RESEARCHING SUGAR CRAVINGS , I kept stumbling on this nauseating statement: "the average American consumes 158 pounds of sugar a year!" – a statistic I can see inspiring a macabre Tim Noble and Sue Webster installation. (The image that forms in my mind's eye is of a 158-pound figure spun of cotton candy – a sort of sticky yeti.) Statistics, though, are slippery. Consumption is a tricky term already (is it ingestion, retail purchasing, U.S. wholesale acquisition?), and the word sugar is certainly a wild card. Sugar is a vast domain – from the refined sugars we add to our coffee (sucrose) and processed foods (high-fructose corn syrup) to sugars that occur naturally in milk (lactose), fruits (fructose), and beer (maltose).

Turns out the sugar that makes up the 158-pound yeti is all added sugar – the stuff of soft drinks, cakes, and granola bars. The good news is that 158 pounds "represents the amount of sugar that is available in wholesale channels. The actual amount consumed is considerably less" (Center for Science in the Public Interest). Although this clarification is somewhat comforting, another statistic claims Americans, 5 percent of the world's population, account for 33 percent of world sugar consumption. Sidebar: the Bush administration is currently in the World Health Organization's hot seat for putting sugar daddies' interests first. The administration recently came out against the WHO's recommendation that only 10 percent of caloric intake come from added sugar. The U.S. guideline is a whopping 25 percent. The sugar lobby is a substantial source of funding for Bush's reelection campaign.

Why do we like sugar so much? "If eating is our first love, sugar is its handmaiden" – the opening phrase of an article titled "The Science of Scrumptious" (from Psychology Today, Sept.-Oct. 2003) – has it in a poetic nutshell. We're born with a taste for sweet and an aversion to bitter. It makes sense to like sugar, a source of quick energy, easily broken down into glucose to power the brain and the muscles. So why does sugar have a bad rep? And why do so many people struggle with cravings, veritable addictions, to sugar, such that an entire niche of publishing is devoted to the topic?

The answer is at least as complex as the molecular structure of the monosaccharide. Cravings are partly culture-specific. In the United States women crave chocolate; in Egypt they crave eggplant stuffed with rice and meat. With our skewed relationship to food, we tend to crave what we think we shouldn't have. As Andrew Weil writes, "I have long been fascinated with the anti-sugar stance of many health-food enthusiasts. I have always suspected that part of the reason sugar gets a bad name is just because it is a major source of dietary pleasure." Craving sugar also ties in to genetics, and not just with diabetes; links have been made between alcoholism, or a family history of it, and a heightened taste for sugar (not too surprising, since alcohol is fermented sugar). Fluctuations in body chemistry also have a role: for example, the premenstrual low in serotonin levels some women experience yields a yen for sweets, since sugar can spike serotonin temporarily. And the word spike is key.

The trouble with sugar is that it lifts you up quickly but doesn't sustain. It causes an energy roller coaster because the body produces insulin, a slow-acting hormone, to deal with a quick-acting food. The insulin continues to act after the sugar has been digested, causing another low in the blood-sugar level. Added or processed sugar isn't the sole culprit in this, though. Any foods that are quickly processed by the body into glucose (e.g., a simple carbohydrate like white bread) – high-glycemic foods – will take you on a blood-sugar roller coaster when eaten alone. This produces a cycle of craving in which the body continuously needs a pick-me-up.

So what can you do to get off the ride? I'd read about a number of supplements that are supposed to help with sugar cravings, so I strolled down to my local herbal supply hub, Scarlet Sage Herb Co., to find out more. Scarlet Sage carries them all, and in all forms – from powder to plant, and in combination formulas – and the proprietors helpfully discussed their properties. Gymnema sylvestre (blocks the reception of sugar's taste and may help balance blood-sugar levels), l-glutamine, and chromium (both help maintain blood-sugar balance) are some of the more popular options. Then I called my acupuncturist (and master of science in Chinese medicine), Josh Piagentini, whose ministrations have quelled the sugar monster in me. "In some ways the supplements are trying to correct a problem that has already been established," Piagentini said. "Isolated, they're not that effective." He advises that with sugar cravings, habits of eating and exercise should be scrutinized. The first step is to eat meals and snacks balanced with carbohydrate, protein, and fat – the sugar absorption, buffered by the other elements, will be more gradual, and the fat and protein will be digested over time, keeping your energy level steady. Unfortunately, most snack foods and bars don't supply a good balance of these elements. But it may be as simple as spreading a rice cake with some peanut butter. Personally, I'd rather be a puffed rice-and-peanut butter yeti than a cotton-candy one. Less danger of melting in the sun – a concern that's surprisingly pertinent in San Francisco lately.

Scarlet Sage Herb Co. 1173 Valencia, S.F. (415) 821-0997. Daily, 11 a.m.-6:30 p.m. Josh Piagentini, L. Ac., MSCM. 928 Sutter, S.F. (415) 928-1485.