Tangyuan, mung bean soup, red bean porridge, dark plum, white sugar soup … these foods are inseparable from sugar.
So, are these sugars added to food white sugar, brown sugar, rock sugar or caramel? How did they come from and what is the difference in their functions? What kind of people are suitable for eating? Let's get to know each other.
How did the sugar come from?
The familiar white sugar, rock sugar and brown sugar are actually natural products, mainly from these two plants: sugar cane and sugar beet.
It is said that more than half of the sugar in the world is extracted from sugarcane, and then processed and manufactured into the final products seen in supermarkets.
Maltose, which is rarely touched in life, is made of corn, barley, wheat and millet.
Therefore, due to different raw materials and different preparation methods, different kinds of sugar have different effects.
Brown sugar: warming stomach and dispelling cold
Under normal circumstances, brown sugar is concentrated from sugarcane juice, which lacks high refinement, so it retains many trace elements, such as iron, zinc and manganese. The nutrients will be richer and more conducive to people's health.
Sugarcane, the raw material of brown sugar, is sweet and cold, but it loses its coldness after slow cooking and concentration. Brown sugar has also become "sweet and warm", which has the functions of warming the stomach, dispelling cold and relieving pain, removing blood stasis and promoting fluid production.
When a woman menstruates, the child catches cold outside, or gets caught in the rain, drinking a bowl of thick brown sugar water can promote blood circulation, remove blood stasis, relieve the deficiency of qi and blood, warm the spleen and stomach, and never be afraid of cold evil again.
White sugar: clearing lung and moistening dryness
White sugar is no stranger. It is usually used in daily cooking just like fine sand. It is made of sucrose through dissolution, impurity removal and multiple crystallization and extraction. But it is precisely because of its high extraction amount that white sugar has almost no trace elements and its nutrition is not as good as brown sugar.
However, sugar is not useless, and its sugar content can reach more than 99.6%. As long as a small amount of sugar is added, the effect of a large amount of brown sugar can be achieved, and the efficiency can be greatly improved to a certain extent.
Moreover, Chinese medicine believes that white sugar is sweet and cold, has the effects of strengthening the spleen and promoting fluid production, soothing the liver, harmonizing the middle energizer, clearing the lung and moistening dryness, and can relieve sore throat and hangover.
Rock sugar: regulating stomach and moistening dryness
The difference between rock sugar and white sugar lies in the process, which is refined by recrystallization of white sugar. Because crystals look like ice crystals, they are called rock sugar.
The sugar content of rock candy can reach 99.9%, which is sweeter than white sugar, and is not easy to deteriorate, which is beneficial to storage.
Contrary to brown sugar, rock sugar is cool, suitable for spring and autumn to avoid getting angry, while brown sugar is suitable for Xia Dong.
It is recorded in Compendium of Materia Medica that rock sugar is sweet in taste and flat in nature, and belongs to lung and spleen meridians. It has the effects of relieving cough, resolving phlegm, regulating stomach, moistening dryness, invigorating middle warmer and benefiting qi, and has strong nourishing power. Rock sugar is often used to stew Sydney and moisten the lungs.
Maltose: Tonifying deficiency and nourishing blood
Maltose belongs to starch sugar and is also a traditional Chinese medicine. Sweet in taste and slightly warm in nature, it has the functions of transforming stomach qi, nourishing spleen essence, promoting fluid production and nourishing blood.
Abdominal pain caused by physical weakness in daily life can be drunk with caramel soaked in water. If the child has cough symptoms, he can also eat caramel steamed bread.
It is worth noting that caramel is easy to nourish the spleen and help to produce damp heat. Children and the elderly should not eat it often, and people with phlegm-heat constitution should also pay attention.
Eating sugar in moderation is harmful.
Although sugar has many benefits, it does not mean that you can eat sugar indefinitely.
The harm of sugar has always been "hidden". In addition to addiction, just like alcohol and tobacco, if sugar addiction commits the crime, he will keep looking for candy to eat, which will also bring great harm to his health.
Once sugar is ingested for a long time, it will be converted into fat in the body. Over time, coupled with other bad living habits and eating styles, people will get fat and gain weight.
Of course, this kind of harm is only the tip of the iceberg, and then the harm of accelerated skin aging, osteoporosis, slow absorption of other nutrients, obesity, type 2 diabetes, cardiovascular and cerebrovascular diseases, dental caries and so on will follow.
The World Health Organization recommends that the upper limit of sugar intake per person per day is 50 grams, and it is best to keep it below 25 grams. Although sugar is sweet, it is most important to eat it in moderation.
Data: health circle