Fructose for Aggressive Fat Loss

But I think that I made it sound like fruit is a big problem, and I wanted to clear that up because fructose has some very specific uses that could allow you to have your cake and eat it too (kind of literally, but more like have your apples and eat them too).

I’ll first cover the whole piece about fructose and liver fat… This is probably the part that is most debated. There is some evidence that fructose quickly gets stored as fat through a process called denovo lipogenesis (DNL). This is the conversion of carbs into fat.

Since it effectively happens in the liver in the case of fructose, it is sometimes concluded that it would deposit right there at the liver level.

Here’s something interesting:

A study published in Nutrition and Metabolism used labelled fructose (where they can basically watch it after ingestion).

6 hours after the fructose ingestion less than 1% of the fructose was converted into plasma triglycerides. The majority of the fructose was oxidized (30.5-62%; A significant amount of fructose was converted into glucose (28.9-54%) and lactate (28%).

What Does this mean?

Basically THIS part means that very little converted into fat.

BUT, things get trickier…

Triglycerides from de novo lipogenesis (DNL) can be stored in the hepatocytes and can be secreted more than 24 hours later.

The delay in triglyceride secretion from DNL was most apparent in patients with diabetes or hypertriglyceridemia…

What this kind of illuminates is that people that are already insulin resistant or on their way to being insulin resistant are likely having a higher chance of denovo lipogenesis and creating fat from fructose.

So Then we ask the question… How much Fructose CAN we have before this happens?

This is where it really varies. Because fructose does go directly to the liver, it doesn’t really get heavily utilized. This doesn’t mean it’s useless as it can still restore liver glycogen which is hugely important (especially after a fast).

So that means that if we over do it, it’s not like we can just go and burn it off really quick.

At first glance, one would think that since the liver can hold 100ish grams of carbohydrates, that we could probably consume 100g of fructose…

But other literature seems to suggest more like 40-50g, and I am more inclined to base off of that.

Here’s the kicker, though. I do not buy into the fact that just eating fructose is going to make you gain fat in and of itself.

There is certainly nuance-y stuff that should be investigated, but yes, I do think that you would probably have to be in a caloric surplus (or close to it at that particular point in time) for fructose to contribute to weight gain.

You know me, I try to look at both sides, both the calories-in-calories-out model as well as the carb-insulin model.

Since fructose doesn’t spike insulin, then maybe it is null and void from the theory that it would slow fat loss…

Fructose Doesn’t Spike Insulin (much)

The issue here lies in that fruit itself is generally a combination of fructose, sucrose, and glucose. So when you eat fruit, it’s not like you’re just getting fructose anyway.

Fruit being largely fructose though is actually a huge benefit. And one of the only reasons that I suggest a tiny bit of fruit isn’t the worst thing along with protein when you break a fast.

Because there isn’t an insulin spike, there’s kind of an advantage to that. In essence, if it’s not spiking much insulin, then MAYBE it’s not contributing to the halting of fat-burning.

In short, I think picking higher fructose fruits like:

• Apples
• Cherries
• Grapefruits
• Guava
• Raspberries

Just to name a few, is the way to go.

If I could suggest how much to eat…

I probably wouldn’t eat more than 30-50g per day, but that’s just me. It doesn’t mean that you cannot get absolutely lean as heck eating a bunch of fruit. I am sure people do it all the time.

When it comes to ketogenesis, it does seem to slow down that process though, so if you’re doing keto, just know that fructose is still going to affect ketone formation almost just as much (arguably more so) than regular glucose.

The bottomline is this

The body has compensatory mechanisms at play. If we overdo it on fructose, usually the delta is made up somewhere else to help us compensate for the “over” consumption of fructose.

Even if it does convert into fat via DNL, if we’re in an appropriate deficit, then that will likely get offset by the burning of other fat (or unfortunately maybe muscle), so relative weight loss might be the same.

That’s not enough to draw a conclusion on a fatty liver, because that portion is still up for debate. But it looks like insulin resistance FIRST is a more attributable risk factor for fatty liver disease, at which point, then it seems like fructose could be playing more of a roll.

Eat Your Veggies, Eat the occasional Fruit. Don’t Freak Out!

I still like fruit (mainly berries), and even on keto I still eat like 1/4-1/2 cup of fruit a day. Not because I am extracting a magical amount of vitamins and minerals out of it….

BUT because I like it. And candidly, liking something should be enough just cause for the occasional indulgence if it is not hyperpalatable garbage.

You’re not going to be getting a bunch of vitamins and minerals out of fruit, though. So don’t go hammering a bunch of fruit down the gullet because you’re getting vitamin XYZ in your body.

You’re much better off eating a diversity of foods in general for that.

Side Note – Here’s a 50% off Discount link for HIYA Chewable Multivitamin for kids (and adults too, ha) – HIYA – Monkfruit Sweetened Multivitamin