Nearly everyone is riding the health train these days. Unfortunately, good intentions can get lost in the supermarket amid colorful, deceptive packages that beg us to take them home. Their voices have particular strength as they tout health benefits prescribed by the medical community. One needs to be a nutrition detective to weed out the unhealthy ingredients in some foods.
It is important that everyone take responsibility for his or her health by learning to read, understand, and discern package labels. The manufacturer's job is to lure their products to your table for you and your family to consume, and then buy more. You need to decide what is best for your health, well-being, and that of everyone you feed.
Skip the front of the package, as this is the manufacturer's window dressing, advertising, and bait. Instead, go directly to the nutrition label, and check all the ingredients. The first on the list is always the largest, and is the prevalent ingredient in the package. Breakfast cereals contain mostly sugar and along with snacks, cookies, candy, and some canned fruits fall into this category. Beginning your day with these will almost certainly sabotage your healthy eating plan.
Hydrogenated oils and high fructose corn syrup indicate highly processed foods. Your body does not need these, as they are very different from the whole foods from which they began, and can cause or aggravate many unhealthy conditions such as obesity and diabetes. You will find these ingredients listed on cake and cookie mixes, chips, and snack labels.
Salt, sugars, artificial coloring and artificial flavors add to the list of undesirable and unhealthy ingredients. It is best to choose food with a short list of ingredients, as they tend to be somewhat healthier, and you are not feeding your body anything you do not want it to have. Find these ingredients in processed package foods and snacks. Be especially careful when buying anything calling itself "lite." Check the label carefully for added sodium and sugar. Check the labels on canned vegetables as these can contain an unhealthy amount of sodium. Processed packaged foods, hot dogs and many brands of sausage contain these ingredients.
When buying breads, English muffins or crackers, be sure that whole grain is the first ingredient on the label. If whole-wheat flour, or stone ground whole wheat flour are the first ingredients on the label, the product contains whole grain nutrition, and has at least two grams of dietary fiber.
When choosing pasta, choose the whole wheat or whole grain variety, as these have not been as processed as their white flour counterparts have. Choose brown rice over white and for additional high fiber nutrition, mix it half-and-half with whole grain barley. A product whose first ingredient is simply wheat contains more refined and processed ingredients, as well as hydrogenated oils, artificial coloring, sugar, sodium and other preservatives.
Eating healthy is not difficult, but with the huge amount of packaged convenience foods containing questionable ingredients available to us, it pays to become a nutrition detective. Buy fresh or frozen fruits and vegetables, stick to whole grain rice, bread, and cereal, and remember to read those labels!
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