Todd Moody wrote:
>
> This is how caramel is made, isn't it?  By
> cooking sugar in butter?

Pure caramel is just browned sugar. You just put sugar in a pan, melt it
and keep cooking until it turns brown. No fat, starch, or protein.
Sounds simple but it's not: just glucose "breaks down and recombines to
form at least 100 different reaction products, among them sour organic
acids, sweet and bitter derivatives, many fragrant volatile molecules,
and brown-colored polymers" (McGee). However, various caramel candies do
have butter or milk solids mixed in for other effects, which is probably
what you're thinking of.

> I think "production of AGEs" is just another term for caramelization.

No, caramel is just browned or burnt sugar. An AGE is a glucose-coated
protein molecule--a different thing.

> We do the same thing, for example, when we "brown" onions in oil, prior > to cooking something else, i.e., we caramelize the onions. It would be > helpful to know whether proteins are caramelized in the same way, > although the word "glycation" in AGE suggests not.

Browning reactions in foods containing proteins and starches (anything
more complex than just sugar) are the Maillard reactions rather than
caramelization. AGEs are advanced products of Maillard reactions,
whether happening in your food or in your body. The real trouble is when
your body's production of AGEs outstrips your immune system's ability to
eliminate them, which accounts for the retina, kidney, and capillary
damage in diabetics. (I'll write more later about why I think this is a
silly study that people shouldn't get all alarmed about.)

Hilary McClure
Danville, Vermont



Another stupid media report of another stupid study. Did you notice that
it was a study of diabetics? That automatically makes it pretty much
irrelevant to normal healthy people. Diabetics not only are already
producing lots of their own AGEs, but they have impaired ability to
eliminate AGEs. They're talking about cooking and browning reactions and
health and they don't even mention hererocylic amines or Maillard
molecules. And they