Who would you prefer to buy your water from?

A company that discloses the water’s source, how the water has been purified, and what pollutants each bottle of water may contain? Or a company that discloses nothing?

We’ll take option A please.

The good news is that it’s the cheaper option too. Way cheaper. Yes, the 50,000 tap water suppliers, whose “product” is regulated by the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), have a high standard to adhere to. They are required to publish an annual report describing their water’s status.

In stark comparison, the bottled water companies, regulated by the FDA, aren’t required to disclose anything to anyone.

This, and other interesting details are available in a new report from the Environmental Working Group (a nonprofit research organization based in Washington, DC that uses the power of information to protect human health and the environment.)

What you need to know:

Bottled water is a textbook example of marketing genius. There is absolutely no reason to be drinking it in most parts of the US. As the recent report shows, from a health perspective, tap is scrutinized more carefully than bottled water. It’s a drain on your pocketbook. And the plastic bottles are an ecological nightmare.

What to do at the supermarket:

With all the cash you saved by not buying bottled water, how about splurging on some of those more expensive / exotic fruits and vegetables in the produce aisle?

Get Fooducated: RSS Subscription or Email Subscription

Follow us on twitter: twitter.com/fooducate

Help us test our new food comparison tool: alpha.fooducate.com

Energy bars are a popular and growing category of snack foods that are a natural evolution of breakfast cereals. Sixty years ago we had time to sit down for a hearty breakfast with the family. By the early seventies, families couldn’t bother with the hassle and settled for a bowl of cereal with milk. Nowadays, many people don’t have time for even this, so they grab a cereal bar / energy bar / snack bar and a spill proof cup of coffee and hop into the car for the morning commute.

With so many bars to choose from, you may find yourself confused. All these bars tout health benefits from here to the 2012 London Olympics. However, there are some companies that try to maintain a higher standard than others, and today we’ll take a look at products from 2 such bars:

Kashi Go Lean Caramel Peanut:

Larabar Peanut Butter Cookie:

Read more…

The long weekend marks the beginning of this year’s barbecue season, and if you’re like most Americans, there will surely be some form of frankfurter sizzling away on your grill.

Hot Dogs are a big business (billions of dollars a year), and as the weather heats up, so do the marketing battles between the market players.

As food companies like to sue each other every once in while in turf wars, how timely it is to read about a weiner war, with Kraft’s Oscar Meyer Brand getting sued by Sara Lee (Ball Park brand) over “We are tastier” claims.

From a nutritional standpoint, the products are very similar, and sadly, very poor in nutritional value.  Read more…

There’s an old Indian proverb - God laughs when a thief steals from a thief.

PepsiCo is suing the Coca-Cola Company over claims that its new sports drink Powerade Ion4, is more complete than Pespi’s  Gatorade.

Seems like Coke just lifted a page from Pepsi’s marketing playbook. And Pepsi is mad.

While nobody here is a thief, both corporations are making gazillions selling us liquid candy, and sports drinks are no exception. This lawsuit is part of a marketing battle, no less, no more.

What you need to know:

Sports drink are a huge business with over $7.5 Billion in sales in 2008, just in the US.

Gatorade is the undisputed champ with over 75% market share, with Powerade at number two with over 20% of the market.

From a nutritional standpoint, both companies’ sports drinks are mostly water, sweeteners , salt, questionable food colorings, and a few more vitamins and minerals in tiny amounts. The sweetener of choice is, of course, high fructose corn syrup (equivalent to 4 teaspoons of sugar in a 12 oz bottle).

The fact that Powerade contains magnesium and Gatorade doesn’t is more trivial than where Paris Hilton partied last week.

Nutrition Info:

“But what about all those electrolytes I lose while sweating”, you may ask.

Powerade boasts 2 electrolytes that Gatorade does not have – 2.5 mg of calcium, and 1.2 mg of magnesium. Sorry to disappoint you folks, the amount of calcium your body needs each day is 1000 mg. Do you really think Powerade is going to help with less than 1% of that? Same for 1.2 mg of magnesium comapred to the 400 mg daily requirement.

Gatorade is no better. Nobody in the Western World needs 110 mg of extra sodium, especially not in a soft drink. We are already consuming far more than the daily recommended value of 2300mg. And the 30 grams of potassium provided is less than 1% of the 3500 mg our bodies need.

Unless you are a super athlete (marathons, professional sports, etc…) all you need in order to replenish after a 30 minute workout is good ol’ tap water and maybe a banana, some nuts, or a sandwhich.

Oh, and by the way, all those cool sounding flavors are NOT the result of any real fruit in the drink.

What to do at the supermarket:

Leave the sports drink to the NFL and NBA superstars

Do yourself and your family a favor. Save $500 a year by quitting carbonated drinks, including the so called sports drinks. Spend the money on real sports products and services – good running shoes or a gym membership.

Simply stated: Just skip the beverage aisle at the supermarket.

Get Fooducated: RSS Subscription or Email Subscription

Follow us on twitter: twitter.com/fooducate

Help us test our new food comparison tool: alpha.fooducate.com

flickr photo: tristanbrand

In round one, table sugar was the bad boy. Empty calories, with no nutritional benefits.

In round two, High Fructose Corn Syrup got heat, because of the perception that it is unnatural, and promotes obesity as well.

In round three, instead of both sugar and HFCS slowly disappearing from products, good ol’ sugar is back in many products that have long used HFCS, a cheaper sweetener derived from corn.

According to a recent New York Times article:

Sugar, the nutritional pariah that dentists and dietitians have long reviled, is enjoying a second act, dressed up as a natural, healthful ingredient.

From the tomato sauce on a Pizza Hut pie called “The Natural,” to the just-released soda Pepsi Natural, some of the biggest players in the American food business have started, in the last few months, replacing high-fructose corn syrup with old-fashioned sugar.

ConAgra uses only sugar or honey in its new Healthy Choice All Natural frozen entrees. Kraft Foods recently removed the corn sweetener from its salad dressings, and is working on its Lunchables line of portable meals and snacks.

Read the entire article…

What you need to know:

So which is better for you – Sugar or HFCS?

Neither.

Calorically, they are the same. Nutritionally, they are also the same – no nutrients whatsoever.

Although a recent study found trace amounts of mercury in HFCS, they are smaller than what you get from going outside and breathing in exhaust fumes from cars and factory smokestacks.

What to do at the supermarket:

Look for sugar , HFCS, and other synonyms on food labels. You’d be surprised in how many places sweeteners have found a place. In many cases, there is more than one sweetener in the ingredient list. Shy away from products who list sweeteners as one of the first ingredients in the ingredient list. As Pat Crawford of the Center for Weight and Health at the University of California, Berkeley says – “Keep sugar for the desserts”.

Get Fooducated: RSS Subscription or Email Subscription

Help us test our new food comparison tool: alpha.fooducate.com

Image by Getty Images via Daylife

Do you know where your food comes from? How many different countries has it been to? How many people handled it? And in what kinds of sanitary conditions?

Well, you should. Or at least have a means to know, if you care. Read more…

Are Lucky Charms Better for You Than Granola?

In a recent Newsweek piece, reporter Tina Peng compared 2 breakfast options and came up with a surprising result -

“Compared with Kellogg’s Low-Fat Granola cereal with raisins, one cup of General Mills’ Lucky Charms is actually healthier, with less fat and sugar and fewer calories and carbs.”

Seems counter intuitive, so Treehugger Blog dug a bit deeper:

If you didn’t read the introduction and your eyes went straight for the chart, you’d probably assume that Newsweek tarred all granola products for their criminally high calorie count and fat and sugar content. The magazine makes its comparison using one particular brand of low-fat granola, however: Kellogg’s, which isn’t particularly representative of the healthier granola options on the market…

Read more…

What you need to know:

When comparing products, make sure the serving sizes match. Newsweek compared a cup of granola to a cup of Lucky Charms, but the the granola serving size is only two thirds of a cup. Shorter ingredient lists without artificial coloring and additives are very important, in this case both products comapred do not excel. Many granolas include dried fruits such as raisins, which are rich in natural sugar (fructose). While still packing calories, raisins are definitely more nutritious than refined sugar or HFCS that is added to Lucky Charms.

What to do at the supermarket:

Look for a short ingredient list. Look out for artifical coloring. Examine the nutrition label. Choose a sugar count of less than 12 grams per serving.

Get Fooducated: RSS Subscription or Email Subscription

Image by colros via Flickr

We posted earlier today with some bread buying advice; now it’s time for the spread. Dr. Kristie Leong over at HealthMad published 2 great posts today:

1. Butter vs. Margarine – Margarine can be a source for trans fats, but on the other hand butter is usually higher in saturated fat. However, butter has additional nutritional value that margarines don’t.

2. Five Healthy Butter Substitutes, including whipped butter, tub margarine, Butter Buds, roasted garlics, hummus, olive oil dip.

What you need to know:

Margarine was invented in France in the late 18th century as a cheap alternative to butter for Napoleon’s army. Margarine is usually a mixture of soy oil and various food additives. Hydrogenation causes the oil to solidify, creating margarine. Created as a bonus side effect is the evil trans-fat that can cause heart disease even faster than the saturate fat in butter. Both margarine and butter are fat, a single serving of 14 grams (one tablespoon) packs 100 calories.

What to do at the supermarket:

As usual, look at the ingredient list and the nutrition data. Choose the product with no trans fat and low saturated fat. If you are looking for a spread, consider alternatives such as hummus, tahini, and other veggie pastes. If you do end up with butter or margarine on your whole wheat bread, just spread really thin…

photo credit: TooFarNorth

Small Bites blogger Andy Bellati responds to a claim that ounce for ounce veggies are more nutritious than fruit. Bottom Line:

All fruits and vegetables (yes, that includes potatoes!) are healthy. Shunning particular ones under the guise of “more nutrition” is very silly. There is definitely room for fruit in all diets.

read post…

If you’re in the San Francisco Bay Area this weekend, you may want to join a revolution. No, the hippies of the 60s and the techies of today are not the luminaries this time. Food is. The Slow Food movement, a counter to today’s fast food society, is trying to bring back the pleasures of yesteryear when meals were prepared at home from scratch. More information here.

See article at USA Today:

With epidemic rates of obesity, diabetes, global warming and ecological
degradation, “we need a new food system in America. We need a new food
system that supports the people who are taking care of the land,
supports the small farmers, that feeds the children something that’s
nourishing.”

What to look for at the Supermarket:
The less processed foods are usually found in the perimeter of the store, whereas the highly processed foods are in the center aisles. Try to buy products with fewer ingredients, those are probably ingredients that you can identify in plain English.