Fructose

[doronin]

I was thinking to move to fructose, the pure one - not the corn syrup, mainly due to it's low GI. But I keep find strange claims that the product called fructose (the powdered sugar like substance), made from corn and is not 100% fructose, but crystallized HFCS with GI just as the regular sugar is.

Where the truth is? Is it fructose, or "Fructose "?

[jsolomon]

This is pinging on my crap detectors. Could you provide some links, please?

[jsolomon]

Okay, I did some googling on fructose and these people say, which makes some sense, that HFCS is not pure fructose and water. It is a mixture of fructose and glucose (which makes chemical sense to me given the nature of the reaction of glucose to fructose) in water. The fructose and glucose stabilize each other in the solution so it doesn't crystallize at the saturation point. So, dried HFCS would have glucose in it, and glucose is necessary to carry fructose into the bloodstream.

So, you may have to switch suppliers for your fructosen needs. I abolutely know that you can get equally pure fructose as you could sucrose (table sugar). I have no idea on how comparable the prices are, though.

Best of luck!

[Patrick S]

I was thinking to move to fructose, the pure one - not the corn syrup, mainly due to it's low GI. But I keep find strange claims that the product called fructose (the powdered sugar like substance), made from corn and is not 100% fructose, but crystallized HFCS with GI just as the regular sugar is.

Where the truth is? Is it fructose, or "Fructose "?

←

I don't know if the powdered "Fructose" is 100% fructose or not, but my understanding is that HFCS can be made to any arbitrary fructose concentration depending on how thoroughly the corn syrup is treated with invertase enzymes, which convert glucose to fructose. So depending on how high in fructose the HFCS is to begin with, it could be crystallized into a powder that is 40,50, and -I'm assuming- 90+% fructose. Some corn syrup has only like 10-15% fructose, and would produce a powder with a GI higher than table sugar. But if the starting HFCS was very high in fructose, let's say 90%, the resulting powder would be little different from 100% fructose in terms of of glycemic index.

Edited September 15, 2005 by Patrick S (log)

[Patrick S]

Okay, there are HFCSs with at least three different levels of fructose concentrations: HFCS 42, HFCS 55, and HFCS 90, with 42, 55, and 90% fructose concentrations, respectively. So they are available up to at least 90%, and presumably that is what Fructose powder would be made from.

[slkinsey]

Yea. The moral of this story is that not al HFCS is created equal. The HFCS that soda manufacturers use contains only 42-55% fructose. It's called "high fructose" because the normal fructose content would be more like 10% or less. I have a hard time believing that anyone could get away with selling this product as "fructose." There are intensive methods that can be used to incrase the fructose content to more like 90%, however, and it would not be inappropriate to market this as "fructose."

FWIW, most of the fearmongering about HFCS has to do with people thinking that the fructose is the bad part, not the glucose. Not saying that I agree, but that's the general rap. . .

[Patrick S]

Good point, Samuel.

Doronin,

I found information on CornSweet brand fructose, which is manufactured by Archer Daniels Midland Company. It is minimum 99.5% fructose, and maximum 0.5% glucose. See here (PDF file). You can buy an 8lb can for $10 here.

[Just loafing]

So I was going to ask a question about fructose, so maybe this is the opportunity...

I do some organic baking for a client and have been using organic cane sugar which is very coarse and I'm not satisfied with the results with some items. I saw fructose in the client's (health food) store and it was much finer than the cane sugar. They didn't seem to know whether it could be subbed for sugar in a recipe. Can it be?

Thanks, Just Loafing

[doronin]

Well... So, is it correct to assume that sugar-like looking product named "Pure Fructose" will actually contain close to 100%... fructose, regardless what it's made from: fruits or corn?

BTW, as what I found why fructose is often perceived as "bad thing", is that even though it has a low GI, in big quantities it has serious negative effect on cardiovascular system - those big quantities are usually associated with tons of sweet fast food made with HFCS. I think a little fructose in my espresso won't hurt.

[Patrick S]

BTW, as what I found why fructose is often perceived as "bad thing", is that even though it has a low GI, in big quantities it has serious negative effect on cardiovascular system - those big quantities are usually associated with tons of sweet fast food made with HFCS.

←

I'm not sure how foods sweetened with HFCS could have a significantly different effect on cardiovascular system than old-fashioned sucrose derived from cane or beets. Remember, sucrose is 50% fructose and 50% glucose, while the HFCS used in most food products is 42% fructose/58% glucose or 55% fructose/45% glucose. So, in most cases, a product will have very similar amounts of fructose and glucose regardless of whether it is sweetened with sucrose or HFCS.

[Patrick S]

Well... So, is it correct to assume that sugar-like looking product named "Pure Fructose" will actually contain close to 100%... fructose, regardless what it's made from: fruits or corn?

←

Yes, that's a safe assumption. In the US at least, it would be a clear-cut violation of labelling laws to sell a product with that label if it contained a lot of glucose.

[jsolomon]

Well... So, is it correct to assume that sugar-like looking product named "Pure Fructose" will actually contain close to 100%... fructose, regardless what it's made from: fruits or corn?

BTW, as what I found why fructose is often perceived as "bad thing", is that even though it has a low GI, in big quantities it has serious negative effect on cardiovascular system - those big quantities are usually associated with tons of sweet fast food made with HFCS. I think a little fructose in my espresso won't hurt.

←

I'm not sure where you found the stuff about the cardiovascular system. But, without glucose to help, fructose is absorbed very poorly by the gut, but your flora in the downstream ends of the gut like it plenty well. So, sometimes sensitive people who have a low-glucose, high fructose diet can have "internal reports" on the palatability of fructose.

And, to support your assumption in your first paragraph, fructose is fructose. It has a definite chemical structure, and fructose from fruit, corn, or raw materials of C, H, and O will be completely indistinguishable chemically.