Feature Article
Turn Off The Juice
Everyone knows that drinking sugary pop (or "soda") is bad. (Well, maybe not everyone, but you know, right?) After all, you'd never
put 10--count 'em, 10--teaspoons of sugar in any 12 ounce beverage, would you? That's about how much sugar is in 12 ounces of cola. Even without
knowing all the science behind the nastiness of sugar, it's kind of obvious that much of it would be bad.
So many people turn to fruit juice as a healthier alternative. Even schools are buying into it, much to the delight of fruit juice providers.
But how much sugar is in 12 ounces of, say, orange juice?
According to
The Harvard School of Public Health, about 10 teaspoons. That's right, the same as the cola. Ouch.
But it could be worse. If you get a cranberry juice cocktail (oh yay, it has juice!), you'll be getting about 12 teaspoons of sugar. That's one teaspoon
per ounce. Are you kidding me?
But "fruit" carries a lot of nutritional heft, which is why marketers put it on anything that has even a tiny bit of fruit in it, or
no
fruit at all. It's even used as a healthy sounding sweetener: "fruit juice concentrate". (Of course, there are
lots of other names for sugar additives.) But it's still sugar. And
lots of it.
But what about the nutritional benefits of juice, like the vitamins? Yep, you get some, especially vitamin C, but the price in sugar is far too high. And
there are plenty of better ways to get it. For example, a half-cup of broccoli has more vitamin C than a glass of orange juice.
But what about the orange itself? While broccoli still beats it as a source of vitamin C, it's
much better than juice. While an 8 ounce
glass of juice comes in at around 110 calories and 24 grams (about 6 teaspoons) of sugar, the orange has just 45 calories and 9 grams of sugar, plus
2.3 grams of fiber which can help slow the sugar absorption. (Sadly, high-pulp orange juice has almost no more fiber than no-pulp.)
So if you've been looking at juice as a healthy part of your diet, look again. It's a sugar drink. So skip the juice and eat the fruit instead. Your
body will thank you.
Be seeing you.
-gary
