Furniture by Stanislav Katz

No, don't just cut out corn syrup, cut out excessive consumption of all sugars.

Not really a how to lose weight, but more of a how to stay motivated.
Take your measurements. The scale may not be moving very much, BUT you may be losing quite a bit of inches all around.

I've read that while HFCS does cause more weight gain, it's sweeter, so if a product did have cane sugar in it, they would have to put more in to compensate for the difference, there wouldn't be any health benefit for making the change. As for a good fatty breakfast, those work great if you have a hangover too.

"the shaking I get between meals if I wait to long to eat is mostly gone when I don’t have corn syrup for a whole week."

This may not be specific to HFCS, but just generally reducing the quantity of simple carbs (sugars) in your diet. It reduces the surges in your metabolism that cause those shakes when you hit a low point. I've noticed the same thing, but I can end up having a hypoglycemic reaction (even more shakes! :)) so I have to pay attention to have a good balance of some sugar, but not too much, and preferably spread out in small amounts.

I have found that I feel better when I get a few salads each week. I also try to eat some good fish too, just don't get your fish at a 'fast food' place where they deep fry it in grease.

Sugars are not only empty calories, they cause a spike in blood sugar (of course). Your body responds by releasing insulin, which brings the blood sugar down by converting it to glycogen. Keeping your blood sugar stable with small amounts of protein with each meal (I won't go into the role of glucagon) and replacing simple sugars with complex carbs will help you lose weight, feel full, and might improve your mood. Getting enough chromium helps, too.

On the topic of portion control (critical on Weight Watchers for me)…my nutritionist introduced me to a new product which has just come out, but it's hard to find in stores. I ordered it online from www.PortionControl.net since they offer free shipping. It’s definitely a why-didn’t-I-think-of-that product, and it really helps me with daily portion control, while making my cooking easier and tastier. I LOVE THEM. It’s really a nifty idea, and I recommend it if you like cooking at home but are struggling with eating right.

These aren't really hacks. They're common sense. They're practically in the user manual. Red Bull is a hack. Steroids are a hack.

I bought the Mountain Dew Throwback soda. I LOVE it! It has a fresher, fruitier (grapefruit) taste. I hope they keep it. Now if I could only find "Mexican" Coca Cola I'll be a happy camper. They call it "Mexican" Coke because it has cane sugar and NO H F corn syrup. Tastes so much better but I can't find it anywhere.
They did a study and found switching your pop to cane sugar based ones actually had people losing weight even though the did not diet or change their eating habits any other way. Did you know the U.S. is the only country that makes Coke w/HFCS?

Looks like the 'corn sugar' lobby has already gotten hold of some of the commenters, hahahaha

Sugar is sugar. Sugar from corn is essentially just concentrated so the industry can use less material to get the same sweetness. Yes, if you compare a cup of granulated sugar to a cup of Karo, you'll see a massive difference, but the volume is not what you should be looking at. You should be looking at the grams of actual sugars. Consider caramel made from cane sugar... The bottom line is the actual gram amount of sugar shown on the label of the food you buy. The source of it is irrelevant, metabolically. Just avoid foods with a bazzilion grams of sugar per serving; don't be concerned about where that sugar came from. Heck FRUIT juice has a TON of sugar, even if it is squeezed in your kitchen. Fruit are sugary.

Also, eating a bowl of cereal for breakfast does not mean that your body can ONLY metabolize carbs for the day. The studies show a fatty breakfast WILL in fact help boost the use of fat as energy, but will not stop anything else from being used as well...

Sidenote: Throwback = yummy

I read a few psychology studies a while back that found that the two highest predictors of how much food you eat in a meal are:

# 1: The number of people eating with you: there is a direct positive correlational relationship between the number of people eating with you and the amount of food you eat. This may have something to do with the "don't eat and multitask" point, as people tend to be distracted and talking while eating.

# 2: The variety of food on offer: The more variety on offer, the more you eat. I don't think this needs to be explained.

These findings were robust and replicable. I also remember environmental temperature being a good predictor, with people eating more in colder temperatures than hotter.

"a German study found that it can help decrease the number of new fat cells you develop while helping you burn off the existing fat cells in your body."

Either worded very poorly or completely false. Once you are an adult, you DO NOT EVER make more fat cells or lose any fat cells (without liposuction). The cells only shrink or expand as the amount of lipid in them changes.

"Sugar is sugar": no. There is a great deal of research to back the link between the rise of HFCS use in foods and the increase in obesity. Some sugars are more easily digested and processed by the body than others. Natural, readily available sugar such as that found in an apple is very different in structure from HFCS, which must be created via a complex chemical process... and while we're on the subject of non-foods, sodium bromate is a commonly used dough conditioner, banned in most countries as a known carcinogen but used in the US (especially in fast-food chain buns and breads).

I was raised in a no/low corn household because my grandmother was allergic to corn and corn products. I cannot stand sodas, pancake syrup, and other items sweetened with HFCS, they're too sweet and TASTE like corn syrup to me. I don't crave that extra sweetness, and actually prefer less sweet things. Dark chocolate instead of milk chocolate, REAL maple syrup (my mother in law nearly had a conniption fit when I told her I don't like sweet pancake syrup), and I drink either Diet Dr. Pepper (I'd rather taste aspartame than corn syrup) or Dublin Dr. Pepper (thank God I live in DFW and it is much cheaper to get here than other places). Hubby loves the mexican Coke (sold @ Costco).

I have found that cutting down on products made with HFCS, and doing things like baking my own bread (from scratch), using extra virgin olive oil instead of other cooking oils, real butter instead of margarine, etc, I have lost weight and have more energy than I used to.

Whoops! Not sodium bromate, I meant potassium sorbate. I am a dork.

Excellent post, some helpful comments. Thanks Neatorama!!

PS: Ashley, are you SURE?

Surprised that no one else finds it odd that an article titled "Hacks to help you stay healthy" is purely focused on loosing weight. Have we gotten to the point in our society where the only thing we associate living healthfully with is loosing weight?

@Ashley, the total number of fat cells has plateaus rather. They stay constant in number and keep growing in size with increasing lipid content, but after a certain critical size, they divide, giving you many more fat cells.

And now, even if you do lost any extra weight again etc. you will still have that additional number of fat cells.