WK04 L11 Be Aware of Sugar Sources

Be Aware of Sugar Sources

0:22 Your last simple strategy for nutrition beginners is to stay mindful of your sugar intake. Let's learn about how sugars used by the body, how much is appropriate in our diet, and complete in activity to get an eye-opening look at the amount of sugar we are consuming.

0:39 When we eat foods that contain sugar, our body breaks it down and stores it in the liver and muscles, or uses it for energy.

0:47 When too much sugar is consumed, the excess can get stored as body fat. How much sugar is okay? According to the American Heart Association, the maximum amount of added sugars you should eat in a day are for women and children ages 2 to 18, 24 grams of sugar, or 6 teaspoons.

1:07 For men, it's 36 grams of sugar, or 9 teaspoons. How much added sugars do most American consume? Americans eat about 20 teaspoons of sugar a day, according to a report from the National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey Database.

1:27 Common sources of sugar are sodas, flavored coffee drinks, sports drinks, ice cream, flavored yogurts, cereal, ketchup, barbecue sauce, chocolate milk, and snack bars, including some protein bars.

1:45 To avoid the excess sugar in many of these products, it's best to make them at home. This puts you in control of the amount of sugar that is in that meal.

1:54 We understand it might not always be possible to cook your own food. So when you're buying packaged foods, look at the labels and choose the brands that have the lower sugar amounts or that sugar is towards the bottom of the ingredient list.

2:13 Sugar-y drinks can be a big source of sugar in our diets. Products can have a deceiving packaging that says 100% juice or all natural, but still contain high amounts of sugar.

2:25 We'd like to show you an eye-opening demonstration of the actual amounts of sugar in common beverages. First, we need to determine the total amount of sugar in a beverage.

2:35 To calculate the total amount of sugar in a beverage, look for the sugar content on the label. Next, look for the number of servings in that beverage.

2:44 If there is more than one serving in that product, multiply the amount of sugar on the label by the number of servings in the beverage.

2:53 Last, we need to divide this number by four because a teaspoon of sugar is equal to four grams. So if we divide the total amount of sugar by four, this gives us the number of teaspoons we'll be looking at in our sugar demonstration.

3:08 Here's an example. 28 grams of sugar were listed on the label. 2.5 total servings were on the label. This makes the grand total of sugar in that bottle 70 grams of sugar.

3:21 When we divided 70 by 4, this equals 17.5. There were 17.5 teaspoons of sugar to be measured into the clear plastic cups.

3:32 Can you believe some beverages had over 17 teaspoons of sugar in them? Wow! Remember, ladies and kids, ages 2 to 18 should have no more than six teaspoons of sugar a day.

3:46 Gentlemen, your daily limit is nine teaspoons of sugar a day. To truly learn what your daily sugar intake is, we recommend you journal your nutrition for three days.

3:57 This is your simple strategy number seven assignment. You can write it down in an notebook and look up the total amount of sugars at the end of the day or use a food journaling app like my fitness pal, lose it or fit bit.

4:11 Many of these apps are free and we'll track your calories and sugar totals for you. At the end of the day, look up your total sugar consumed.

4:21 Was it higher than you thought it would be? When we've journaled your food intake, you'll be able to look at what foods or beverages gave you the highest amounts of sugar.

4:30 Work on eliminating these from your diet or decreasing the frequency and amount that you are consuming.