Sugar Types Used In Fast Food

Sugars found in fast foods are added to the foods and beverages sold by the fast-food industry during the processing or manufacturing process. This does not include the sugar found in milk, lactose, or the sugar found in fruits, fructose. Fast-food sugars do, however, include caloric sugars or sweeteners such as white sugar, brown sugar, honey and other chemically manufactured sweeteners, such as high fructose corn syrup. Additionally, fast-food sugars include non-caloric sweeteners such as sucralose and aspartame.

How to Identify Sugars

Nutrition labels usually do not include a detailed list of the amount of sugars found in a food product. The labels do, however, list both added and naturally occurring sugars. You can, therefore, read the ingredient list on a product label to identify the sugars. Some sugars commonly listed as an ingredient in fast food include syrup, brown sugar, sugar, raw sugar, corn syrup, molasses, corn sweetener, malt sugar and sugar molecules ending in “-ose,” such as dextrose, fructose, glucose, maltose, and sucrose.

High-fructose Corn Syrup

High-fructose corn syrup is a common ingredient found in fast foods. In 1957, two scientists came up with a process that results in the production of high-fructose corn syrup. The process involves turning one simple sugar, glucose, into another simple sugar known as fructose. The final product is a combination of the two simple sugars. High-fructose corn syrup has the same sweetness as sucrose but costs much less to process. Additionally, high-fructose corn syrup also functions as a preservative in manufactured food products.

Corn Sweeteners and Corn Syrup

Manufacturers make corn sugars and corn syrups from corn and processed cornstarch. These corn byproducts contain varying amounts of glucose, maltose and dextrose sugars. Corn syrup is commonly used in many soft drinks, baked goods and canned products sold by the fast-food industry. Before high-fructose corn syrup, glucose syrup was the primary corn sweetener in the United States. The high-fructose corn syrup commonly used in soft drinks differs from sucrose in the sugar proportion. High-fructose corn syrup has 5 percent more fructose than sucrose, according to the book “Chew on This: Everything You Don’t Want to Know About Fast Food.”

Artificial Sweeteners

The fast-food industry also commonly uses artificial sweeteners in many products, such as desserts and soft drinks. The Food and Drug Administration has approved a number of artificial sweeteners for use in manufactured food products, including acesulfame potassium, aspartame, neotame and saccharin.