In fact, we are no strangers to free sugar. In life, we have the shadow of free sugar in many foods such as drinks, squeezed juice, braised pork, steamed rice, chewed popsicles, licked lollipops and so on. Free sugar is artificially purified or processed into sugar. According to the definition of the World Health Organization, free sugar refers to monosaccharides and disaccharides artificially added in food, as well as naturally occurring sugars in honey, syrup, fruit juice and concentrated fruit juice. Monosaccharides include but are not limited to white sugar, brown sugar, rock sugar, honey, maple syrup, molasses, soft candy, yellow sugar and some artificial sweeteners that can generate heat, such as glucose.
Sugar is a kind of carbohydrate, an essential nutrient for human body and an important component of human tissue, which can provide energy for human body, protect liver and detoxify, and assist fat oxidation. However, sugar is beneficial to human body, which does not mean that we can eat sugar unscrupulously. A large number of research data show that sugar intake is positively correlated with obesity, which is the root of chronic diseases such as "three highs". In addition, long-term intake of too much sugar can easily lead to diabetes. For developing children, eating too much sugar will also affect tooth development, even "sugar addiction".
In view of the harm of excessive sugar intake, the World Health Organization suggests reducing the intake of free sugar, and the upper limit of daily intake is below 10% of total energy intake. The Dietary Guidelines for China Residents 20 16 also suggests that the daily intake of added sugar should not exceed 50 grams, preferably 25 grams. In 20 19, the world health organization issued a new ban, requiring children under three years old not to add free sugar to their food. Then, besides self-restraint to reduce sugar intake, how to detect free sugar in food?
There are many detection methods of sugar in food, which can be roughly divided into three categories. The first category is physical methods, including polarimetry, refraction and colorimetry. The second category is physical and chemical methods, including point method, spectrophotometry, chromatography and so on. The third category is chemical methods, including Lingfei method, iodometry, anthracene copper colorimetry, carbazole colorimetry and so on.
High performance liquid chromatography (HPLC) is a commonly used inspection equipment, which is widely used in industry, chemistry, medicine, agriculture, environmental protection, forensic examination and other disciplines and plays an important role. The field of food detection and analysis is naturally the "performance stage" of HPLC. High performance liquid chromatography (HPLC) has the characteristics of fast analysis speed, high separation efficiency, high sensitivity and small sample size, and has its advantages in analyzing the content of free sugar in food. High performance liquid chromatography combined with evaporative light scattering detector can also be used to determine free sugar in honey, pomegranate and other foods. In addition, capillary gas chromatography, spectrophotometer, gas chromatograph and other instruments and equipment are also commonly used to detect free sugar in food.
With the development of science and technology, our technology of detecting free sugar in food is also improving. From the instrument aspect, some advanced equipment can eliminate the interference of sweeteners such as sugar alcohol in food when detecting free sugar. This greatly improves the accuracy of the detection results.
Although we are calling on everyone to reduce the intake of sugar, there is no special detection standard for free sugar in food because sugar itself is harmless and will not affect the quality and safety of food. But it seems that we can also foresee that with the increasing demand for healthy diet, the detection of free sugar content in food may become the norm. At least, according to the current management trend of the World Health Organization on food for children under three years old, free sugar has become an "unwelcome person".
"Sweet" is a taste that none of us will hate. In addition to the real taste, we will also use "sweet" to describe a beautiful smile, a happy life, a beautiful love and even a warm time. But I also want to advise my friends again that although "sweetness" is good, remember not to be greedy.