FoodPolitik: Sugar semantics and the FDA

It’s only fair. If “corn sugar” is too taboo for food packages, maybe the FDA should re-brand table sugar as “high fructose cane sugar granules” or “industrially produced gluco-fructo-disaccharide.”

The reality is that Americans want to know what is in their food, not which squares on the Periodic Table it occupies. Red wine isn’t “sulfured, enzyme-enhanced fermented grape pressings.” We don’t call tofu a “hexane-treated soy-based meat substitute.”

Sugar is sugar. Same difference. I’m hopelessly optimistic that you’ll eat it in moderation, and that someday soon this whole subject will be old news.

For now, however, I’m filled with humble pride for avoiding any discussion of  “Peacekeeper missiles,” “congressional ethics” or the “down escalator.”

Rick Berman is President of the public affairs firm Berman and Company. He has worked extensively in the food and beverage industry for the past 30 years. To learn more, visit http://www.BermanCo.com.