‘Health Food’ that is anything but.

Most of us are aware of those foods that we should enjoy as treats, but not make a major part of our diet. Chocolate, sweets, crisps, cakes, biscuits, alcohol etc, etc – we all know that these aren’t ‘good’ for us in large quantities.

Similarly, we’re fairly clear on the stuff that a nutritionist like me would consider ‘healthy’. It’s everything in the fresh produce sections of the supermarket – vegetables, fruit, fish, maybe chicken &/or grass-fed meat.

However, there’s whole aisles full of other foods where it’s not quite so clear; & worse, where the manufacturers are trying to present their offerings as healthy when it’s nothing more than an exercise in cynical labelling.

Packaging proclaiming its contents as ‘low-fat, low-sugar, no added sugars, non-GMO, organic, fortified with vitamins & minerals, gluten-free, natural, contains real fruit, etc’ is designed to convince us that we are making the ‘right’ choice for ourselves &/or our family. It relies upon you not reading further or having any knowledge about nutrition.

That’s not to say that every product with these labels is designed to deceive, but it does pay to dig a little deeper to make sure that if you’re trying to buy ‘well’ that you’re not being misled.

Spending some time getting familiar with food labels, & particularly lists of ingredients, is time well spent. The following are good foodstuffs to start with:

Yogurt – can be a minefield. All the above labels can apply & the lists of contents can be alarming. The easiest route is to be buy natural, unsweetened yogurt. Check the label that the pot contains milk & possibly added cultures and nothing more. You can easily add your own fruit, honey, whatever, if you like.

Cereals – high fibre, fortified with vitamins & minerals – got to be a good buy, right? Not so fast. So many of the more popular cereals are highly processed & contain huge amounts of sugar. To be frank, these are a ‘no’ from me.

Gluten-free foods – if you’re coeliac, these are a must. However, many, many foods labelled as GF are highly processed & these particular GF foods are best avoided by everyone.

Protein bars – very often also high in carbs as they’re full of sugar!

Low-fat anything – you may be choosing to follow a low-fat diet, but check your labels that all they’ve done is remove/reduce the fat & not, 1) added sugar to make it palatable, or 2) added artificial sweeteners, emulsifiers, gums, stabilisers etc that very often your body doesn’t know what to do with & add nothing in the way of healthiness.

If you’re trying to make dietary change to combat a health condition, it’s even more important to make those changes count. If you’d like expert support to get on the right track, please drop me a line.