Health Tip Tuesday: Limit Sugars. Here are tips from the American Heart Association to help limit your sugar intake. Although sugars are not harmful to the body, our bodies don’t need sugars to function properly. Added sugars contribute additional calories and zero nutrients to food. Over the past 30 years, Americans have steadily consumed more and more added sugars in their diets, which has contributed to the obesity epidemic. Reducing the amount of added sugars we eat cuts calories and can help you improve your heart health and control your weight. The American Heart Association recommends limiting the amount of added sugars you consume to no more than half of your daily discretionary calorie allowance. For most American women, this is no more than 100 calories per day and no more than 150 calories per day for men (or about 6 teaspoons per day for women and 9 teaspoons per day for men). Tips for getting less added sugar Most Americans consume more than double the daily recommended amount of added sugars. A report from the 2001-04 NHANES (National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey) database showed that Americans get about 22.2 teaspoons of sugar a day or about 355 calories. This is well over the recommended amount of no more than 100 calories per day for women and no more than 150 calories per day for men. Use these simple tips to reduce sugar in your diet: Remove sugar (white and brown), syrup, honey and molasses from the table — out of sight, out of mind! Cut back on the amount of sugar added to things you eat or drink regularly like cereal, pancake, coffee or tea. Try cutting the usual amount of sugar you add by half and wean down from there, or consider using an artificial sweetener. Buy sugar-free or low-calorie beverages. Buy fresh fruits or fruits canned in water or natural juice. Avoid fruit canned in syrup, especially heavy syrup. Instead of adding sugar to cereal or oatmeal, add fresh fruit (try bananas, cherries or strawberries) or dried fruit (raisins, cranberries or apricots). When baking cookies, brownies or cakes, cut the sugar called for in your recipe by one-third to one-half. Often you won’t notice the difference. Instead of adding sugar in recipes, use extracts such as almond, vanilla, orange or lemon. Enhance foods with spices instead of sugar; try ginger, allspice, cinnamon or nutmeg. Substitute unsweetened applesauce for sugar in recipes (use equal amounts). Try zero-calorie sweeteners such as aspartame, sucralose or saccharin in moderation.
Posted on: Tue, 16 Sep 2014 12:42:38 +0000
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