It's Sugar, It's Alcohol, It's Sugar Alcohol!

Ain't no party like a sugar-booze-caffeine party!

When I heard about sugar alcohols, my first thought was, "Ah! Now THAT is the product of the future!" Sugar and alcohol is quite a party combo. However, "sugar alcohol" is good if your party is full of senior citizens:

Sugar alcohols can produce a noticeable cooling sensation in the mouth when highly concentrated, for instance in sugar-free hard candy or chewing gum.

From the highly toxic single-carbon methanol to the food-friendly multi-carbon sorbitol, they're all sweet to the taste, and have fewer calories than sucrose's 4 cal/g.  They're not as sweet as sucrose, but can take the edge off the off flavors of artificial sweeteners. Sugar alcohols also don't cause tooth decay - sweet! But meh.

Sugar and alcohol have something in common: If sugar were to get in to a fight with alcohol, he'd slice his hand off and casually admit, "I am you father...."

"4-Luke-oh, you are a distillation of me, Darth Sucrose." Sorry.

They're both super-simple carbohydrates that the body needs to do little to get into the bloodstream. Sugar will rush in and give you fast energy, then a crash. Alcohol will rush in and get you drunk, then hang you over. When sugar undergoes the metabolic process known as fermentation, an environment is produced to allow yeast to go nutso and eat all the sugar. The yeasts belch & poo two new, simpler components: alcohol and CO2. Through distillation, any boring stuff like water is taken away and you're left with spirits.

Sugar is 4 cal/g, and even though alcohol is made directly from the sugars in the original sources like grains (vodka, beer), raw sugar plants (rum) and grapes (wine), it has 7cal/g. It's quite a different animal. Or is it?

Excess sugar can alter metabolism, raise blood pressure, skew the signaling of hormones and damage the liver — outcomes that sound suspiciously similar to what can happen after a person drinks too much alcohol. Schmidt, co-chair of UCSF’s Community Engagement and Health Policy program, noted on CNN: “When you think about it, this actually makes a lot of sense. Alcohol, after all, is simply the distillation of sugar. Where does vodka come from? Sugar.”

Alcohol is an acquired taste, but the pleasure from it's intoxicating effects is universal and timeless. Add some sugar to an alcoholic drink to mask the taste of the alcohol and make it taste like candy, and you got one wicked brew.

Sorority Breakfast.

As a middle-aged parent of two, I don't drink much anymore and don't know many people who drink much more than I do. Of course, back in college, I drank to keep up and I had one close friend who became a full-blown alcoholic after our university years wound down. Looking back on our time together, I remember him being much more enthusiastic about getting drinks than I, but what sticks out more is his over-arching love for potatoes in all their forms. We joked it was because of his Irish heritage, but perhaps he needed the simple starches to help quell an addiction to simple sugars, which would eventually be serviced with alcohol? Research seems to point to a relationship between sugar addiction sweet tooths and a prediliction to par-tay alcoholism.

More and more, I'm wondering why sugar isn't being consider a combination food/drug, like alcohol, and it's giving me the sadz.

Make that a sugar-free cupcake, dang it!

THE COUNT: 2450
Went over the budget, but it was a day on my feet, taking Edie to the Bronx Zoo, so I'm not going to beat myself up. There were many, many opportunities to indulge in french fries and ice cream at the zoo, and Edie didn't let me forget it.

BREAKFAST: 8:15am, kolon bloe, 300 cal

LUNCH: 12:30pm, almond butter & grape jelly on whole wheat bread, momma salad, chocolate covered espresso beanz, 7oz diet coke, 700 cal

PM SNACK: 1pm, small vegan chocolate chip cookie, +/- 50 cal
Friend and fellow kitchen experimenter offered me a cookie, I couldn't say, "sorry, I'm on a strict diet, so I'm going to be a sourpuss and a dark cloud of unfun and refuse your delicious cookie."

DINNER: 7pm, whole wheat spag with turkey meatballs, tomato sauce, parm and steamed string beans with butter, 1160 cal

PM SNACK: 9:30pm, popcorn, 240 cal