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Food

Even Fruit Might Be Ruining Your Diet

A recent study suggests that the sugar commonly found in fruit can increase cravings for unhealthy foods. Fructose-drinkers were even willing to forgo cold hard cash in exchange for the instantaneous prospect of tasting greasy grub.

Good god, is there nothing left in the world that's safe for us to eat?

Sure, everyone knows that fruit is full of sugar. It's nature's candy, after all. But with that sugar comes a literal ass-load of fiber and otherwise expensive vitamins; the simple carbs gets balanced out all of the other goodies contained within your bodega cup of papaya chunks and fear-inducingly fizzy mango. (They really need to fix that refrigerator.) Fruit has what scientists like to call "nutrient density," or the opposite of empty-calorie foods like potato chips and dear, sweet, reassuring alcohol.

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But within fruit's sugar might lie the problem. A recent but totally not definitive study published in the journal PNAS suggests that fructose—the sugar most commonly found in fruit—can actually make you want to gorge on decadent foods even more.

Now, before you go full-tilt Food Babe on us, know that fructose is not the same as high-fructose corn syrup, or HFCS. Regular store-bought corn syrup is typically made of glucose; HFCS is corn syrup that has had some of its glucose converted to fructose—which tastes sweeter than sucrose, or table sugar—with the help of enzymes. HFCS is simply a way of turning an already sweet and astoundingly cheap product into an even sweeter one.

But back to the study. Researchers at the University of Southern California recruited 24 volunteers who drank a cherry-flavored beverage sweetened with fructose on one day, and one sweetened with glucose on the other. Afterward, they were shown images of high-calorie foods like pizza and hamburgers, and asked to rate their hunger and desire for those foods. They were also asked to make a decision between two rewards: the immediate pleasure of food, or money to paid at a later date.

In short, the fructose made people hungry as hell. After drinking the fructose beverage, they even had "greater willingness to give up long-term monetary rewards to obtain immediate high-calorie foods," according to the paper.

Yes, they were willing turn down cold, hard cash in exchange for the instantaneous prospect of tasting greasy grub.

Now, as with almost any new nutrition study, this one calls for some contemplation. Fructose alone is rarely found in sweetened drinks or candy; most people consume it in whole fruit, which often has fiber that helps you feel full, or in fruit juices.

Speaking to the BBC, Priya Tew from the British Dietetic Association elaborated: "[Fructose] in fruit is tied up within the cellular structure of that fruit and the fibre content slows down the release of the fructose into the bloodstream. Fruit also has a high water content and takes a while for us to chew and digest so the fructose is not instantly released."

So no, you shouldn't swap your smoothie for a cup of corn syrup. Just be aware that pounding a quart of strawberries doesn't give you nutritional license to eat an entire four-cheese pizza, too.