As a mom and a health coach, I’ve always been a label reader and one who is skeptical of food products with a cartoon character on the front and ingredients that remind me of chem class on the back. Recently I was asked by NYC Green Schools to research just what some of these ingredients are and the answers, while not pretty, are not really surprising. Many are found in the obvious junk foods where you might most expect them but a large amount are also hiding in “healthy” foods llike whole-grain bread, yogurts and cereals. Here are a few to look for:
High Fructose Corn Syrup (HFCS) has gotten quite a bit of attention lately and we are now seeing ads touting products made with “real sugar” instead of HFCS. (I love the irony of sugar being the healthy choice). How bad is HFCS? Research is mixed. Some researchers believe that because HFCS does not occur in nature, our bodies don’t know how to process it and more of it is stored as fat. Others have not found that connection but worry that its cheap cost has made highly sweetened food very affordable and widely available. Last year, The Institute for Agriculture and Trade Policy published two studies showing that almost half of the HFCS samples they tested contained mercury. This is of concern in part because of the huge amount of this stuff in the food supply. The Washington Post reported that Americans consume 12 teaspoons a day of HFCS.
Personally, I don’t like the company HFCS keeps: it is usually listed with other questionable ingredients and found only in highly processed foods. Until we know more, I am staying away. Other popular sweeteners feeding our growing national sweet tooth may be listed as polydextrose, maltose, maltodextrin, mannitol, barley malt and sorbitol.
In 2006, the FDA began requiring food companies to label the amount of trans fat in their products. There is a big loophole here though. A food can have up to .49 grams of trans fat and still be labeled “trans fat” free. This is a problem because many of us eat more than one serving from a package or eat multiple products with allowable trans fat in them, thinking it’s “trans fat free”. Since the recommended amount of trans fat in our diet is zero, this unconscious consumption could have far-reaching health consequences.
To replace partially hydrogenated oil, food manufacturers are looking for a new product that can give them the same long shelf life and you may have seen “interesterified oil” on labels. Preliminary research on this new fat does not look good, and until more is known, it seems wise to avoid it.
Food dyes seem to be everywhere in kids food and The Center for Science in the Public Interest just released a report called “Food Dyes: A Rainbow of Risk” that charges these dyes trigger allergic reactions and behavior problems in children and can cause cancer. The group says the three most commonly used dyes – Red 40, Yellow 5 and Yellow 6 – are contaminated with cancer causing substances. Great Britain has required companies to stop using food dyes and the EU requires a warning notice on dyed foods.
What exactly are these dyes and how do they turn food such groovy colors? They begin with benzene, a colorless and flammable oil that then goes through a complicated process that involves mixing it with nitric acid and sulfuric acid to create a poisonous substance called nitrobenzene. The next step is to expose it to iron to turn it into something called aniline, the chemical base for most dyes. Yuck.
I would love to see more research and legislation here in the US. My kids seem to love all brightly colored foods and it is the ingredient that I’ve found the hardest to eliminate as it’s not just in candy and other obvious places. Some yogurts have them and I’ve seen them in products as varied as chocolate syrup and seaweed salad. Food manufacturers use about 15 million pounds of eight synthetic dyes annually so they are very hard to avoid.
Artificial flavoring is another “ingredient” frequently listed. These flavorings are produced from chemicals that are manipulated in a lab to imitate specific flavors found in nature. Some of them may originate from crude oil or tar but the exact chemicals used are the proprietary information of the food companies so this is a case where it is almost impossible to know what you are actually eating. My recommendation? Put down the package and walk away.
Many popular kids’ foods are designed to have a long shelf life which can seem like a great thing for busy parents. After all, a granola bar can last for weeks in a backpack. This long life though is usually extended by the addition of BHT to the package. BHT is a petroleum based substance that reduces rancidity and is on the CSPI’s list of additives to avoid.
So, this is the buyer-beware, complicated terrain parents face in a standard trip to the grocery store. My best advice is to ignore the upfront labels and read the ingredient list. One popular granola bar has a label that declares it has “25% less sugar, no HFCS, is made with whole grain oats and is a good source of calcium and fiber”. When I read the ingredient list, I found 12 different sweeteners (including one artificial sugar), partially hydrogenated oil, artificial flavor and BHT (and this was printed in type so small it will challenge the eyes of most of us over the age of 40).
The bottom line here is to read your labels carefully or, better yet, choose foods that don’t need an ingredient list. After all, we really weren’t designed to eat a diet rich in sweeteners and petroleum based chemicals and neither were our kids. Stick to real foods as much as possible – it’s better for you, your children and the planet.
Article By Paula Seefedlt
