Seems that I’ve tumbled across more articles lately about how bad sugar is for you. I’m not sure if it’s just what I happen to be reading or if there’s a sudden surge of publicity about the negative effects of sugar, but it’s gotten me to really think about how much sugar, particularly refined sugar, I’m ingesting every day.
One article pointed out how over the last couple decades food manufacturers, in order to cater to FDA regulations and consumers wanting “low-fat” foods, have replaced fats with sugars. Of course fats are what gives food a lot of flavor and so, the logic goes, replacing them with sugar keeps processed food tastier. Makes sense to me. So I took a look at the ingredient labels on a bunch of stuff in my kitchen, and lo and behold, there was sugar, near the top of the ingredient list in almost everything in my cabinets that came in a box!
So a challenge quickly formed in my mind to go through a day without consuming any sugar. Now sugar is literally everywhere, so I decided to modify my challenge to allow naturally occurring sugars in fruits and vegetables, where the other nutrients help the body to process sugars without causing insulin production to spike up too high.
I also didn’t want to just grind through a day starving and making myself miserable just to make a point. So part of the challenge was also to make flavorful, satisfying meals that I actually wanted to eat and would fill me up.
With those caveats, the challenge is pretty simple: Go through a day without any refined or processed sugars and make satisfying and flavorful meals that are reasonably inexpensive and easy to make. So here are my results!
Pre-Breakfast
- Homemade Café Latte with 2% milk (of course, you can use fat free instead!)
Breakfast
- 2 eggs over easy with sea salt, cracked pepper, red pepper flakes and parsley (see my featured picture with this post)
- Smoothie made with Greek yogurt, an orange, frozen blueberries, parsley, an apple, coconut water, whey protein powder and flaxseed meal
Mid-Morning Snack
- A rather large handful of baby carrots & a glass of water
Lunch
- Baked Potato rubbed with olive oil and garlic salt and topped with Greek yogurt, scallions and diced apple chunks
- Apple slices (between the potato and the apple slices, I used 2 small honey crisp apples, the kind that come in a 5 lb bag at the supermarket)
- Large glass of sparkling water (I prefer LaCroix, but San Pelegrino will work in a pinch!)
Afternoon Snack #1
- Handful of Almonds
- Boiled Egg
Afternoon Snack #2
- Another Café Latte
- Banana
Dinner
- Grilled Ckicken Kababs with green bell peppers, yellow bell peppers and onion
- White rice (Yep, starchy, I know, but we didn’t have any brown rice on hand and no sugar!)
- Sparkling water
Thoughts
Of course, it definitely took some thinking to avoid the sugars. A whole foods based smoothie with protein powder was a great compliment to the eggs for breakfast since it kept me filled up for most of the morning. With just the eggs, I’d have probably started ranging for more snacks, but as it was the carrots were enough to keep me not thinking about food until lunch. Why parsley in the smoothie? It didn’t effect the flavor at all and is packed with nutrients, specifically anti-oxidants, vitamins C and A and folic acid.
The apples on the potato were just an idea that actually turned out pretty good. They added a sweet crunchiness to the potato and worked well with the Greek yogurt, which by the way is one of the most versatile foods I know of!
Drinking water is a vital part of heath and nutrition, but I get bored with glass after glass of ice water. Sparkling water satisfies my “fizz-fix” (I cut out sodas way back when) and I think adds a little flair to any meal or snack. Sparkling water probably takes a little getting used to if you haven’t had it before, but I totally love it. It can take a bland meal and transform it into a bistro style experience (think European café)!
I’ve got a heck of a sweet tooth and was able to complete my challenge and really not miss sugar at all. Is cutting out sugar completely a realistic possibility? Probably not without some radical changes to menu planning, shopping and lifestyle, but one thing my challenge showed me is that I can make major strides in that direction without compromising tasty and satisfying meals.
I’d love to hear your ideas as well!