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Chef Boyardee’s Whole Grain Hoax

September 2nd, 2010 3 comments

ConAgra’s Chef Boyardee brand is out with a whole grain canned pasta product – Chef Boyardee Pasta, Whole Grain, Beefaroni – and they’re letting the world know about it. Take a look at this  “silent” commercial where parents are hiding the whole grain truth from their daughter. If she thinks it’s healthy, she’ll refuse to eat it.

OK, we’ll just out and say it – double dumb family.

Once, for thinking that duping a child is the only way to get her to eat healthfully. Twice for buying into the whole grain health halo (see below). We dug around the nutrition facts and ingredient lists of the original vs. the new beefaroni, and found the following…

What you need to know:

Ingredients of the original product: (3 grams of fiber)

Tomatoes (Water, Tomato Puree), Water, Beef, Enriched Macaroni (Semolina Wheat Flour, Niacin, Iron, Thiamine Mononitrate [Vitamin B1], Riboflavin [Vitamin B2] and Folic Acid), Contains Less than 2% of: High Fructose Corn Syrup, Salt, Modified Corn Starch, Enzyme Modified Cheese (Cheddar Cheese [Pasteurized Milk, Cultures, Salt, Enzymes]), Flavorings and Soybean Oil.

Ingredients of the whole grain product: (3 grams of fiber, just as before)

Tomatoes (Water, Tomato Puree), Water, Beef, Pasta (Whole Wheat Flour, Semolina Wheat Flour), Less than 2% of: High Fructose Corn Syrup, Salt, Modified Corn Starch, Flavorings, Enzyme Modified Cheese (Cheddar Cheese [Pasteurized Milk, Cultures, Salt, Enzymes], Water, Sodium Phosphate, Xanthan Gum), Potassium Chloride, Maltodextrin, Citric Acid, Disodium Guanylate, Disodium Inosinate, Soybean Oil.

Here’s why we don’t like this product (not that the original was any good either):

1. You’re paying for a lot of water – it’s the first ingredient!

2. There may be some whole wheat, but the amount must be so low that it doesn’t add any more fiber to the meal. Note that the product is not 100% whole grain, there is still enriched flour here. The company is marketing “whole grain pasta” because they know people are looking for whole grains to increase fiber intake. But fact is this is mixed whole & enriched wheat pasta. There IS NO additional fiber. Scam.

3. For some reason, 5 additives that were not used in the original product have been added here: Potassium Chloride, Maltodextrin, Citric Acid, Disodium Guanylate, Disodium Inosinate. These are all flavor enhancers that you wouldn’t add to a home cooked meal. They weren’t even added to the original Chef Boyardee recipe.

4. 750 mg of Sodium per serving (that a third of the daily maximum). This is lower than than the original formula (990 mg), and perhaps explains all those additives added – they help fill in the void of the missing salt. But why not use real spices such as basil, oregano, parsley, as well as garlic and onion?

On the plus side, the new formula has only 3.5 grams of saturated fat vs. 4.5 grams in the original. Either ConAgra is using leaner cuts of beef or they cut back on 20% of the beef content.

Bottom line: Chef Boyardee’s Whole Grain Beefaroni is just another example of unjustified health halos for highly processed food products.

What to do at the supermarket:

If you want to reap the benefits of a whole grain pasta product, make sure it’s 100% whole grain. Going the canned route – watch for crazy high sodium counts, you really want to keep it under 500mg per serving.

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Four Graphic Examples of Portion Distortion – You’ll be Shocked

August 31st, 2010 5 comments

One of the most important pieces of information in a nutrition label is the serving size. Many people look at the calorie count, and are happy to see low numbers. But what they don’t notice is that they are consuming twice or more than the stated serving size. Which means twice the calories, twice the fat and sodium, etc.. (but on the bright side – also twice the minerals & vitamins.

There are some funny examples of products with ridiculously small serving sizes, for example “11 chips” for potato chips, or “2 cookies” for Oreos. These don’t make sense, because nobody eats so little. So why are these serving sizes used?

The answer is that a long time ago, the FDA/USDA surveyed consumers and set a “reference amount customarily  consumed” (RACC). The RACC was the amount of food normally consumed per eating occasion by persons four years of age or older.

But what has happened in the past few decades is that our actual RACCs have shot up skyward while the stated RACCs remained static. We can thank supersized meals in fast food establishments as one of the contributors to this phenomena. Without noticing, our expected potion sizes have ballooned. And so have we.

Take a look at the images here, courtesy of the Center for Science in the Public Interest (CSPI). What do you say? Is it time to super-shrink fast-food?

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Read It Before You Eat It

August 31st, 2010 3 comments

Last May I received an email from Bonnie Taub Dix, a dietitian based in New York, complimenting Fooducate on the information presented in the blog about nutrition labels and how to decode them. She told me she was writing a book on reading food labels, and a beautiful friendship ensued.

Today, Bonnie’s book, Read It Before You Eat It: How to Decode Food Labels and Make the Healthiest Choice Every Time, is available for sale. She sent me a copy of the book for review a few weeks ago, and I enjoyed reading through its chapters of practical advice on nutrients, ingredients, other labels such as organic, etc… My one caveat – I wish the book gave some examples of real food products and analyzed them. But hey, then what would this blog have left to do ;-)

Below are some interesting points Bonnie and I discussed.

[Fooducate] Where did you get the idea for the book?

[BTD] I was asked to write this book by my agent. A publisher came to him and asked if he knew of someone who could write a book that could decipher food labels and he thought I would be the perfect person to take on the challenge.

You shouldn’t have to be a dietitian, a mathematician, or a librarian to read a label. Although I must admit that the subject matter was not one of my favorites at that time, I’ve grown to know and love food labels and I hope my book helps consumers to feel that way too!

[Fooducate] Marion Nestle wrote a similar book, What to Eat, in 2007. What’s different about this book?

[BTD] Thank you for the compliment by even comparing my book to Marion’s! My book is very neutral – in over 250 pages, not even one brand name or manufacturer is mentioned. Consumers can use my book as a guide to shop any aisle, in any store, anywhere. It’s meant to be like a GPS of the supermarket…a complete resource about how to pick the healthiest foods.

In addition, I am thrilled to announce that my book cover carries a quote from Marion saying, “If the words on food labels seem hopelessly obscure, Read It Before You Eat It is just what you need. This book goes right on my shelf of handy references.” I was honored to have her blessing!

[Fooducate] What are your top 3 pieces of advice for a novice grocery shopper?

[BTD]

1. Don’t be fooled by the flashy front of the package — flip the bag or box over to get the real “facts” about what’s in the food you’re spending your money on and putting into your body.

2. Beware of buzz words like “free”, “natural” and “organic”, just to name a few. These terms are not always what they seem. In my book I have a whole chapter on misleading terms because they bug me the most! Bottom line: words like “free” could cost you unnecessary dollars and calories!

3. And of course, most importantly, Read It Before You Eat It (couldn’t help using that line!)

[Fooducate] You have 3 sons, did you take them/ still take them to the supermarket with you? How did you/do you handle excess requests for junk food?

[BTD] If you know me…you know I love food shopping! Ever since my boys could be propped up in a seated position, they have accompanied me to the supermarket.

During the early years, we made games out of the foods we selected, shopping for different shapes and colors (especially in the produce aisle) and as they got older, we moved onto comparing labels. Their preferences were always taken into consideration, with some requests welcomed, some compromised on, and some rejected.

Although (almost) all foods became potential purchases…certain foods, like candy and soda, were more like party and restaurant indulgences rather than regularly stocked at home.

Just another point, is that I also always got my kids involved in cooking with me, so it completed the cycle of making a shopping list, selecting the food, creating a yummy dish, and then cleaning up. (They weren’t great at the last part, but they excelled at the rest! The pay-off is that now, at 23, 20, and 15, they shop and cook for me sometimes, and it’s a glorious treat.)

[Fooducate] Are there foods / aisles that you recommend people DON’T look at the label, rather just enjoy?

[BTD] There’s something to enjoy in every aisle! In my opinion, not reading the label is like not taking care of yourself. Your health is a worthwhile investment that reaps countless benefits. The key is to try to blend together the enjoyment of what you’re eating with enjoyment of what you look and feel like. It’s a perfect mix.

[Fooducate] What’s your personal junk food fetish/weakness? (we won’t tell anyone;-)

[BTD] This question is tough for me to answer because I’m not a big ‘junk’ fan. I love rich, creamy ice cream and I adore a 72% cocoa or higher intense dark chocolate. Is that junk? That’s amazing stuff! I already know what’s in them…so I only use the labels of these foods to lead me to my favorite brands.

[Fooducate] What are the top 3 things you would change in nutrition labeling if it were up to you?

[BTD] I’d like to see natural sugars in milk, yogurt, and fruit separated from the “added sugars” derived from empty-calorie sweets; I’d like to see more realistic serving sizes listed because not many people eat only “1/2 muffin” or “1 cookie”; I’d like to see hydrogenated and partially hydrogenated fats eliminated from foods. (Labels that boast “zero trans fats” should contain zero…really and truly, zero.)

[Fooducate] Is there anything you discovered while writing this book that you didn’t know before?

[BTD] On the mechanical end — I discovered that it’s critically important to be passionate about what you’re writing because it takes your undivided attention, day and night, to write a book. On the educational side — I discovered that it’s really hard to read a label…it truly seems overwhelming at times, even to someone in the food business. But we are so fortunate to have this wealth of information in the Nutrition facts Panel, right on the packages of the food we’re buying. It’s so important and — it’s all there!

[Fooducate] Thank you!

Disclosure: Fooducate received a free copy of this book. Fooducate is mentioned as a resource in the book’s appendix.

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What Do People Look For on Nutrition Labels?

August 30th, 2010 7 comments

Earlier this month, The NPD Group, a market research firm, released a report on consumer trends in reading Nutrition Labels. Hey, that’s our favorite subject matter, so we were eager to take a look.

Top 5 items consumers are most interested in (ranked from highest down):

  1. total calories
  2. total fat
  3. calories from fat
  4. sugars
  5. sodium

Top 5 items consumers want maximize :

  1. whole grains
  2. dietary fiber
  3. calcium
  4. vitamin C
  5. protein

Top 5 items consumers are trying to avoid:

  1. fat
  2. sugars
  3. cholesterol
  4. sodium
  5. trans fat

What you need to know:

Some observations and recommendations.

* Obviously calories are the number one concern for many of us, as healthy diet has become synonymous with weight loss. What you need to read carefully is the the serving size. Many times consumers see a low calorie count and select a product, only to eat twice or more at a sitting than the actual serving size for which the calorie count was calculated.

* Unless you are vegan or a professional weightlifter, protein is NOT something you should worry about. Most Americans get  more protein in a day than their body requires.

* Iron, on the other hand, is a mineral that certain groups, such as teen girls, pregnant women, and pre-menopausal women, tend to lack.

* Fats as a group are getting a bad rap because for each gram of fat we pay with 9 calories, vs. 4 calories per gram of protein or carbs. But fats are divided into the healthy, unsaturated fat, which we should look to consume, the unhealthy saturated fats we should limit, and the industrially produced trans-fat which should avoid altogether.

* More important than all the nutrients though, is the product ingredient list. The shorter it is, the less processed a product (in most cases). Better yet are products without ingredient lists – fresh and frozen produce, bulk grains and legumes, and lean cuts of meat, poultry and fish.

By eating real food, instead of foods that have added nutrients in anticipation of consumer Nutrition Label reviews, you can be sure you’ll be getting the full nutritional benefit of foods.

More on nutrition labels tomorrow.

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Bisquick – A Shortcut Loaded with Trans-Fat

August 29th, 2010 12 comments

We got the following question from Lanette:

I do much of our cooking from scratch and am trying to eliminate processed  foods.  I have found several ‘recipes’ for make-your-own-baking-mix but they all call for shortening.  I don’t know which is worse!  I’m wondering if you could
do a post on Bisquick vs. Homemade options.  I use it all the time for pot-pies, dumplings, the occasional biscuits, pancakes, etc. so it’s handy to have a mix on hand.  I’d love to hear Fooducates take on this kitchen.

Excellent question. We’re happy to read that you’re making lots of food from scratch. Now let’s take a look if Bisquick is worth the time it saves. But first a note on shortening.

Shortening is basically a fat that is semisolid at room temperature and can be used for baking. It provides an amazing texture to baked foods – making light and fluffy breads, biscuits, and rolls. You don’t get the same mouthfeel with liquid oil.

Historically, shortening meant lard. But then hydrogenation was invented, and vegetable oils, bombarded with hydrogen atoms suddenly became semisolid at room temperature too. They were cheaper than lard, and became very popular. Crisco, anyone?

Unfortunately, the side effect of hydrogenation is the creation of trans-fatty acids, which are even worse for health than saturated fats of butter and lard.

What you need to know:

Betty Crocker’s Bisquick was invented in the early 1930’s to save time for busy cooks by premixing the ingredients needed for baking biscuits. Betty Crocker is part of General Mills.

Here’s what you’re getting in the Bisquick box:

Enriched Flour Bleached (Wheat Flour, Niacin, Iron, Thiamin Mononitrate, Riboflavin, Folic Acid), Partially Hydrogenated Soybean and/or Cottonseed Oil, Leavening (Baking Soda, Sodium Aluminum Phosphate, Monocalcium Phosphate), Dextrose, Salt.

Dear Betty: you lost me at Partially Hydrogenated Soybean and/or Cottonseed Oil. Is there any reason to continue selling a product with trans-fat in this day and age? We know how bad these fatty acids are for us. The recommendation is for NO consumption of trans fats a day.

What to do at the supermarket:

It’s really easy to mix your own bisquick equivalent. Buy the following ingredients at the supermarket: flour, baking powder, salt, Canola oil / butter. And here’s the “recipe”, that takes all of 96.3 seconds to prepare:

  1. pour 1 cup flour, 1½ tsp baking powder, ½ tsp salt, and 1 tbsp oil or melted butter into a mixing bowl.
  2. mix

Butter based recipes will taste better than ones with oil but you’re going to get more saturated fat. If you really want to go all out with a recipe – lard is making a comeback.

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Over 45 yrs old? Try the “Water Before Meal” Diet

August 28th, 2010 4 comments

Here’s yet another potential diet. Drink 2 glasses of water before every meal, and you’ll lose weight. That’s what a 12 week study has shown in middle aged people. They lost more weight than a control group that did not drink water. Both groups lost weight as they were instructed to follow a low fat, low calorie diet.

The caveat, according to the researchers at the department of human nutrition, foods and exercise at Virginia Tech, is that you need to be “middle aged” for this simple trick to work. Young people’s metabolism is a bit faster and as a result the stomach starts to empty the water immediately as it enters. In older folks, the water stays in the stomach a bit longer, thus promoting a sense of fullness that reduces the feeling of hunger and ultimately the amount of food consumed.

We’re big fans of water, regardless of this study. If you are looking for the easiest and fastest way to start shedding pounds, make water your only drink. No sodas, juices, energy drinks, or frappuchinos. (OK, you can make exceptions, but you get the point…). Tap water is really cheap too, saving up hundreds of dollars for you to buy fresh tasty vegetables and fruits.

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Should We be Happy? It’s Not Our Personal Fault We’re Fat

August 27th, 2010 9 comments

You know an article is important when you get links to it in multiple emails, tweets and facebook updates. We got numerous links to Saturday’s Fixing a World That Fosters Fat, in the business section of the New York Times. And it truly is an interestin g piece, touching upon a critically important question:

WHY IN THE WORLD ARE WE [collectively] GETTING SO FAT?

Before we even get a chance to respond, the article provides an answer:

[Dieting and exercising] won’t work on their own without seismic societal shifts, health experts say, because eating too much and exercising too little are merely symptoms of a much larger malady. The real problem is a landscape littered with inexpensive fast-food meals; saturation advertising for fatty, sugary products; inner cities that lack supermarkets; and unhealthy, high-stress workplaces.

In other words: it’s the environment, stupid. read more…

We couldn’t agree more. There are too many daily cues that trigger food consumption in this country.

The wonderful efficiencies of scales that made automobiles, TV sets, and computers accessible to the average Jane & Joe, worked fantastically in the food industry too. From a hungry country in the 1930’s, the US became, within less than 100 years, the fattest.

Problem is that government policy is still directed at solving the malnourishment of the 1930’s, for example in the form of silly subsidies for the mother of High Fructose Corn Syrup, Corn.

As a result of a misaligned government policy, the food industry has optimized itself for providing as much food as possible for as low a price as feasible. We call this efficiency. This cost cutting has led to the use of truly ingenious substitutions of real food ingredients with chemicals (artificial colors, for example. Vanillin instead of real vanilla, another example, HFCS instead of sugar). But the price of this efficiency has been a loss of of long term effectiveness: We are no longer effective at nourishing our nation.

The food machine, if you will, has made it cheaper today to eat junk food than it is to eat healthy food. A greaseburger costs less than an apple per calorie. If you’ve got a buck and you’re hungry, what will you choose?

Dr. Adam Drewnowski of the University of Washington has written many times on Nutrient Dense Foods, and recently published a paper on nutrition density of foods per dollar spent. Turns out there is a growing disparity – prices of nutritious foods rose almost twice as fast as those of non-nutritious foods in the years 2004-2008.

With innumerable options daily to reach out for dirt cheap junk food, The question shouldn’t be way are 200 million Americans overweight, rather how come not all 300 million of us are…

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Is Chocolate Milk Losing Ground in School Lunches?

August 26th, 2010 14 comments

Photo: Tony Cenicola | The New York Times

Chocolate milk contains way too much sugar. An 8 fl oz serving (the standard carton served in schools) contains 3 teaspoons of added sugar! That sounds more like a treat than a healthy drink. Not something kids should be getting with their lunch at school on a daily basis.

The New York Times ran an article earlier this week on this matter, presenting arguments for both sides, and examples of actions taken by parents, lunch directors, and even entire school districts:

When students went back to school Monday in the District of Columbia, they were served only low-fat white milk. Berkeley, Calif., schools banned chocolate milk, and Florida school officials are considering it.

Is this the beginning of a new trend? Probably not. As we reported last month, The dairy industry published a report that demonstrated a precipitous drop in milk consumption at schools where “flavored milk” was removed. But the severely underfunded schools need to serve milk and have kids choose it in order to be eligible for funding from the government for the school lunch program. Get the picture?

We think there is a middle road that has not been fully explored yet. Serve flavored milk, by all means, but not with 3 teaspoons of added sugar. Isn’t 1 or 1.5 enough?

A while back, we asked Greg Miller, PhD, executive vice president of science and research for the National Dairy Council, why no manufacturer will try a slightly less sweet formulation.His response was that kids simply did not like the taste once a certain threshold of sugar was removed.

We believe that the answer is competition. No company wants to be the first to take the bold step of sugar reduction and lose out. With a tremendous oversupply of milk in this country, nobody wants to lose market share to a competitor for creating a drink that kids are less likely to choose.

As usual, the onus falls on parents to fight the uphill battle for their children’s health.

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Another Health Halo Shattered – Bottled Teas Contain Virtually no Antioxidants

August 25th, 2010 7 comments

Tea is the world’s most widely consumed beverage, not coffee. Just in the US, the market last year stood at $7 Billion in sales of tea bags and bottles, including iced tea. The industry has quadrupled itself since the early 1990’s partly due to the health halo tea , and especially green tea, enjoy. Scientists discovered that tea contains antioxidants called polyphenols that may reduce risks of heart disease, cancer, and other maladies.

Unfortunately, a study presented this weekend at the National Meeting of the American Chemical Society revealed that bottled tea contains very low levels of polyphenols compared to tea brewed at home:

“Consumers understand very well the concept of the health benefits from drinking tea or consuming other tea products,” said Shiming Li, Ph.D., who reported on the new study with Professor Chi-Tang Ho and his colleagues. “However, there is a huge gap between the perception that tea consumption is healthy and the actual amount of the healthful nutrients — polyphenols — found in bottled tea beverages. Our analysis of tea beverages found that the polyphenol content is extremely low.” read more…

Just how low were the levels of polyphenols in the bottled tea products? Testing 6 different brands, a 16 ounce bottle contained on average less than 30mg, or 15mg per cup. That’s compared to a home brewed cup of tea with 50-150mg. Some bottled teas contained less than 2mg per cup.

Why such a difference? Polyphenols in tea tend to “evaporate” once the tea leaves are brewed or otherwise processed, at home as well. In addition,

“Polyphenols are bitter and astringent, but to target as many consumers as they can, manufacturers want to keep the bitterness and astringency at a minimum,” Li explained. “The simplest way is to add less tea, which makes the tea polyphenol content low, but tastes smoother and sweeter.”

Once again we see how clever marketing trumps health and nutrition.

What to do at the supermarket:

Consider any non-water drink as a treat rather than a necessary hydration vehicle. That way you won’t be expecting any health benefits and won’t need to read health claims marketing claims that dupe you into shelling out money for something that is not.

As it relates to brewed tea, it doesn’t get much easier – boil some water, pour into your favorite mug, dunk in your favorite flavored tea (Earl Grey anyone?) and enjoy. Oh, and you can add your own sugar in sane amounts.

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Four Cheese Pizza – DiGiorno’s vs. Newman’s Own

August 24th, 2010 4 comments

Everyone loves pizza. It’s the #1 looked up entry in yellow pages and very popular in google searches as well. While dining at a pizzeria or getting delivered to your home are the most popular consumption modes, people are going to want this goodness on call in their freezer as well. There’s an entire section of a supermarket aisle to support this claim.

While we enjoy pizza outside the home about once a month, and every couple of months make our own, many families keep some frozen pizzas in the freezer for those evenings when you barely have the energy left to turn on the microwave/oven.

We decided to take a look at two brands of pizza and see where they were similar, and what set them apart from each other. Here’s the nutrition comparison between Newman’s Own and DiGiorno’s Four Cheese thin crust pizzas.

What you need to know:

Calorically both pizza’s are similar – a 2 slice serving is about 300 calories. Both are fatty, including 6-7 grams of saturated fat (1/3 of the daily value). DiGiorno’s includes 1 gram of trans-fat, a nutrient that we should consume ZERO grams of daily. Both are high in sodium (over 600mg per serving, about a quarter of the daily max).

Nutritionally, pizza is not your best friend, as you can see from the above.But if you’re going to enjoy pizza, at least have a pizza with real ingredients. This is where DiGiorno and Newman’s Own’s philosophy vastly differ. DiGiorno uses cheap oils, artificial flavors, and other food manufacturing tricks to put together its pizza. Newman’s ingredient is actually understandable by a layperson. See below:

DiGiorno’s ingredients:

Shredded Low-Moisture Part-Skim Mozzarella Cheese (Part-Skim Milk, Cheese Culture, Salt, Enzymes), Water, Wheat Flour, Tomato Paste, Contains Less than 2% of Modified Food Starch, Grated Cheese Blend (Parmesan, Asiago, and Romano Cheese Made from Cow’s Milk [Part-Skim Milk, Cheese Culture, Salt, Enzymes], Cellulose Powder to Prevent Caking), Yellow Corn Meal, Vegetable Oil (Soybean Oil and/or Corn Oil), Partially Hydrogenated Soybean and Cottonseed Oil, White Corn Meal, Salt, Sugar, Yeast, Spice, Garlic, Artificial Flavor, Soy Lecithin, Natural Flavor, Beta Carotene (Color).

Newman’s ingredients:

Ingredients: MULTIGRAIN CRUST (WHEAT FLOUR, WATER, VEGETABLE OIL [CORN OIL, EXTRA VIRGIN OLIVE OIL], FLAXSEED, YEAST, SUGAR, SALT, WHOLE OAT FLOUR), LOW MOISTURE PART-SKIM MOZZARELLA CHEESE (PASTEURIZED PART-SKIM MILK, CHEESE CULTURE, SALT, ENZYMES), SAUCE (TOMATOES [DICED TOMATOES, TOMATO JUICE], WATER, TOMATO PASTE, EXTRA VIRGIN OLIVE OIL, RED WINE VINEGAR, SALT, SUGAR, SPICES, GARLIC*, ONION*), CHEDDAR CHEESE (PASTEURIZED MILK, CHEESE CULTURE, SALT, ENZYMES), PARMESAN CHEESE (PART-SKIM PASTEURIZED COW’S MILK, CHEESE CULTURES, SALT, RENNET), ASIAGO CHEESE (PASTEURIZED PART-SKIM MILK, CHEESE CULTURES, SALT, ENZYMES). *DRIED. CONTAINS: MILK, WHEAT.

Obviously Newman’s is the winner here. Too bad it’s more expensive. But hey, you get what you pay for, both good and bad.

What to do at the supermarket:

When buying a frozen pizza look for products that use as many natural sounding ingredients as possible. Avoid products with partially hydrogenated vegetable oil – that’s the source of trans-fat. Look out for sodium bombs reaching 1000 or more mg per serving.

Choose products low in saturated fat (less than 3 grams per slice if possible). Opt for pizzas without added cheese or meats, rather added veggies.

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