SoylentNews is people
SoylentNews
The BBC has a report on Nestle's press release concerning its recent experiments in materials science. From the press release:
Using only natural ingredients, researchers have found a way to structure sugar differently. So even when much less is used in chocolate, your tongue perceives an almost identical sweetness to before.
The discovery will enable Nestlé to significantly decrease the total sugar in its confectionery products, while maintaining a natural taste.
"This truly groundbreaking research is inspired by nature and has the potential to reduce total sugar by up to 40% in our confectionery," said Stefan Catsicas, Nestlé Chief Technology Officer.
While details of the method are not yet available, the process apparently involves "hollowing out" the sugar crystals so they dissolve faster, thereby increasing perceived sweetness with less total sugar. Nestle is already touting this as a way of achieving some of its publicly announced goals of sugar reduction in its products. Apparently they plan to introduce the new sugar structure in Crunch, Butterfinger, and BabyRuth bars in 2018.
[Continues...]
However, is this actually a useful change for dietary control or to prevent obesity? New York Magazine is skeptical:
This all sounds amazing until you remember that reduced-calorie foods with artificial sweeteners — looking at you, diet soda — can make you eat more by messing with your brain's expectations of how much sustenance it's about to get. Diet soda is particularly bad because it contains zero calories but is still very sweet, though studies in mice suggest that reduced-calorie foods can also increase hunger.
Even if you don't feel hungrier after eating diet chocolate, you might think about the calories you saved and then eat them somewhere else. In playing mad scientist with sugar, snack companies are doing what they think they need to do as customers are trying to eat healthier, but just know that it might not save you any calories in the long run.
While the ultimate effects are speculative for the moment, this latter statement seems to follow the logic around previous studies on artificial sweeteners reported here (such as on sucralose and aspartame).
(Score: 2, Insightful) by Ethanol-fueled on Saturday December 03 2016, @01:36AM
Well, Nestle chocolate is already fake-tasting crap (even by American standards, which admittedly are pretty bad), so making it slightly more healthy would be a good improvement. Although I love their Butterfinger bars, the only candy bar worthy of Bart Simpson's endorsement. [youtube.com] It even had its own ritual, just as Chee-toes with the residue on the fingers -- the malleable butter part gets stuck in your teeth and there is no other way to quickly remove it other than scraping the business end of your molars with your fingernails to dig it out. I'd be happy to serve as a Guinea-pig because the stakes are pretty low.
Actually, I think sugar is getting a bad rap, there have been many bullshit "wars on ingredients" before. Eggs, formerly demonized for the cholesterol content of their yolks, had their turn -- in fact, there was an ad campaign released decades ago with the slogan "give eggs a break" which dramatically showed a condemned egg being released from its cell and walked out the prison to freedom.
What there should be a war against is laboratory-synthesized crap. Even in California, unless you shop at Whole Foods or Sprouts, it is cheaper to buy produce and chicken than it is to live off of fast-food. It is also cheap to exercise, in fact, you can do it for free. The problems with food-related epidemics, more often than not, boil down to human sloth. Local convenience stores accept EBT (welfare gibs-me-dats* allocated to only food) which only serves to perpetuate the bad life choices of EBT's recipients (my parents were far from perfect, but at least I had a somewhat homemade canned green-beans and whipped-up hamburger-helper for dinner -- rather than a 64-oz soda and a rancid sweaty 7-11 hotdog like the families you see in 7-11 around dinnertime).
(Score: -1, Troll) by Ethanol-fueled on Saturday December 03 2016, @01:41AM
* Oh, my apologies, in my haste I forgot to clarify the asterisk:
also known as "gibsmedats," are when minorities who don't want to work are given subsistence money at the taxpayers' expense.
(Score: 1, Touché) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday December 03 2016, @02:58AM
'Cause everyone knows white trash doesn't use welfare. Ha!
(Score: 2) by Azuma Hazuki on Saturday December 03 2016, @06:36AM
I'm not sure he's more than casually trolling with the racist bullshit honestly. I really cannot tell whether he actually believes it, is doing it for the shock value (much like a toddler deliberately exposing himself in public) or some combination of both. Regardless, his journal entries are a hoot.
I am "that girl" your mother warned you about...
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday December 03 2016, @02:41AM
homemade canned green-beans and whipped-up hamburger-helper
Don't brag. That food is probably just as far from home-made as the soda and hot-dogs. Seriously, check the ingredients - way too much salt and chemicals.
(Score: 3, Informative) by linuxrocks123 on Saturday December 03 2016, @08:24AM
way too much salt and chemicals.
Oh yeah, man. Chemicals are the worst. Just take a look at this one, which is present in virtually all the foods you buy at the store. Even Whole Foods has aisles of products full of this stuff: http://www.dhmo.org/ [dhmo.org]
Dihydrogen monoxide is just one of the many chemicals we need to get out of our systems. If we all just stopped ingesting stuff like dihydrogen monoxide every day, I'll bet the death rates from cancer and heart disease would plummet within DAYS.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday December 03 2016, @09:36AM
Incidentally, the IUPAC official chemical name for dihydrogen monoxide is oxidane.
This chemical is quite commonly used as the major constituent of automobile engine coolant.
Its also frequently used in the toilet.
Its CAS number is 7732-18-5, and as little as a few ounces of the stuff in the wrong place will do you in.
The world is full of chemicals... woe! woe! woe! You won't get away from 'em till you become a spiritual being.
(Score: 2) by Aiwendil on Saturday December 03 2016, @01:51PM
While on the subject of chemical free [smbc-comics.com]