McDonald's Fructose Free

Hello! It's been almost 2 months since Nate was determined fructose intolerant. I began this blog to help us and others find information about eating with little to no fructose.

 I hope it has done just that! Below is some useful information our Dietician from the Cleveland Clinic gave us about Nathan's favorite place to eat McDonald's!

ALLOWED AT MCDONALD'S:

Chicken McNuggets (without sauces)
French Fries
Burgers, Chicken Sandwiches(the bun has hfcs and of course the onions and tomato ketchup)
Vanilla ice cream cone
Vanilla Shakes

***So that's great news! A fry and mcnuggets! Even a cone!!***

I'm choosing not to list all the foods Nate Can't have- focusing more on the haves than the have nots :)

Letter from Coca Cola about fructose

Hello! I emailed Coca Cola after reading a few studies that said fructose was found in Mexican Coke which lists sugar as it's ingredients- as we know cane sugar is okay for fructose intolerant peeps like my son. Here is what I wrote and Coca Cola's timely response:
WHAT I WROTE:Hi. My son is fructose intolerant. Mexican Coke only says sugar- but some 
studies I read says they contain hfcs. Is this true? Thanks, JIll Kupchik 


COCA COLA'S RESPONSE:

Thank you for contacting The Coca-Cola Company, Ms. Kupchik.  Your interest in our brands is certainly appreciated.


The majority of Coca-Cola bottlers use high fructose corn syrup (HFCS).  This decision is typically based on availability and cost.  


The only sparkling product made with sucrose is Coca-Cola from Mexico, which is available in select regions.
Coca-Cola from Mexico contains the following safe ingredients:  Carbonated water, sugar, caramel color, phosphoric acid,  natural flavors and caffeine.

You may be interested to know that nutritional information for most of our brands in the U.S. is available via our website. 

Go to thecoca-colacompany.com, click on "Brands" at the top, then select "U.S. Product Nutrition Information."

In addition, you may know that HFCS is a sweetener derived from corn.  The mixture we use in our soft drinks is very similar to liquid sucrose and is composed of approximately half glucose (45%) and half fructose (55%).
We hope this information is helpful.  Please be assured your comments have been shared appropriately.  Feel free to contact us again if you have further questions.
Jennifer
Industry and Consumer Affairs
The Coca-Cola Company


I was very impressed by how quickly they got back to me (within 2 hours). Perhaps the studies are incorrect- all research is flawed, can be skewed....learned this from a graduate research class and good ole' common sense! We'll have Nate try it. I don't condone pop drinking (my kids have about 3 sips a year at Christmas!) but now that Nate's 8 I do see his friends drink it at birthday parties.

Label reading is tough- are companies telling the truth? For my son's sake I sure hope so!

Mexican Coca-Cola and fructose

Mexican Coca-Cola. I thought it was too good to be true!

If you read my last post about hfcs and soda then you know what I'm talking about! 

Tested samples of Mexican Coca-Cola – which is supposedly made with cane sugar instead of HFCS – contained no sucrose, only fructose and glucose in a 52%-to-48% ratio.

You see on the label in the pic below Meixcan Coke contains no hfcs- only good ole' cane sugar (which Nate can have). In the recent studies it was determined that it does, in deed, contain hfcs. 

Perhaps these studies are incorrect? I will email coka cola and see what they say.

 All  research is flawed slightly- I learned this in my graduate Research class! 

When my husband found Mexican Coke at our grocery store we thought it was a nice "once in awhile" treat for Nathan- he'll never get to drink pop at a party or a restaurant but if it does contain fructose it'll be added to the can't have list. Yay it's healthy being fructose free but when you're friends are sucking down cola's and you have water and your'e a kid- it's a drag. Thank goodness for Kool-aid!

How much high fructose corn syrup is in soda?

How much fructose is really in soda?

Hello! Here is a study I though was interesting about soda and hfcs.: from October 26, 2010|By Karen Kaplan, Los Angeles Times

Researchers from the University of Southern California’s Keck School of Medicine went shopping in East Los Angeles and bought 23 cans and bottles of popular beverages. Then they sent them off to a laboratory in Massachusetts that used a technique called high-performance liquid chromatography to determine how much fructose, glucose and sucrose were in each sample. Each beverage was tested three times, and all samples were unlabeled.

**Fructose is sweeter than glucose and has been shown to do more damage to your metabolism.*** and to my son fructose isn't tolerated! 

Sucrose – better known as table sugar – is a 50-50 combination of fructose and glucose. **So if you're fructose intolerant you should steer clear of sucrose too! Or at least limit it.

The HFCS used in soda is supposed to contain no more than 55% fructose and 45% glucose, according to the Corn Refiners Assn. (Another popular formulation is 42% fructose and 58% glucose.) 

But it turns out that some of the stuff they put in soda isn’t HFCS, it’s RHFCS – Really High Fructose Corn Syrup.

The Keck researchers found that the sweeteners in Coca-Cola and Pepsi contained as much as 65% fructose (and only 35% glucose), and Sprite registered as much as 64% fructose (and 36% glucose).

The study included a few other surprises:

• Mountain Dew had 13% less sugar than advertised on the label, and Dr. Pepper had 8% less.
• Tested samples of Mexican Coca-Cola – which is supposedly made with cane sugar instead of HFCS – contained no sucrose, only fructose and glucose in a 52%-to-48% ratio.
• 17% of the sweetener in Red Bull was fructose, even though sucrose and glucose are the only sweeteners listed on the label.

Of course Nate can't have pop (as we call soda in cleveland) nor can his Dad who has hypoglycemia. Just interesting that even with reading labels we cannot always trust they are correct. So yes a cold soda looks refreshing but not worth it when your'e fructose intolerant.

Fructose Intolerant Symptoms

What happens when Nathan cheats and has fructose:

*Bellyache
*Really fowl smelling gas
*Stomach "problems" which leads to weigh loss (sometimes he pukes)
*Feeling so very full he eats as much as a 2 year old (he's 8)- which led to weight loss and stunted his growth

*Yes we have cheated here and there but when Nate had a little too much fructose you can see how little he ate at dinner, and he likes this dinner!  No night time snack...just not worth it.

Sticking with a fructose free life and healthy living. Good luck on your new diet :)

Fructose free bread: Brownberry!!

Breads that DO NOT contain FRUCTOSE (natural or artificial)

 Surprisingly this bread is not 

                                                                                sweetened with honey!

 

Brownberry also sells this soft Italian bread. It is delicious and fructose free!

Nathan loves it! Dips it in olive oil & spices, he can eat sandwiches again (with lunch meats not containing honey!) It's great bread & conns no hfcs!!!

Yay Brownberry :)

Bubblegum and Fructose

"Can I have this gum?"- a question my son keeps asking me. 

But the first or 2nd ingredient is always 

corn syrup. So when Grandma handed 

me new bubbleum to check the label I 

was surprised. Hfcs was missing and 

instead ingredient no. 2 was: Gluclose 

Syrup- something I haven't seen in any 

other label I've read. So what is this? 

Does it have fructose? 

Here is what I 

found:

The term "glucose-fructose syrup" is a European thing, where the EU regulates the amount of fructose in things.  "Glucose-fructose syrup"  has more glucose than fructose, where most HFCS is 55% fructose.  They'd have to call that "fructose-glucose syrup". It is usually manufactured in the same way as HFCS, by taking glucose syrup (aka corn syrup) and processing it to convert some of the glucose into fructose.  There are other ways of making it, but this one is common because it's cheap. So it's very similar to HFCS, but not quite the same.  The exact amount of fructose isn't clear from the label, and it could be much lower than HFCS, or it could be nearly identical. So it looks like the new gum is out. Not worth a belly ache.