The trouble with that charbroiled burger and biggie fries isn’t just the damage it does to your waistline and the smell it leaves in your car and on your clothes. Both, with plenty of other foods, are packed with appropriately named components called AGEs. That’s short for “advanced glycation end products,” tongue twisters that can age your arteries and cause big health trouble faster than the kid at the counter can ask if you want fries with that. These foods have more to hate than just AGEs, but let’s just go there for today (rather than the morgue, where AGEs and other parts try to get you).
What exactly are AGEs? In short, they’re destructive “Frankenproteins” created by high-temperature cooking and also by the interaction of proteins and sugars in your bloodstream. They’re not scarce: Any of us eats three times more AGEs every day than our bodies can handle. That’s because AGEs give fried, grilled, roasted and crispy-baked foods like meat, french fries and snack foods their delicious caramelized flavor and satisfying crunch.
