Fuel for cycling

Pop into your local bike shops and the chances are there will be a display stand somewhere holding a range of products which scream at you about their energy boosting or sustaining qualities.  Then there's the 'recovery' products too which, the helpful sales blurb tells us we should take to replace things we loose when we're riding.
There are gels, powders, liquids and chewy things mainly brightly coloured all wanting our attention.
I often wonder what people in 50 years time will think about these products.  I recall listening to a radio documentary about how attitudes toward bathing had changed.  It included an interview from the early 20th century with a guy who was convinced that bathing more than once per month would sap his strength - to our current sensibilities, those are the words off a mad man.
I recount it here as it shows that truth and knowledge are historical and open to change or as Nietzsche efficiently put it: "Whichever interpretation prevails at a given time is a function of power and not truth." 
I cant help thinking that our current trend for consuming these dietary additives will too be seen as a quaint absurdity by the time the year 2100 rolls around.
So are we just being sold snake oil?  Well, I'm not a scientist but I can say that you can ride your bike for 6 hours at reasonable intensity, over the hills of the Peak District without having to use any of these uber-products.
If I was riding competitively and needed to 'accumulate marginal gains' then maybe these products are the way to go.  But I, like the 99.9 per cent of cyclists in the country, am not and can get by quite comfortably on bananas and water.  But yet it's me who feels the subtle pressure to buy into this stuff.

Graeme Obree famously fuelled himself on jam butties (sandwiches) and that's good enough for me.  I'm never going to ride a 3 week stage race, attempt the hour record or compete in a spring classic and, therefore, I don't need to buy any of that stuff to ride my bike.

Ride safe.