Foods that contain a high level of free fructose. Glucose helps the small intestine to absorb fructose, so if a food is high in fructose, but also contains as much or more glucose, you can usually eat it with no negative effects. Foods with a high glucose content eaten with foods containing lots of fructose may help to absorb the excess fructose.
Many common fruits contain nearly equal amounts of the fructose and glucose, so they do not present problems for those individuals with Fructose Malabsorption. Some fruits however have a greater ratio of fructose than glucose and should be avoided. These are apples, pears and watermelon – which contain more than twice as much fructose as glucose. Fructose levels in grapes vary depending on ripeness and variety – unripe grapes contain more glucose.
AVOID –
- Fruit and fruit juices: apple, cherry, grape, guava, lychee, mango, melon (honeydew and watermelon), orange, papaya, pear, persimmon, pineapple, quince, and star fruit. Cooked fruit generally has lower fructose content than uncooked fruit.
- Most dried fruit, including currant, dates, dried fruit or health bars, fig, raisin.
- Processed fruit: barbecue sauce, chutney, fruit from cans (often in juice), plum sauce, sweet and sour sauce, and tomato paste.
- Berries in larger quantities: blueberry, raspberry.
- Sweets, food and drinks with very high sucrose (table sugar) content and with high fructose corn syrup (HFCS).
- Honey, maple syrup, agave, molasses, palm or coconut sugar, high fructose corn syrup.
- Vegetables in larger quantities (fructan content): artichoke, asparagus, beans, broccoli, cabbage, chicory, leek, onion, peanuts, tomato, and zucchini.
- Sweet wines: e.g. dessert wines, muscatel, port, and sherry.
- Wheat- based products: flour, pasta, bread, and whole-grain breakfast cereals.
- Whole-meal products in large amounts.
- Sorbitol (E420 is sorbitol) and xylitol (E967 is xylitol) containing foods: diet / ‘light’ and diabetic drinks, sugar-free chewing gum and sweets, stone fruit, dried fruits (e.g. apple, apricot, date, fig, nectarine, peach, plum, raisin). Beer may be a problem in large amounts.
- Inulin, (a fructan) content is high in the following foods generally known to cause bloating and gas: asparagus, dandelion leaves, garlic, leeks, and onion and wheat bran.
- Foods containing sorbitol, present in some diet drinks and foods, and occurring naturally in some stone fruits, or xylitol, present in some berries, and other polyols (sugar alcohols), such as erythritol, mannitol, and other ingredients that end with -tol, commonly added as artificial sweeteners in commercial foods.
