Anyone tried/trying to quit sugar?

Utter pain in the bum to make and it usually means sacrificing a pot.
My own recipe is condensed milk, sugar, butter, vanilla pod and gold top milk. Its the full fat milk gives it its special taste

It’s not that bad, unless you’ve gone badly wrong tablet is water soluble, you just have to be very patient steeping the pot. Your recipe sounds like mine, except I don’t use vanilla.

The ice water technique involves putting one hand into a bowl of iced water, then plunging that hand into the boiling sugar mix, rubbing the mix between your fingers to judge if it is ready, then into the iced water again before the heat burns your hand off

I hope you’re joking, that’s not the ice water technique! In any case, I use a thermometer.

Yes for a couple of years. Best thing ever in terms of digestion , joints, vision and recovery.

I *occasionally* lapse every couple month or so but never have more than one sugar incident. My default position is absolutely avoid fructose/glucose and minimise lactose. And booze.

It includes fruit for me too.

I think they’re can be different reasons and different approaches but mine is based simply on an inflammed stomach and poor toilet habits. It’s like a dismal feedback loop.

Trouble is once your stomach is irriated lots of things irritate it and it gets difficult to figure out what causes what.

On the flip side my body never has any issue with potatoes etc. Bread is okay when made here or farmshop stuff. So there is leeway for some fast carbs.

But never fizzy pop, chocolate etc. And never combine things like wheat and sugar (even honey and you can get problems. )

I would suggest anyone intrigued by gut health take a look at aguulp products. This has helped me too, and seem to make more of a difference than just vitamins which I never notice any difference with.

Oh and combine with 1-2 18hr fasts a week- its a good routine for me.

Keeps the weight off and stomach comfortable. I actually like the fasting element , saves a bit of time and cleaning, bit of money and you get more focused in a morning to get on with things.

Rest of the week it’s boiled eggs/oats for breakfast.

I see these fast sugars as mostly redundant and not particularly enticing these days.

Oh check out ‘pulse’ bars if you want a good tasting sugar free/keto plant bar. They’re fantastic on taste if you get a crave.

@dooosuk – the trick is in the shopping.

If you have zero crap in the house then it makes eating healthy easy.

I did eat a whole bag of tenderstem broccoli as a mid morning snack the other day. Enjoyed it thoroughly. So sweet. Almost like a real food that we’ve evolved to like. Way more satisfying than any chocolate bar or piece of cake.

The benefits of not eating any shite massively outweigh any short term loss you may feel. You just need to be really hot on what processed food actually is (starting with cereals and “bread”) and cutting it out ruthlessly.

@chevychase – agree with the shopping. Wife does most of it and with kids she buys bits for them… but I end up eating most of it.

@rome – boiled eggs (or poached/omlette/scrambled (with avocado, pea and feta smash preferably and a bit of a side salad so I can completely disappear up my own ass) or oats is good.

Strawberries/blueberries and real full-fat greek yoghurt with a handful of crushed pecans or pistachios is also an awesome filling breakfast – or pudding, if you like pudding.

I can’t believe I was brought up on weetabix, with sugar and semi-skimmed milk and told it was “healthy”, rather than an obesity and sugar-craving kickstarter to my day. It’s no wonder 70% of the UK population is overweight and type-2 diabetes is bankrupting the NHS.

I haven’t read all this, not much to add but :

I noticed she’d bought a big bag of tablet from the wee fish van that does the rounds.

Don’t you know its a tablet van masquerading as a fish van? It’s clever, they do it here too.

I haven’t read everything above, so sorry if I’m repeating things.

I gave up sugar about 10 weeks ago after being diagnosed with non-alcoholic fatty liver disease. I am active & exercise between 10-20hrs per week (this is not including dog walks, everyday activity etc.). I’ve logged my calories for years & consider myself fit & healthy; I’m 52 years old & my garmin gives my “fitness age” as 20 years old.

However last May my weight shot up by 12kg in 5 weeks without any change whatsoever to my diet & exercise. I’ve been going through a revolving door of repeated blood tests but no actual help. Appointments went along the lines of “you need to lose weight”, to which I would reply “I know, it’s why I’ve come to you – I follow all the rules, food & exercise wise yet I’ve suddenly ballooned” they would then say “but if you lose weight you’ll get better”.

Fast forward to this year where I’d tried starving myself, weight watchers, slimmers world, fasting… I watched that sugar film by Damon Gameu. This is a must watch if you’re interested in why we should give up on sugar.

Anyway, fast forward to now – bear in mind that I’ve never had a sweet tooth – I’ve cut out all added sugar & most refined carbs such as bread, pasta, white rice, and I only drink alcohol – 2 pints – on a Friday night. The results are, that wthout a massive change in calorific intake I have lost over 20lbs in 10 weeks.

Like Scud, I think my problems started following a bout of Covid, but importantly I’ve found that my body no longer seems that able to deal with Carbs; I’ve yet to come up with a good fuelling strategy before exercise – some days I feel totally empty & other days I feel amazing; I need to work out the source & timing of any carbs I have.

I have had the odd sugary “treat” but it now tastes awful & leaves a really sour taste in my mouth, so all in all I can’t see myself going back to regular carbs & certainly no added or refined sugar.

Not sure if any of that is useful but I do recommend watching That Sugar Film (it’s on YouTube currently).

I can’t believe I was brought up on weetabix, with sugar and semi-skimmed milk and told it was “healthy”, rather than an obesity and sugar-craving kickstarter to my day. It’s no wonder 70% of the UK population is overweight and type-2 diabetes is bankrupting the NHS.

Yes was definitely a sign of the times.

You keep linking to a classification system. I’ve found an actual article, but it’s a long read.

No @cougar, please try again: https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/31105044/
It is a paper on PubMed called: “Ultra-Processed Diets Cause Excess Calorie Intake and Weight Gain: An Inpatient Randomized Controlled Trial of Ad Libitum Food Intake” It does pretty much what it says in the title – in a randomised trial people given Ultra Processed food eat more and put on weight.

This is an important study because it is the first time it was shown in a very credible study that eating UPFs has a physiological effect independent of the sugar/salt/fat/etc content.

So while eating too much sugar, salt, fat, and too little fibre may be bad, eating UPFs makes it worse.

Thanks for the link, I’ll have a look.

Did keto, lost 3 stone. Now mostly eat a ketogenic (or rather very low carb) diet but allow myself to eat what I like if I’m being social.

Cholesterol went from 6 to 4. Feel loads better. Generally only eat home-cooked food, from fresh, with ingredients you can either pull out of the ground, pluck off plants or cut off animals.

If we eat badly, we try to make sure it’s in the middle of the day, with some exercise happening afterwards. But we’re not self-harming zealots about it.

Zero ultra processed food. Zero added sugar. Zero sweeteners (that comes in the ultra processed bit) – so none of that low-fat ultra-processed yoghurt crap.

Don’t miss sugar at all. In every measurable way I’m fitter, slimmer, happier, less hungry, more healthy.

Exactly this!

Wife and I started Keto in January. She’s down 3 stone and I’m down 1.5. I wasn’t particularly overweight and only joined in to support her as I have Fluoroquinolone Toxicity (damaged joints, muscles, various neuropathies) and fancied ditching sugar, particularly all the hidden sugars and other additives in UPF.

It’s been nothing short of a revelation. Aside from the weight loss, we both think more clearly, sleep better, have very few cravings and my body aches way less. My ‘buzzy’ neuropathies are less frequent / intrusive. I can also exercise more intensely as the significant cardiac issues caused by Fluoroquinoline Toxicity appear to be somewhat diminishing.

Fasting also helps. We drink Peppermint / Lemon & Ginger tea in the morning and only start eating at 1pm with a light lunch. Dinner is always made fresh from scratch, finished by 7pm and we don’t snack in the evening. 18:6 fasting does good things to a body. Cravings are minimal as we aren’t full of carbs.

We’re not evangelical about it and sometimes fall off the wagon in social situations. If one of us has a night out, drink will be taken. If eating out, we just try to pick the lower carb options, kinda tricky in Italian, Indian or Chinese restaurants! Despite occasional lapses, we both know that resuming healthy eating will quickly get us back on track.

I’m totally sold and will undoubtedly follow a predominantly low sugar / carb diet for life.

Crisps mmm, that’s a thread on its own.

Having a will of iron and as mentioned above shopping in a certain way eg, at a greengrocer,baker, butcher, fish monger,health food shop and those refill shops are good, that way the basket/trolly is full of actual ingredients and not plastic covered tat masquerading as food.

Or better still try and grow food. Get on a local facebook group that does seed swaps, or thrifts edible plants (ours is always giving away free strawberry and tomato plants at this time of the year). Crops that can be grown in a bucket such as beans or a courgette plant are easy to start off with.

Don’t you know its a tablet van masquerading as a fish van? It’s clever, they do it here too.

Yes, he does those jumbo empire biscuits as big as a tea plate too 😭😭

I had a pretty big lapse on Friday, gave myself various flimsy excuses but ultimately yes, just because the crap was there. Oh, and an obscenely juicy slice of carrot cake whilst out for 100km on the road bike yesterday for which I have no excuse.

So back on the wagon we jump, will have to appeal to my wife to leave fewer treats lying around 🙄

The scientists at the Centre for Epidemiological Studies in Health and Nutrition, School of Public Health, University of Sao Paulo, Brazil.

Came here to say what Cougar has been pointing out and that this was thoroughly de-bunked as too simplistic when it first came out when Angry Chef was doing his thing online (blog has now gone off-line unfortunately). His books are worth a read if only to point out that there are a lot of charlatans out there promoting their method and getting rich from desperate people (Helmsley sisters and Ella I’m looking at you).

Proper nutrition and maintained weight loss is difficult there is no “easy” one size fits all means of doing this. What works for me may be ineffective for someone else and their method may cause me to get sick or gain weight.

This sounds interesting – Panorama tonight BBC 1 8.00am ‘Ultra processed food’ a recipe for ill health.

Proper nutrition and maintained weight loss is difficult there is no “easy” one size fits all means of doing this. What works for me may be ineffective for someone else

I got figuratively burned at the stake on here for saying that years ago.

an obscenely juicy slice of carrot cake whilst out for 100km on the road bike yesterday

Pfft. Amateur…

I do think that, for me at least, engineered foods are the problem. They’re so delicious and are specifically tuned to make you want more.

I still do get very hungry on a low carb diet because there’s only so many vegetables you can eat and, if you do a lot of riding on type 2 muscle like me then you might need more carbs than you can get. But as said the quality is important. Better to have a slice of brown bread and some cheese than four chocolate digestives.

kinda tricky in Italian, Indian or Chinese restaurants!

Dahl is great in Indian restaurants – you can have a bowl of that and a side dish like meat or onion bahjis or something. They do look at you a bit funny if you refuse rice though.

This sounds interesting – Panorama tonight BBC 1 8.00am ‘Ultra processed food’ a recipe for ill health.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-65754290

@molgrips

Better to have a slice of brown bread and some cheese than four chocolate digestives

Only because of the cheese tbh.

Out on a bike, sandwiches are fair game. I’m lucky that I’ve an artisanal baker near here that does a traditional rye sourdough – the type that takes 3 days to make, with the only ingredients being the rye flour, salt, water. It’s ridiculously dense. I make sarnies using that if I’m going on a long ride and need sustenance.

But the rest of the time, if I’m not exercising, root veg contain plenty of carbs. Growing my own beets (got a patch with about 70 of a few different varieties in at the moment, with a pile more to go in) as I bloody love ’em and they’re way better than what you get in the supermarket. Baked sweet potato as an occasional treat – and as I’ve cut out all the ultra-processed stuff and am generally low carb anyway it really is a treat. Ridiculously sweet.

I don’t know how we’ve managed to get ourselves conned into eating the way we eat. And I’m doubly frustrated that governments don’t legislate us out of the mess we’re in. I really do get why they don’t (money, public resistance, apathy) but it’s no good for anyone 🙁

Only because of the cheese tbh.

I disagree (of course 🙂 ) – chocolate digestives are *too* delicious. They stimulate your appetite for more chocolate biccies and treates and things. At least, they do mine. Wholemeal bread has carbs, but it’s relatively low GI (especially if home made) and lots of other nutrients. There are also things in it that feed the ‘good’ bacteria in your microbiome.

I’m exercising 3-4 times a week, so there aren’t many times when I don’t need carbs. In the past I managed it by consuming carbs only on the bike and immediately afterwards, but that’s become harder and harder.

I do think that, for me at least, engineered foods are the problem. They’re so delicious and are specifically tuned to make you want more.

Interestingly, the ultra-processed food-eating twin in that podcast started off thinking like that, by the end he’d started to find the stuff repulsive. But you’re right, processed foods are full of stuff designed to make you crave more of it and that’s on top of the high levels of fat and sugar that are common. If you’ve not encountered it, it’s worth a listen.

I don’t know how we’ve managed to get ourselves conned into eating the way we eat. And I’m doubly frustrated that governments don’t legislate us out of the mess we’re in. I really do get why they don’t (money, public resistance, apathy) but it’s no good for anyone

It’s kind of a natural consequence of our greed-based / growth-obsessed economy/society where people are money rich and time poor (relatively speaking) and food is a commercial industry just like everything else. It’s an industrial process designed to stimulate demand and grow profits over anything concerning well-being or health. But that’s just typical of how we run our world. We’re fixated on ‘growth’ instead of quality of life. We confuse owning more and more consumer goods with being happy etc.

None of which is news really, but it is where we are. A government less focussed on ‘growth’ and re-election along with satisfying its donors and more on public health and well-being might do something about it, but right now, no chance. See also transport policy. Health policy etc.

It’s kind of a natural consequence of our greed-based / growth-obsessed economy/society where people are money rich and time poor (relatively speaking) and food is a commercial industry just like everything else.

That applies for the demographic here. Those that are working 2 or 3 jobs to make ends meet go mad for the processed stuff because it is a treat and someone else has prepared it.

A government less focussed on ‘growth’ and re-election along with satisfying its donors and more on public health and well-being might do something about it, but right now, no chance. See also transport policy. Health policy etc.

You make it sound like we’re all evil, stupid, weak minded or all three. It’s not quite so mendacious, in my view. Essentially we’re all just dumb actors trying to get the things we need (that includes dopamine), and the current global economy is the consequence of that. To change this would require everyone to start thinking collectively which would require the complete re-programming of the entire world. Which is a pretty big task. Of course, we need it, or something like it, but go easy on us. Sympathy gets more votes than criticism.

@molgrips

You make it sound like we’re all evil, stupid, weak minded or all three. It’s not quite so mendacious, in my view. Essentially we’re all just dumb actors trying to get the things we need (that includes dopamine), and the current global economy is the consequence of that. To change this would require everyone to start thinking collectively which would require the complete re-programming of the entire world

Disagree here (of course 🙂 ). That’s why we have governments – to govern.

What we need is to remove the influence of private money from government. For example, the top ten funders of both the Democrats and Republicans are the same .

Massive democratic reform is what’s needed. To run an actual democracy. Then we’re in with a shot of being able to govern correctly.

That’s why we have governments – to govern.

Yeah but sadly they are democratically elected…

What we need is to remove the influence of private money from government.

Won’t make much difference. Companies will still influence voters who will then vote.

Anyway, I have given up sugar in the past. Then I wandered back into it during the covid times. This week I ate so much sugary shit (conference food) that my digestion was painful and I have decided to quit it again. I’m into day 2.

The SHOCKING BENEFITS Of Quitting Sugar For 30 Days! (How To Live Longer) | Dr. Robert Lustig – YouTube

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No.1 Heart Surgeon: Cardio Is A Waste Of Time For Weight Loss! Philip Ovadia | E240 – YouTube