annaraven - more random update stuph

[AnnaRaven]

The reason we use agave is that it doesn't spike his blood sugar. He's not a big sweet-tooth anyways - this is for marmalade that he might have a tablespoonful twice a week at most. So I'm not particularly worried about using it instead of regular sugar.

Abi - for most fruit spreads and fruit uses, I'd agree with you. But the marmalade was really bitter without some sugar or sweetener added. I tasted it. It was also nice to be able to use 3/4 as much sweetener by using the agave compared to the sugar recipe. I'll probably cut down the sweetener to half next time. I don't mind some level of bitterness: heck, I drink campari! But for the marmalade, it needed some sweetener added.

 

[AnnaRaven]

while at the same time, its wrecking your liver
Thats why I get upset about it.
Its really pushed for diabetics, and they have trouble with their livers already.

Link please?

There is a little bit about it here.
http://www.vegfamily.com/whole-family/wholesome-sweeteners.htm
And lots more here.
http://www.living-foods.com/articles/agave.html

I use honey for just about everything. For jellies and jams, you can use Pomonas Pectin, that does not require sugar, nor does it require lots of cooking to jell.
Here is a blog hop my mother put together for all natural sugar free jelly making.
http://seedsofnutrition.com/?p=6407

We're not vegan. We're not raw foodists. I don't use honey for him (although I love honey and real maple syrup, in small quantities) because it spikes his blood sugar and we're specifically working on his A1C levels - we got it down to *normal* range by the changes of diet we've made, including incorporating agave-sweetened items where sweetener was necessary.

Note - most things don't need sweetener. Yogurt is *better* plain, imho, or mixed with real fruit and doesn't need any honey. I plan to can no-sweetener-added fruit spreads this summer. We mostly prefer un-sweetened stuff. Too many marinaras and spaghetti sauces have sugar in them, which is just silly. However, there are things where sweetener of some form is necessary - or we have to choose between sugar sweetened, agave sweetened, or the sugar-substitute things like stevia or nutrasweet. Stevia is okay in small quantities - we use it sometimes for his tea when he's craving a sweetened tea. Nutrasweet is evil. Agave seems the best choice among those options.
ETA: he drinks sweetened tea maybe once a week, and doesn't drink soda or other sweetened beverages.


So yeah. I am interested in knowing about any scientific studies of agave. Please post if you have links to such studies. Thanks!

 

[AnnaRaven]

Anna, you might enjoy reading about what this family does for livestock, in the middle of a massive city and on 1/5th of an acre, most of which is taken up by the house and gardens.
http://urbanhomestead.org/journal/category/animals/
They have little goats, chickens, ducks and bees, and raise about 6,000 pounds of veges.
http://urbanhomestead.org/

I am not advocating getting goats, but this may give you an idea of some are able to pull it off in small urban areas.

Wow. Amazing!
Thanks for the link.

I don't think we'll be able to fit a goat in here - too much of the backyard is taken up with the pool which was here when we bought the place and DH actually uses in summer. And the front yard isn't really appropriate - big sequoias. oh well. Next house!

 

[Bubblingbrooks]

Link please?

There is a little bit about it here.
http://www.vegfamily.com/whole-family/wholesome-sweeteners.htm
And lots more here.
http://www.living-foods.com/articles/agave.html

I use honey for just about everything. For jellies and jams, you can use Pomonas Pectin, that does not require sugar, nor does it require lots of cooking to jell.
Here is a blog hop my mother put together for all natural sugar free jelly making.
http://seedsofnutrition.com/?p=6407

We're not vegan. We're not raw foodists. I don't use honey for him (although I love honey and real maple syrup, in small quantities) because it spikes his blood sugar and we're specifically working on his A1C levels - we got it down to *normal* range by the changes of diet we've made, including incorporating agave-sweetened items where sweetener was necessary.

Note - most things don't need sweetener. Yogurt is *better* plain, imho, or mixed with real fruit and doesn't need any honey. I plan to can no-sweetener-added fruit spreads this summer. We mostly prefer un-sweetened stuff. Too many marinaras and spaghetti sauces have sugar in them, which is just silly. However, there are things where sweetener of some form is necessary - or we have to choose between sugar sweetened, agave sweetened, or the sugar-substitute things like stevia or nutrasweet. Stevia is okay in small quantities - we use it sometimes for his tea when he's craving a sweetened tea. Nutrasweet is evil. Agave seems the best choice among those options.

So yeah. I am interested in knowing about any scientific studies of agave. Please post if you have links to such studies. Thanks!

What did I say about vegan?

 

[AnnaRaven]

There is a little bit about it here.
http://www.vegfamily.com/whole-family/wholesome-sweeteners.htm
And lots more here.
http://www.living-foods.com/articles/agave.html

I use honey for just about everything. For jellies and jams, you can use Pomonas Pectin, that does not require sugar, nor does it require lots of cooking to jell.
Here is a blog hop my mother put together for all natural sugar free jelly making.
http://seedsofnutrition.com/?p=6407

We're not vegan. We're not raw foodists. I don't use honey for him (although I love honey and real maple syrup, in small quantities) because it spikes his blood sugar and we're specifically working on his A1C levels - we got it down to *normal* range by the changes of diet we've made, including incorporating agave-sweetened items where sweetener was necessary.

Note - most things don't need sweetener. Yogurt is *better* plain, imho, or mixed with real fruit and doesn't need any honey. I plan to can no-sweetener-added fruit spreads this summer. We mostly prefer un-sweetened stuff. Too many marinaras and spaghetti sauces have sugar in them, which is just silly. However, there are things where sweetener of some form is necessary - or we have to choose between sugar sweetened, agave sweetened, or the sugar-substitute things like stevia or nutrasweet. Stevia is okay in small quantities - we use it sometimes for his tea when he's craving a sweetened tea. Nutrasweet is evil. Agave seems the best choice among those options.

So yeah. I am interested in knowing about any scientific studies of agave. Please post if you have links to such studies. Thanks!

What did I say about vegan?

The links were to a raw food site and to a vegan site. I did see links at the bottom of the vegan site to some studies, but those were on HFCS not agave. I do hope to find out more info about this. Thanks for letting me know there's something to investigate on it.

 

[Bubblingbrooks]

I forgot about this list of links I had. Been so long since I have thought about the stuff, and my nutrition links section has become huge.
http://www.westonaprice.org/modern-foods/1604-agave-nectar-worse-than-we-thought.html
https://www.westonaprice.org/press/1568-press-release-2009apr12.html

My Dh has Type 1, and by following traditional foods, and good doses of fermented cod liver oil, he no longer has any of the "normal" issues that diabetics are told they have to live with. The main ones being infections and slow healing.

 

[abifae]

Here is my issue: I have ONLY read about BAD AGAVE on sites I do not find scientific.

But...

Elana's Pantry uses agave in most recipes and here is her take on it...

And here is another , but again, he like most bad agave articles posts a lot of... not necessarily alarmist... but not really scientifically studied? Some of his stuff I can agree with and some not but I don't trust the research.

If you are eating it that rarely, I honestly would not worry at all. LOL.

If it was in everything you cooked, I'd be more concerned.

I'm not sold one way or the other. I react to it like sugar, but I will make insulin on SMELLING sugar. So there you go.

I'm funny about food. I'm pretty sold on low carb but all the "this fights cancer" "this does this amazing thing" etc... I dunno. LOL. There aren't many real studies done on diet let alone individual foods. There are SOME but not many.

So read all you can and see what you think. Anything fructose IS harder on the liver. Fact. Using any sweetener constantly is probably bad for you.

 

[AnnaRaven]

Okay, according to a scientific review:

"
In rats, moderate intake
of various sweeteners (F, HFCS or agave) for 3 nights per
week during a 10-week period increased serum alanine
aminotransferase levels, but no other serious disturbances,
such as those seen with HF, were observed.
54
In humans, the
deleterious effects seen with 20-25% F as an energy source
were not observed when more realistic quantities of 4-12%
F were investigated.
"
So from what I'm reading, according to this review (CLINICS 2010;65(7):729-38), the problem with the studies is that they're conflating high fructose corn syrup and other forms of fructose, and that they're giving huge unrealistic amounts. Until agave is investigated separately in moderate amounts, there's no reason to believe that it leads to negative effects on humans, when taken in moderate amounts.

 

[abifae]

RIGHT! I haven't seen studies shown in real proportions on much of anything.

Name anything you can overeat that won't hurt you?

If you eat 42 times the normal amount of organic free range chicken each day... Your kidneys will still die.

 

[AnnaRaven]

Here is my issue: I have ONLY read about BAD AGAVE on sites I do not find scientific.

But...

Elana's Pantry uses agave in most recipes and here is her take on it...

And here is another , but again, he like most bad agave articles posts a lot of... not necessarily alarmist... but not really scientifically studied? Some of his stuff I can agree with and some not but I don't trust the research.

If you are eating it that rarely, I honestly would not worry at all. LOL.

If it was in everything you cooked, I'd be more concerned.

I'm not sold one way or the other. I react to it like sugar, but I will make insulin on SMELLING sugar. So there you go.

I'm funny about food. I'm pretty sold on low carb but all the "this fights cancer" "this does this amazing thing" etc... I dunno. LOL. There aren't many real studies done on diet let alone individual foods. There are SOME but not many.

So read all you can and see what you think. Anything fructose IS harder on the liver. Fact. Using any sweetener constantly is probably bad for you.

We tend to try to low-carb to *some* extent. DH is Italian, so we do eat pasta (in measured portions) several times a week. We also measure his blood sugar afterwards though, and as long as it's a measured portion without bread, he's fine. 2 oz of regular pasta or 3 oz of whole wheat pasta are fine for his blood sugar. I make the sauces at home, so I know they're not sweetened with sugar or worse, HFCS.

He's not into drinking soda or other softdrinks, so that makes it easier. I gave up soda years ago - found out that colas gave me bladder infections (but not coffee or tea so it's the cola NOT the caffeine) and switched to clear sodas; but then when I needed to get my weight to reasonable, I switched off sodas to water and tea. That was years ago. Nowadays, I might have a glass of soda once a month when I go out. But that doesn't happen that often. I'm more likely to have water anyways, and then have coffee or espresso afterwards.

Anyways - this is a long-winded way to say, I agree about the whole low-carb thing to *some* extent. I loathe the "low-fat" craze that swept the US. Yuck. Stupid. Other than some unnatural crap like nutrasweet and HFCS, and natural poisons like belladonna, there are no evil foods, just bad portion sizes. I'm a big believer in moderation in all things - including moderation.