Too much sugar intake can contribute to various diseases. So when you unavoidably eat foods loaded with sugar, is there a way to reduce the impact? Recent studies suggest there could be a few tricks to eating healthy, and they don't involve reducing your sugar intake.

Sugar often gets a bad reputation because we eat it alone. If foods are loaded with simple carbohydrates, they rapidly increase blood sugar levels. When this happens, we try to bring the sharp increase down by increasing the production of sugar-lowering hormones such as insulin and incretin. If we increase them too much too often, this mechanism stops working, which can lead to type 2 diabetes.

But there are ways to prevent. People can start by simply eating less sugar, or eating it with other foods. Perhaps the best type of food to eat sugar with is protein. The intake of protein leads to the release of glucagon, another hormone, which maintains insulin levels.

Some recent research suggests we should take one step further. Studies show the order in which you eat various types of food matters. The most recent study had participants—all with type 2 diabetes eat the same meal on three different days, but in various order. One day, they ate carbohydrates first, followed 10 minutes later by protein and vegetables, then protein and vegetables first, followed by carbohydrates 10 minutes after, and finally everything eaten together at the same time.

Researchers measured their blood sugar levels just after the meals and every 30 minutes for the next three hours. They found peaks in blood sugar levels when carbohydrates were eaten last were all around 50 percent lower than when they were eaten first. Even eating everything at once produced a spike 40 percent higher than that seen when carbohydrates came last.

The findings are pretty significant. It's probably fruitless to promise yourself you won't eat any sugary treats this holiday season. But follow the tips, and you can still enjoy the delicious homemade apple pie.

What to Eat—and What to Skip—When It Comes to Takeout Food

If the burden on your wallet doesn't bother you much, the effect your takeout habit can have on your waistline just might arouse your attention. Here's the best and worst of the lot for your belly.

Steamed Vegetable Dumplings: Order This.

When she orders Chinese, registered dietitian nutritionist Elisa Zied gets an order of steamed vegetable dumplings. "I often pair them with either chicken and broccoli in brown sauce（I ask for a little sauce made without sugar）or steamed shrimp dumplings," she tells us.

Crab Wontons: Not That!

When you deconstruct crab wontons, it's easy to see why they're a "Not That!" The inside is filled with crabmeat and cream cheese（which is just a fancy, spreadable fat）.The wonton is made of refined flour, egg and salt and the crispy（脆的）coating is a result of a deep oil bath.

Peking Duck: Order This.

Most of the fat from the skin flows out of the duck over the course of cooking, making this a healthier choice than most of the stir-fry dishes available. Order a side of steamed vegetables and serve it with a small scoop of brown rice. Done and done!

Sweet and Sour Anything: Not That!

Anything with “sweet and sour” in its title is a powerful cue that something has been deep-fried and covered in a sickly-sweet pink sauce. If you pair your selection with a side of rice, you're looking at a 1,000-calorie meal.

Summer Roll: Order This.

Summer rolls are steamed instead of fried—and typically filled with lean proteins and vegetables, making them a winning appetizer in our book. Pair them with an order of edamame（毛豆）and a broth-based soup for a satisfying, filling meal.

Spring Roll: Not That!

Spring=deep-fried, which is why we say to skip them! They're filled with fat and calories your belly doesn't need.

In principle, it sounds simple: eat less and move more. 【小题1】 Yet, despite all the calorie counting, dieting and exercising, worldwide obesity (肥胖) rates just keep speeding up. People in the US were heavier in 2021 than they were in 2020, placing many more people at risk from serious diseases.

So why hasn’t this approach to weight control worked? One possibility is that we haven’t tried hard enough. 【小题2】 Or perhaps the problem is the focus on “calorie balance” itself. In a recent paper, my colleagues and I question the basic assumption of whether taking in more calories than you burn really is the chief cause of obesity. We argue that the evidence actually points the other way: we are driven to overeat because we are getting fatter.

【小题3】 As their growth rate speeds up, teenagers may eat hundreds of calories more each day than they used to. Does this “overeating” cause the rapid growth? Or does the rapid growth, which requires more calories to build new body tissues, make teenagers hungrier so they eat more? Clearly the latter, as adults won’t grow taller, no matter how much they eat.

The key to how this works in obesity is hormones (激素), especially the fat-storage hormone. Processed, rapidly digestible high-carbon foods like potato chips and sugary drinks raise our hormone level too high. 【小题4】 A few hours after eating a high-carbon meal, the number of calories in the bloodstream falls rapidly, so we get hungrier sooner after eating.

Therefore, in order to prevent and treat weight problems, the emphasis should be placed on what to eat instead of how much we eat. Replacing processed high-carbon foods with high-fat foods-such as nuts-lowers the hormone obtainable for the rest of the body. 【小题5】

Although much more research will be needed to test this idea, it is time to question the basic assumptions about cause and effect, calories and weight gain that have dominated our thinking for decades.