Jan 17, 2026
3 min read
We've come to love energy-dense foods like honey, but there's too much sugar in the modern diet.Here's how to eat at the right time and in abundance
Sugar tastes great for a good reason: We evolved to like honey when it was a hard-to-find, energy-dense treat and we spent half our time chasing antelope.Now that it's easier to reach and we don't move as much, our sweet tooth is working against us: Most of us are consuming too much of it and suffering from poor health as a result.But apart from providing too many calories and enough nutrients.Is there anything particularly wrong with it?
"When we taste sugar, the body begins to react when the sweetness touches the tongue," says Dawn Menning, a registered dietitian who works with the health app Nutu.identical twins were more similar in their sweet taste perception than twins or non-twin siblings.They concluded that genetic factors account for about 30% of the variation in how sensitive people are to sweet tastes - but it's unclear whether that affects what we eat.
However, what happens after your first taste depends on the type of sugar you take: glucose, which is what you get from starch, has a slightly different effect than fructose, which is concentrated in fruits and juices.Table sugar, and many sweet treats, contain sucrose, which is a mixture of both.
"Glucose causes the pancreas to release insulin, a hormone that - to put it simply - removes that glucose from circulation and deposits it where it needs to be," said Sarah Berry, a lecturer at King's College London and chief scientist at science and nutrition company Zoe.Glycogen, i.e. converted into fat."Meanwhile, fructose does not cause insulin to be released.
If you eat too much of both types of sugar,It increases a type of fat circulating in your blood called triglycerides: they're essential for energy, but high levels can lead to heart disease;Increases stroke and pancreatitis.Fructose is more of a problem for people at risk of fatty liver disease, while glucose is a problem for people who have trouble regulating insulin.So what you should be more concerned about depends on your lifestyle choices and genetics.
"What we do know is that if you have insulin spikes that are too high, several times a day, inflammation increases," Berry says."It's not bad because we have inflammation in our bodies all the time — but if it's repeated and gets too high, we believe it can be a problem."
The sugar rush, a myth that has persisted for decades: When researchers reviewed a 1995 meta-analysis of studies on youth sugar consumption, they concluded that "sugar does not affect children's behavior or cognitive performance," suggesting that "parents' strong beliefs may be due to general expectations and associations."More recently, a 2019 meta-analysis found no mood-enhancing effect from carbohydrates (including sugar) and noted that it was "associated with greater fatigue and less alertness in the first hour compared to placebo."But even if our seemingly sugar-crazed loved ones are really just acting in response to the placebo effect or are at a party, the other problem is the insulin spike.What happens after departure and we feel the corresponding sinking
“We know from research we've done with our Zoe Predict team that when people experience that drop, they feel hungrier and they tend to eat an extra 80 calories at their next meal, and 320 calories more per day,” says Berry.
This means it's not just about how much sugar you eat: it's about when you eat it, and how much."We know that the blood sugar response is more adaptive in the morning because you're more sensitive to insulin than in the afternoon," says Berry."But our bodies are also better able to handle sugar if they are being provided as part of an overall balanced meal with heart-healthy fats and healthy proteins." By the way, this whole idea of trying to "flatline" your glucose response that you see from some influencers is completely unnecessary: an increase in blood glucose is not necessary to ensure a normal physiological response.
The takeaway?As a nation, we eat more sugar than we need or can use.A recent study published by the Oral Health Foundation found that 84% of us eat at least one sugar a day, and 79% eat "up to 3" a day.It's a good idea to eat less, but there's no need to demonize it or cut it out completely: take it in moderation, not too late in the day, and ideally with some fiber, healthy fat or protein.
And if you're tempted to skip all that boring business by relying on sugar substitutes, it might not be the no-nonsense plan you're hoping for.It was once thought that artificial sweeteners could make your insulin react or trick your hunger hormones into making you hungry, but neither of those things seems to be true: in fact, the problem is happening somewhere else.
"There is some emerging evidence that sweeteners like saccharin and sucralose can affect your oral and gut microbiome," Berry said."More research is needed to understand whether there are further effects on other long-term health outcomes, such as blood pressure, insulin resistance and body weight. But this is not a get-out-of-jail-free card."It's also possible that some sweeteners actually convert to fructose in the body, causing effects similar to regular sugar, according to a recently published study.
As far as that goes, take the sweetness out of the sugar - that's what we evolved.But remember: our paleolithic ancestors didn't have access to as much as you do, and they probably moved around a heck of a lot.
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