Hacker News Reader

Comment by sneak | Hacker News Reader

FYI, high fructose corn syrup has only slightly more fructose (a single digit percentage) than normal sugar, which also has a fuckton of fructose in it.

Corn syrup is a red herring.

View on HN

Correct. Sucrose (table sugar) is exactly 50% fructose, 50% glucose. The most common blend of HFCS is 55% fructose, 45% glucose - which is barely different. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/High-fructose_corn_syrup

That link has a bit of nuance. Some HFCS has lower fructose content:

"HFCS 42" and "HFCS 55" refer to dry weight fructose compositions of 42% and 55% respectively, the rest being glucose. HFCS 42 is mainly used for processed foods and breakfast cereals, whereas HFCS 55 is used mostly for production of soft drinks.

Yup. ~5% more fructose than table sugar in its most common formulations, actually lower content than table sugar in some formulations (e.g. HFCS-42). The 'high fructose' moniker is derived from a reference to 'pure' corn syrup which is nearly 100% glucose, not a reference to table sugar as commonly assumed.

Right. The main issue with HFCS is that it's really cheap so it gets added to a lot of things that wouldn't normally contain sugar or it is added in greater amounts than other sugars.

I've heard the issue with high fructose corn syrup is that the levels of sugar in it does not correspond to its sweetness level. Corn syrup on its own is not very sweet, so to make it taste sweet you have to add much higher levels than if you had used other types of sweetener.

Not sure how to square that with the chemical composition of hfcs.

It's the opposite. You'll add more sucrose to hit the same sweetness experience as most HFCS blends, not less.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com