tradition in tatters, and I blame the government, the economy, corporate greed, the education system and the housing market.

In the UK we drink in the region of 165 million cups daily. Almost all of those are made from tea bags, which is bad enough, but many people even dispose of that most quintessential accessory, the teapot. I bet today’s youth haven’t even heard of a tea strainer.

A good reason to avoid teabags, other than taste and decency, is that most contain chlorine, whose purpose is to bleach the bag and disinfect it to prevent bacterial decay. In doing so, it leaves a chemical residue. Not all do, but that’s not the point. A bag of dusty tea can never replace the real thing – loose leaf, stored in a tin caddy.

By switching to loose leaf, and therefore properly brewed tea, you are joining a revolution which is taking place all over the world. It is a quiet revolution, and rather, well, slow. The Slow Food movement began in Italy in 1986 as a protest against the opening of a branch of McDonalds at the foot of the Spanish Steps in Rome, and now has over 100,000 members in 150 countries. It is ostensibly concerned with the rejection of a pervasive fast food culture and the promotion of real, sustainable food. But on another level it is much more than that. Slow Food is an ideology which gently subverts the culture of ‘consumerism’ which has reduced us to mere economic units, too busy to stand and stare, or to eat properly, or engage with the process of making a proper cup of tea. Instead, the focus of consumerism is speed and quick fixes. New homes are built with tiny kitchens, the idea being that spatial economy can maximise value. How can we be happy with nowhere to store a teapot?

Some things are best done at a snail’s pace, like eating slowly, chewing each morsel thoroughly and thoughtfully. Similarly, we need to adopt a Zen-like approach to tea making. The pleasure is not only in the drinking but in the preparation. The Japanese art of tea-making exemplifies this philosophy; each step is a choreographed ritual culminating in the most simple of pleasures, performed with reverence for the tea, the giver and the receiver.

So, how to make a decent brew? I’m not keen on builder’s but like a nice pot of green or herbal tea. When I say herbal, I don’t mean those pleasant-smelling but foul-tasting fruit teas. No, I mean loose leaf nettle, perhaps mixed with dandelion leaf or comfrey; that sort of thing. Mint leaves after dinner also go down very well. It is essential to warm the pot before you add the tea, then cover the pot with a well padded cosy. I let the tea draw for around five minutes, then strain. OK, that’s not entirely worthy of a Japanese ceremony but definitely more Zen than a chlorine-dunked bag of dust.

Following on from my previous sunlight and vitamin D post, here’s a personal anecdote which illustrates the healing power of the sun, and how fiendish food intolerance can be.

A food intolerance is a slippery knave. It can develop any time in your life, seemingly inexplicably but often after years of overdoing a certain food. My dairy intolerance certainly caught me on the hop, but thinking about it, I have always been a cheese addict and I certainly got my just desserts in the end. Just as I was settling cosily into middle age I developed eczema on my legs for the first time.

Now, how I sympathise with anyone with this condition. It’s a fire that burns not so much with pain as maddening itch. It starts with a harmless tingle, but I know what’s coming – a blazing crescendo of angry inflammation. My resolve collapses and I set to scratching for all I’m worth to gain some indescribably blessed relief. Slathering on some cool soothing aloe vera gel really does help, but it is by no means a cure. It takes at least half an hour and intermittent slathering and scratching before the fiery beast tires of tormenting me and makes its retreat.

Eczema is an itchy inflammatory skin disorder – redness, dry patches, blisters and lesions are all symptomatic. There are various types, and it is much more common in children than in adults.The medical view is that the cause is unknown, but may be due to genetic and/or environmental factors and treatment usually involves steroid creams and emollients. I find it breathtakingly irresponsible that the role of food sensitivity, although occasionally mentioned, is generally downplayed.

In my book I Wish I Hadn’t Eaten That, I describe the process of identifying a food intolerance without the use of expensive testing, which basically involves eliminating a suspect food for several days and then reintroducing it in a large amount in one sitting. That is what I did myself, and sure enough I found that a cheese fest would bring on an attack of the beast, but not immediately. A delay of a few hours is normal. I did a bit more experimenting and discovered that I really do have a classic intolerance – if I eat dairy foods no more than once every four days I can avoid all symptoms completely, but if I cross that line I will pay for it. This means that I count the days till I can have my next fix, really enjoy it and then start on the next period of abstinence.

Now, here’s the thing. I don’t have this problem at all in the summer. Off come the layers and out I head, bare-legged, to get as much sun exposure as I can. It’s glorious – almost immediately I can eat cheese with impunity and stop counting days. Not that I overdo it – an intolerance is still an intolerance and I don’t want to drive symptoms inwards, but I can relax in the knowledge that if I do occasionally overdo it I won’t be punished. Come late September early October, the first itch appears, like the first frost. Every year it’s exactly the same, and I go back to counting days and planning my next cheese fix.

It is already established from research that sun exposure can alleviate eczema, though you’d hardly know it from medical or charity websites. Phototherapy – the use of sun lamps using UV rays can also be effective, under the supervision of a specialist dermatologist.

Now I’m not saying that anyone with eczema is going to have the same experience. Not at all – in each individual case it is important to establish the cause. But experimenting with possible food intolerances seems a reasonable approach, when the alternative is a lifetime on steroids.

Letić, M. (2009) Exposure to sunlight as adjuvant therapy for dyshidrotic eczema. Medical Hypotheses, (73)(2):203-204.

Potter, P. (2011) A therapeutic approach to atopic eczema. SA Pharmaceutical Journal, (78)(5):40-44.

After living with vitamin D deficiency for the past 50,000 years we’ve finally woken up to how serious the problem is – the BBC has started reporting the issue. Unless you’ve been living in a hermetically sealed envelope the last few weeks, you’ll be aware that vitamin D is the nutrient du jour. Cases of childhood rickets – a sign of severe deficiency – have rocketed over the last 15 years with one in four toddlers thought to be at risk.

The problem can be traced back to the Garden of Eden, and our leaving thereof. That’ll teach us to go seeking knowledge. Humans originated in equatorial Africa, where we all went about naked as newborns, enjoying year-round warm sunshine and vitamin D on tap. We also all had black skins that offered protection from the blazing sun and the radiation which would otherwise have killed us. Then, for whatever reason, we took it upon ourselves to move out of this earthly paradise, a transition which necessitated the donning of more than just a strategically positioned fig-leaf. Moving further north meant wearing clothes and following fashion. Think about it – no other animal on this planet has to build shelters, insulate and heat those shelters and still wear multiple layers of clothing just to stay alive, which shows how poorly suited we are to our current environment. It also explains why we have a primeval love of warm weather and stripping off whenever the opportunity presents itself.

Moving north towards Europe meant that we gradually lost more and more protective skin pigmentation, as having paler skins made it easier to absorb rays to make vitamin D. However, layers of clothing also means that the sun never reaches those parts once so blissfully exposed. Most of the world’s population today lives in the northern hemisphere, and the further you are from the equator, the less vitamin D you make. And from October to April you can expect to make none at all. The darker your skin, the worse off you are: black people only synthesise about one-sixth of the vitamin D that white people synthesise on exposure to sunlight.

Your only other hope – and it’s a very important one, whatever your skin pigmentation – is diet. This vitamin (which is actually really a hormone) is only available naturally in some animal-derived foods, especially oily fish (the food which keeps on giving), and eggs. Those hardy folk who live close to the Arctic would have died out long ago were it not for all the seal blubber and oily fish they consume.

Not only is vitamin D deficiency linked to rickets and other bone disorders, but also sudden infant death syndrome (SIDS), TB, heart disease, multiple sclerosis and a variety of cancers: breast, prostate, colon, pancreatic, ovarian and Hodgkin lymphoma. Therefore anything that blocks your ability to make vitamin D is potentially harmful.

Sunlight has two ultraviolet rays: UVA and UVB. UVB is the one needed to make vitamin D but can also cause your skin to burn. UVA is more damaging as it can penetrate the outer skin and reach the cells that can become cancerous.Sunscreen protects against burning, but when it comes to preventing skin cancer, that’s quite another matter. There are three main types of skin cancer associated with excessive sun exposure – cutaneous melanoma (the most lethal), basal cell carcinoma (the most common form) and squamous cell carcinoma. And the truth is, there is no evidence that they (sunscreens) protect against basal cell carcinoma or melanoma …. sunscreen companies have emotionally and inaccurately promoted the use of sunscreens. (not my words, before you sue. See Berwick below) They might not prevent cancer, but sunscreens block the formation of vitamin D. According to the World Health Organization, malignant melanoma from sun exposure is relatively rare, compared to the number of diseases caused by lack of exposure. That’s quite a statement, when you think about it. I’ve not even got on to the chemicals in sunscreen – I’ll save that for a sunny day.

Mead, M.N. (2008) Benefits of sunlight: A bright spot for human health. Environmental Health Perspectives, 116(4):A160-167.

Lucas, R., McMichael, T., Smith, W. and Armstrong, B. (2006) Solar ultraviolet radiation: global burden of disease due to ultraviolet radiation. Environmental Burden of Disease Series, No. 13. World Health Organization (2006)

Berwick, M. (2011) The good, the bad, and the ugly of sunscreens. Clinical Pharmacology & Therapeutics, 89(1):31-33.

Even more so when that term is applied to products which are anything but. I’m thinking specifically about that ‘alternative to dairy milk’ known as rice milk – also now available in supermarkets in their (groan) ‘healthy options’ aisles.

Rice milk is made with the sugar from cooked rice and the water it’s cooked in. Usually sunflower oil is also added. The sugar in rice, and therefore its ‘milk’, is maltose and glucose and something called maltotriose, which is mainly glucose. So rice milk is basically sugary water, perhaps with some added calcium to make it in some way comparable to dairy milk. Other flavourings may be added. The brands available in the UK have not been tested for their glycaemic index but I do know that the Australian equivalent has a GI of 92. That is not very healthy – anything with such a high GI will play havoc with your blood sugar levels. Not for nothing is rice milk not recommended for diabetics, or anyone watching their teeth. Sugared water with a high GI can only mean one thing – big spikes in insulin levels. Think insulin, think fat storage, diabetes, obesity, heart disease and cancer. Rice milk producers boast that their product is lactose free, cholesterol free and low in fat – of course it is, it’s sugary water. And they’re right – there is no added sugar. There’s no need! There’s plenty already there. It is also natural, and so is tobacco.

I haven’t even mentioned the sunflower oil yet. Sunflower oil is a polyunsaturated oil and to my mind up there with sugar when it comes to the bad food list. I’ve discussed this before but I’m happy to keep repeating myself. These ubiquitous polyunsaturated oils are highly processed. First, the seeds are heated to a very high temperature to facilitate extraction. Then the oil is extracted, most commonly using a solvent derived from petroleum. The oil is degummed, bleached and then deodorised. The process ensures that the oil is thoroughly de-nutritioned too. Deodorisation is necessary to remove the rancid odours created during all this refinement and is performed at temperatures in excess of 200ºC. Worse still, these oils now contain something that wasn’t there to start with and which you won’t find on the label: trans fatty acids, those heinous fats famous for their harmful effects on health.

Rice milk drink is suitable for the dairy intolerant and vegans. Drink it if you like sweetly flavoured water, but don’t drink it because you believe it to be good for you in any way.

Reference

Kemény, K., Recseg, G, Hénon, K. et al (2001) Deodorization of vegetable oils: Prediction of trans polyunsaturated fatty acid content. Journal of the American Oil Chemists’ Society, 78(9).

I can’t abide breakfast cereals, from any perspective – health, taste or aesthetics. As far as taste goes, I think they are wretched, bordering on punitive. In the health department, they have nothing to offer of any value, and most are just sugary mush.

Porridge is an exception to my rule. It is warming, nutritious and quite manly, having been long associated with alpha males, shot-putting in t-shirts and kilts up breezy highlands, or hardened criminals keeping their strength up in prison. Unfortunately it is not much of a looker. It has all the visual appeal of slurry and is redolent of the glue used in primary school craft classes. Other than that, it has much to boast. It is quick to prepare if you uses jumbo oat-flakes, which have been pre-steamed. Unlike other cereals, it has a low glycaemic index (GI), as long as it is made with jumbo oats as opposed to small oats, which can have a fairly high GI. The GI is the rate at which the carbohydrate raises blood sugar and therefore insulin levels, and a low GI is always desirable.

Porridge boasts a soluble fibre called B-glucan which can be partially digested and whose known benefits include its ability to increase levels of the good HDL cholesterol, lower blood pressure, regulate blood sugar levels and reduce the risk of certain diseases such as diabetes and gallstones. One of the more extraordinary features of oats is that they are the only food known to contain a plant chemical called avenanthramide (AV). AV is a polyphenol – a type of antioxidant – which has been found to inhibit inflammation and help prevent heart disease. Chronic inflammation is associated with the formation of plaques on artery walls which can lead to heart disease. These plaques can break off, causing a blockage, either to the heart or brain. AV enhances nitric oxide production, which inhibits the formation of these plaques.Inflammation is also thought to be a risk factor in colon cancer, and AV can significantly inhibit the proliferation of cancer cells in the colon.

Oh porridge! Hot slurry of the highlands, it’s what’s under your skin that matters.

Peruse any website extolling the virtues of juicing and you will discover that this practice variously detoxifies the body, builds blood cells, energises, cleanses the skin and kidneys, performs ‘cellular cleansing’, helps you lose excessive weight, is ‘highly eliminative’, improves clarity of mind and even leaves you with a natural high. Who needs nirvana, or sex, when you’ve got all that going on simultaneously.

Juicing involves taking a whole fruit, or vegetable, and stripping it of the fibre content so that only the fluid is retained. Drinking juices is often central to a fast, or detox regime. Stripping a whole food of its fibre content is what those much maligned, junk food manufacturers do, creating refined carbohydrates which have come to be associated with a range of diseases, from constipation and bowel cancer to type 2 diabetes and heart disease. Yet when juicing advocates do they same thing they say they say that by eliminating the fibre you are giving the body a rest. Ha ha – that’s cunning spin, if nothing else!

So, to the facts. First, let’s consider fruit juices. Drinking fruit juices gives you a great deal of unbound fructose (fruit sugar) which, like ordinary table sugar, is a significant contributor to dental erosion. Also, once extracted, fructose is much sweeter than either glucose or sucrose. Concentrated fructose has been found to increase blood fat levels and is linked to insulin resistance (one step away from diabetes) and high blood pressure. Fructose is more lipogenic than glucose, which means that it is more readily converted into fat.

So what about vegetable juices? These have less sugar, and one of the reasons they are heavily promoted is their rich carotenoid content. Carotenoids are antioxidant plant chemicals (also known as phytonutrients, or phytochemicals) and this group include beta carotene, as found in carrots. But peeling and juicing have been shown to result in ‘substantial losses of carotenoids, often surpassing those of heat treatment.’ Other plant chemicals are also reduced. A study of the loss of anthocyanins in blueberries found that approximately 20% of these powerful antioxidants were left behind in the pulp after juicing.

Most of the health claims relating to juicing, that trip too readily off the tongue, are based on their high nutrient content, but just a nanosecond of thought will tell you that these nutrients are already present in the whole food – you don’t get more by juicing. Juices contain nothing extra, but a lot less. I contacted a couple of companies whose websites promote juicing, and sell juicing machines, to ask them for evidence of their eye-popping health claims. Neither got back to me.

Juices can be delicious and you can do a lot worse than indulge yourself occasionally at a juice bar. Just don’t expect an orgasmic or life-changing experience.

References

Bray, G.A. (2007) How bad is fructose? American Journal of Clinical Nutrition, 86(4):895-896.

Elliot, S.S., Keim, N.L, Stern, J.S. Et al (2002) Fructose, weight gain, and the insulin resistance syndrome. American Journal of Clinical Nutrition, 76(5):911-922.Committee on Nutrition (2001) The use and misuse of fruit juice in pediatrics. Pediatrics, 107:1210-1213.

Dutta, D., Chaudhuri, U.R. & Chakraborty, R. (2005) Review: Structure, health benefits, antioxidant property and processing and storage of carotenoids. African Journal of Biotechnology, 4(13):1510-1520.

Kalt, W. (2004) Effects of production and processing factors on major fruit and vegetable antioxidants. Journal of Food Science, 70(1).