Who the hell makes JAM with High Fructose Corn Syrup?!?!?

[GirlinContempt]

Well, I'll tell you who. House of Webster, Inc from Rogers, Ar

I was hunting through the pantry for jam, as we have none left in the fridge, and this is the only one I found. It's also the only jam I've ever seen with HFCS in the ingredients. This just seems nuts to me.
Most jam ingredients lists read: fruit of some kind, sugar, pectin, maybe some preservative or something

This one reads: red raspberries, corn syrup, high fructose corn syrup, fruit pectin and aitric acid.

This is serious business. My late night "I skipped dinner" toaster waffle peanut butter and jam sandwich has been compromised.

[DarkTirade]

1. I think just about all of them use it nowadays.

If you can find some 'no sugar added' kinds, they probably won't have any.

[GirlinContempt]

2. No jam I have ever bought has had HFCS in it

Then again, this one was bought in the US.
Maybe that's it. It's an American thing.

[DarkTirade]

3. Oh yeah, they're replacing sugar with HFCS in just about everything here.

That's why people make a big deal about finding mexican coca-cola instead of american... they still use real sugar there.

[GirlinContempt]

4. I think out coke uses normal sugar too

It doesn't say HFCS

[TreasonousBastard]

10. Aha! I forgot you're Canadian and you...

can get cheap Cuban sugar up there, so you don't have this problem. Actually, any sugar you get up there is at the world price, which is much cheaper than ours.

US food companies went to HFRC years ago simply because it's so much cheaper than sugar down here. Once in a while I see it in European, mainly Swiss, preserves and things, but that's been rare.

[GirlinContempt]

11. That's too bad

If I was an American, I think i'd be willing to pay extra for sugar, just based on the taste of that nasty ass jam I just ate

[TreasonousBastard]

15. Many of us are. There are products without HFRC, and...

quite a few don't cost much more. I should stay with the sugar-free ones, though, but they're almost all even nastier than the HFRC stuff.

[GirlinContempt]

17. Here

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=105&topic_id=7460012&mesg_id=7460524

I just did a random sample... my pantry is way too huge to check everything, but I'm seeing a trend.

[Gold Metal Flake]

5. Yup, in the states that crap is in everything.

Tomato sauce, jelly, barbeque sauce, syrup, Rose's Lime Juice. You gotta read labels. This can not be good for us.

[GirlinContempt]

6. Gross

[Gold Metal Flake]

8. I just looked in the fridge.

:scared:

I think we need to figure out how to get what we want without the HFCS. Problem is that it will probably require additional trips to additional stores to find products we like. A busy family has little time to shop for groceries at several stores across a crowded urban environment. Oh, gas prices are up so I hear. Man, this sounds like the start of another one of my Grand Experiments. Find groceries without HFCS.

Oh, did I mention Mustard? Yeah, the bastards are screwing with Mustard!

[GirlinContempt]

18. That's awful

:( Maybe it's time to move :D

[Muttocracy]

9. yep, read Omnivore's Dilemma

Thought I was pretty educated on food and ag issues, but my god, that stuff is in everything!

http://www.michaelpollan.com/omnivore.php

[Connonym]

20. That is one hell of an enlightening (and somewhat frightening) book

corn is teh evil!

[Muttocracy]

70. indeed! and we are made of corn now so.... n/t

[GirlinContempt]

7. I can now officially report that jam made with HFCS tastes like shit.

Yuck.

[Gormy Cuss]

45. Yep neither HFCS nor corn syrup deliver sweetness as well as cane sugar.

The proliferation of HFCS in food here is so bad that even some of the *cough* health food varieties had them.

[grasswire]

12. it's even in canned tomatoes

...tomato soup, everything.

[GirlinContempt]

14. That is just sick.

I'm going to look in my pantry now.

[GirlinContempt]

16. A random sampling from my pantry:

Campbells Cream Of Asparagus Soup - Condensed
water, asparagus, enriched wheat flour, canola or soybean oil, salt, cream, modified corn starch, whey powder, sugar, soy protein isolate, msg, xanthan gum, spice and calcium caseinate

Aylmer Diced Tomatoes w/ Spices
fresh red vine ripened tomatoes (sure, whatever), tomato juice, sugar, salt, dehydrated parsley and basil, spices, citric acid, calcium chloride

Old El Paso Thick N'Chunky Medium Salsa
water, diced tomatoes, onions, tomato paste, salt, lemon juice, white vinegar, sugar, dried jalapeño peppers, garlic and onion powder, spice, calcium chloride, citric acid, capsicum extract

Heinz Tomato Ketchup
tomato paste, sugar, white vinegar, salt, onion powder, spices.

Briannas Lively Lemon Tarragon Dressing
water, honey, malt vinegar, apple cider vinegar, salt, Dijon mustard, fructose, canola oil, garlic, dried lemon, xanthan gum, spices, natural lemon and orange flavours, turmeric, citric acid, mixed tocopherols (vitamin e)

Classico Alfredo Pasta Sauce (jar)
water, cream, Parmesan cheese, egg yolks, modified corn starch, butter, salt, sugar, whey protein, xanthan gum, roasted garlic puree, spice, lactic acid, natural flavour, soybean oil


Not a single HFCS in the bunch. Kind of creepy that the soup and tomatoes and stuff have sugar in them, mind you, but no HFCS.

[Donk Yore]

13. High just may be your key word

in that sentence!

:)

[MagickMuffin]

19. Smucker's, Welch's and probably ALL American brands

I went to my fridge and we have a jar of jam, looked at the label and noticed corn syrup but not HFCS, then I noticed it was imported from Britain.


Here's some info on the process of jelly/jam making, I didn't copy the whole article just this part:

When sugar prices soared in the early 1970s, high fructose corn syrup (HFCS) became a popular substitute. Several major food processing companies, including Archer Daniels Midland, Amstar CPC International, Cargill, H.J. Heinz, and Anheuser Busch opened HCFS plants.

Raw Materials

Jams and jellies are made from a variety of fruits, either singly or in combination. Most of the fruits are harvested in the fall. The level of ripeness varies. Pears, peaches, apricots, strawberries, and raspberries gel best if picked slightly underripe. Plums and cherries are best if picked when just ripe. The fruit is purchased from farmers. Most jam and jelly producers develop close relationships with their growers in order to ensure quality. The production plants are built close to the fruit farms so that the time elapsed between harvest and preparation is between 12-24 hours.

Sugar or high fructose corn syrup, or a combination of the two are added to the fruit to sweeten it. Cane sugar chips are the ideal type of sugar used for preserving fruit. Granulated and beet sugar tend to crystallize. Sugar is purchased from an outside supplier. High fructose corn syrup is processed by fermenting cornstarch. It is purchased from an outside supplier.



We even import our HFCS. I hate that shit.

I think more studies need to be conducted on HFCS to determine if that shit is responsible for our health problems. I happen to think that they do have an ill effect on our bodies.

I try to avoid anything with HFCS, of course as others have stated it is in EVERYTHING.:puke:

Now GirlinContempt, you should go wash your mouth out, rinse, repeat, not because your have a potty mouth (because I resemble that remark) but because you were just eating shit.

[GirlinContempt]

21. I have Heinz ketchup, and I've bought Kraft and Smucker's jam without HFCS

I guess I'm just really really lucky.

And yeah, it was revolting.

[MagickMuffin]

22. Oh Noesssssssss

Alrighty then, you made me go back and check my ketchup (Heinz, of course) HFCS, √

Wishbone Salad Dressing HFCS, √

Worcestershire Sauce HFCS √

It really is hard to buy anything without it. It's kinda like people who insist that throwing pig (bacon, ham hocks) into a pot of beans to give it flavor, like beans don't have flavor without the pig added into it.

I grew up in that culture of thinking you have to add meat to vegetables to give them flavor:crazy:

I love fresh green beans and guess what, they have flavor all by themselves, although I do love to add fresh new potatoes, which also have a wonderful flavor.

Too bad you don't live close to me I'd ask you for your nasty jam and feed it to my goats. Casper would love it.

[GirlinContempt]

25. That's really too bad

I don't think I can mail opened foodstuffs ;)

[ghostsofgiants]

23. The stuff was probably made in Canada and thus used sugar instead of HFCS?

I dunno, that's a guess.

[GirlinContempt]

26. Yeah could be. I don't doubt

that near everything there has it, I was just checking my own stuff to be sure it didn't

[Flaxbee]

24. Went to pick up cranberry juice the other day, and now Ocean

Spray doesn't use sugar, they use HFCS instead. OK, cross Ocean Spray off the list! I found some *pure* cranberry juice, though (and man is it TART!), and mixed it with Perrier and it was yummy.

But I was seriously pissed off. It has gotten so that I just buy unsweetened everything; I figure I can blend in some sugar or honey if I think whatever it is (like peanut butter) needs a little sweetening.

[GirlinContempt]

27. We always buy 100% juice, thankfully

it's nice mixed with mineral water, you're right :)

[1]

28. come on...

sugar is sugar.

cane vs beet vs hfcs?

its all the same...

[GirlinContempt]

29. No, it isn't.

[MagickMuffin]

30. OH No it isn't the same, CasualWatcher9

HFCS is nasty, and we don't even have a clue whether or not they are using genetically engineered corn.

Genetically engineered corn is not supposed to be consumed by humans, yet we have no idea if it is getting into our food supply.

I would rather use regular sugar cane as my preferred sweetener.

Pigs are pigs, all pig meat is the same.

Do you like pigs feet?

Cows are cows, all cows are the same.

Would you eat cows tongues?

Chickens are chickens, all chickens are the same.

How about chickens lips?

Would you like to eat chicken lips?

:rofl:.............. Sorry chicken lips is an old joke from my childhood.

[hippywife]

31. Nope, it's not.

Many doctors think that it's main culprit, among the many, responsible for the increased obesity in this country along with Type II Diabetes which they can no longer call Adult Onset Diabetes because of the number of children who now have it. They draw a correlation to these increases with the time that the so called food industry started using HFCS.

It's nasty shit and we buy nothing with it in there. It's really difficult and pricey but it's important and it can be done.

Watch your bread folks. It's in there, too.

[EstimatedProphet]

32. Soda jam!

All the best qualities of soda and jam in one!

[GirlinContempt]

42. My soda doesn't even have it

[HughBeaumont]

33. US companies.

This is why, if I want soda, I buy Boylan's. No High Fructose Corn Throw-up there.

http://www.boylanbottling.com/

And whoever said "all sugars are the same"? HFCT has a nasty aftertaste that sticks to your pallate after you consume it. Cane sugar has no such aftertaste.

[Gold Metal Flake]

36. Oooh, I like the Boylans!

I look for real sugar in my pop. We get soda at Beverages and More and they have a good selection of small-label sugar-based pop. But, Bubble-up and Seven just ain't the same. I'd love to have the option of real sugar Seven Up.

[GirlinContempt]

43. Yeah, I've noticed

when I go to the US that some things just taste different, and I don't really like it. It was the same kind of 'different' with the jam. HFCS is not = sugar at least in the basic taste dept. cane OR beet.

[distantearlywarning]

34. You think that's crazy?

Try going to your pantry for some tomato soup and looking at the ingredients only to find that evil poisonous shit!

Tomato fucking soup! I swear, it's like an HFCS conspiracy or something. I've found it in everything - bread, beans, soup, salad dressing, mayo, crackers, you name it.

At least jam is *supposed* to be sweet.

[GirlinContempt]

44. That's just gross

Jam may suppose to be sweet, but it isn't supposed to be gross :)

I can't believe how much stuff it's in. I'm so glad we've escaped it.

[distantearlywarning]

35. DUPE

[guitar man]

37. that crap is in just about everything

...you pick up off the shelf these days :(

My 2 year old daughter has an extreme intolerance to it, a fructose malabsorption problem they call it. Before the doc figured out what was wrong, it had plugged her intestines up something awful.

So we have to shop very carefully for natural foods for her....and it gets very expensive to feed her because of it....:(

[1gobluedem]

38. Smuckers has HFCS too, I think

I order my jam online now from American Spoon: www.americanspoon.com. Try the cherry-blueberry spoon fruit -- yum.

[GirlinContempt]

46. Not the stuff you can buy in Canada

At least not that I've bought! Hop across the border and stock up on jam :D

[lizerdbits]

39. That's why I make my own

And with high pectin fruits you don't even need to add additional pectin if your batch is small enough (hence mass production adding it), just sugar and a bit of lemon juice. Of course most people I know think I'm nuts for making my own since I water bath can instead of freeze it, but I like it. Tiny jars make great gifts!

[Fire Walk With Me]

40. I was looking at a BBQ sauce yesterday that has it as the first ingredient.

[MissMillie]

41. I'm sorry, but as bad as that is, to me it's the HFCS in

SPAGHETTI SAUCE that makes the least amount of sense.

[GirlinContempt]

47. None if it makes sense

Why not just use sugar?


I do know the reasons, but I still think it's nuts.

[MissMillie]

51. I get your point

but I don't think sugar belongs in spaghetti sauce either. :puke:

[GirlinContempt]

53. Agreed

[HiFructosePronSyrup]

48. It's just sugar.

:shrug:

[GirlinContempt]

49. Have a spoonful of jam made with HFCS

and then one made with sugar, and tell me that.

[HiFructosePronSyrup]

50. Well, they'd both be made out of sugar, now wouldn't they?

But I think you're talking about sugar refined from corn syrup, and sugar refined from sugar cane.

OK. You try it too in a blind taste test and see if you can taste the difference.

[GirlinContempt]

52. Sugar is commonly defined as sugar cane and sugar beets (sucrose).

Honey isn't 'sugar', it's honey. It doesn't taste like sugar. HFCS isn't sugar, its High Fructose Corn Syrup.

Sugar is made by collecting the juice of the cane and boiling it. When it cools , the liquid crystallizes.

HFCS is made by processing corn starch to get corn syrup, which is almost all glucose. Then they add enzymes to make it fructose.
1. Cornstarch is treated with alpha-amylase to produce shorter chains of sugars called oligosaccharides.
2. Glucoamylase breaks the sugar chains down even further to yield the simple sugar glucose.
3. Xylose isomerase converts glucose to a mixture of about 42% fructose and 50–52% glucose with some other sugars mixed in.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/High-fructose_corn_syrup#Production

I know there is a difference. I notice a difference every time I visit the US in the taste of common beverages and snacks. I didn't realize what it was before. I ate that jam, and I tell you I never will again. It tasted wrong. It hurt my teeth and didn't feel or taste right in my mouth. Many people can tell the difference, because there is one.

If HFCS is high fructose corn syrup. Sugar is sugar cane or sugar beets, same as it has been since 10,000BC

[HiFructosePronSyrup]

55. Oh sweet Jesus, may God have mercy on the scientifically illiterate.

Sugar is a class of edible carbohydrates, usually five or six carbons and oligomers thereof. The most common of which are glucose and fructose, the dimer of which is sucrose, which constitutes the bulk of table sugar. Sucrose, of course, is digested into glucose and fructose, which are the same sugars in HFCS, and are interconverted into one another via the pentose phosphate pathway and other forms of metabolism.

[GirlinContempt]

57. And may he also have mercy on the overly technical and dense.

Sugar is the common name for sucrose. HFCS is not sucrose, period. How your body breaks it down has nothing to do with the way it tastes or what it begins as. HFCS is what sugar may BECOME, but it is not SUGAR.

The body also processes saccharides and proteins in to glucose. That does not make beef protein, soy, or bread sugar.

While the end up the same, they are not the same thing. For one so scientifically literate, you sure are dense at functioning in the real world where people categorize things based on raw content, taste etc.

[GirlinContempt]

60. Here's some science!

http://www.scq.ubc.ca/our-sweet-ending-health-consequences-with-high-fructose-corn-syrup-consumption/
Unlike table sugar, HFCS contains simple sugars that do not require further digestion to be absorbed by the human body. This contributes to the higher sweetness factor of HFCS. Furthermore, HFCS-55 contains a higher fructose to glucose ratio than table sugar (1). These characteristics show that substituting table sugar with HFCS results in an overall increased absorption and consumption of fructose. In fact, fructose consumption has increased drastically by 26% in the last three decades (4).

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2007/08/070823094819.htm
n the current study, Chi-Tang Ho, Ph.D., conducted chemical tests among 11 different carbonated soft drinks containing HFCS. He found 'astonishingly high' levels of reactive carbonyls in those beverages. These undesirable and highly-reactive compounds associated with "unbound" fructose and glucose molecules are believed to cause tissue damage, says Ho, a professor of food science at Rutgers University in New Brunswick, N.J. By contrast, reactive carbonyls are not present in table sugar, whose fructose and glucose components are "bound" and chemically stable, the researcher notes.

[Shakespeare]

66. Yup. It fucks w/the adrenals. That's why my doctor (MD!) advised me to avoid that stuff.

I have PCOS, and have to watch my carb intake very closely, and he advised me to specifically avoid HFCS. The adrenal system processes HFCS differently than other sugars.

:thumbsup:

[IronLionZion]

54. Companies who don't want me to buy their jam, that's who.

I try to remember to read the labels before buying stuff. Peanut butter is another one that has terrible things in it. And the organic stuff is better for you but the oil separates from the peanut butter.

[Connonym]

56. Read post #9 by JoeIsOneOfUs

that shit is EVERYWHERE. Corn actually is in just about every fucking thing these days. I would seriously recommend everyone read Omnivore's Dilemma. You'll look at how we (Americans) eat in a whole new way. Corn is (pardon the pun)one of the CORNerstones of our economy. It's sort of creepy.

[GirlinContempt]

58. I'm lucky I'm a Canadian

this thread is a real eye opener. I read labels sometimes, not religiously, but this jam I happened to read as the ingredients were on the front with the name. I was shocked.

Can you taste the difference?

[progressoid]

59. There are corn products in LOTS of processed foods.

I heard about someone who tried eat food with out corn products in the ingredients. Apparently very difficult.

[End Of The Road]

61. Check out Lea & Perrins Worcestershire Sauce - yep -

HFCS is the third or fourth ingredient. Who'd a thunk it in worcestershire?

[GirlinContempt]

62. Mine doesn't have it! neener neener!

[End Of The Road]

63. Ahhh - send me yours!

My bottle even has the audacity to say "original" on it - yeah, right. We switched brands and it's not as good.

[End Of The Road]

64. Have you accidentally picked up a product with Splenda

in it, instead of sugar or HFCS? Ewwww. Whose bad idea was that?

[GirlinContempt]

65. Thank crike no

[Muttocracy]

71. yes! they're sneaky about it!

Splenda is in so many things now and you have to read carefully. Or just go non-processed-food.

[Beausoleil]

67. "if you want the best jam, You gotta make your own"

Strawberry Jam
Michelle Shocked

Saturday morning found me itching
To get on over to my grandma's kitchen
The sweetest little berries was cooking up right
And then we'd put them in a canning jar and seal them up tight
We were making jam
Strawberry jam, that's what kind
Yeah, if you want the best jam
You gotta make your own

We have Smucker's, Welches, Knotts Berry Farm
But a little homemade jam never did a body no harm
A little local motion is all we need
To close down these corporate jam factories
We'll be making jam
Strawberry jam, mmmm-mm
If you want the best jam
You gotta make your own


Yeah, we have a little revolution sweeping the land
Now once more everybody's making homemade jam
So won't you call your friends up on the telephone
You invite 'em on over, you make some jam of your own
You'll be making jam
Strawberry jam
If you want the best jam
You gotta make your own

Saturday morning found me itching
To get on over to my grandma's kitchen
Where the sweetest little berries were cooking up right
And then we'd put them in a canning jar and seal them up tight
We was making jam
Strawberry jam, that's what kind
If you want the best jam
You gotta make your own
Aw, one more time
Oh, makin' that jam
Yeah, Strawberry jam
If you want the best jam
You gotta make your own

[applegrove]

68. Sugar in the US is kept at an artificially high price. Why some candy

corporations have moved to Mexico or Canada.

[GOPisEvil]

69. Fuck! Normally I buy a brand I know has no HFCS. Stupid sale roped me in.

Now I have TWO JARS of that stuff in my house. x( Normally I'm better about reading labels.

[GirlinContempt]

72. What, the same brand as the one I have?

[GOPisEvil]

73. No. Safeway store brand.

[GirlinContempt]

75. Oh, odd. I have bought it and it doesn't have HFCS

does your safeway have the O Organics brand?
I just bought a jar of that so I'd have some good jam yesterday, it's made with organic cane sugar :)

[GOPisEvil]

76. They do have the O Organics, but this is just the regular store brand.

I got suckered by the sale price. Normally I buy the organic stuff. Live and learn.

[Broken_Hero]

74. Zod, he makes it that way....

thats why we must unite, against the Kryptonian scourge...:)

[GirlinContempt]

77. That sounds like a lot of work