We’ve been following developments in nutrition rating schemes and front of package labeling for quite some time. Smart Choices is a labeling system that informs consumers which products are a nutritious choice using a green check mark as a quick glance visual cue. The selection criteria is based on nutrients in the foods, and has been defined by the food industry together with nutrition experts. This bias has created an unobjective system, whose purpose is to help sell more products under the guise of nutrition and health.

Here is a perfect example – Smart Choices has recently been spotted in supermarkets across the country on products such as breakfast cereals, including the sugary kid stuff. If we needed any further proof that this benchmark system is NOT IN THE HEALTH INTEREST of consumers,  take a look at Froot Loops, which has received the coveted “Smart Choice” checkmark. Froot Loops is manufactured by Kellogg’s, one of the members of Smart Choices.

What you need to know:

Let’s look at the Ingredient List and Nutrition Panel:

Sugar, Corn Flour, Wheat Flour, Whole Oat Flour, Partially Hydrogenated Vegetable Oil (One or More of: Coconut, Cottonseed, and Soybean) (Less than 0.5 g Trans Fat Per Serving), Salt, Sodium Ascorbate and Ascorbic Acid (Vitamin C), Reduced Iron, Natural Orange, Lemon, Cherry, Raspberry, Blueberry, Lime, and Other Natural Flavors, Red No. 40, Blue No. 2, Yellow No. 6, Zinc Oxide, Niacinamide, Turmeric Color, Blue No. 1, Pyridoxine Hydrochloride (Vitamin B6), Riboflavin (Vitamin B2), Thiamin Hydrochloride (Vitamin B1), Vitamin A Palmitate, Annatto Color, BHT (Preservative), Folic Acid, Vitamin D, Vitamin B12.

The first ingredient is sugar! In fact, Froot Loops is 41% sugar by weight. And Whoa(!) partially hydrogenate vegetable oil too. Doesn’t sound like a smart choice to us. A 1 oz serving (which by the way is too small for regular people) contains 12 grams of sugar – that’s 3 teaspoons. 48 of the 110 calories per serving are from sugar.

And check out the partially hydrogenated vegetable oil – that’s trans fat folks, even if there is less than half a gram per serving, it adds up to 8 grams in a box. People should not consume ANY trans fat during the day.

Additionally, there is less than 1 oz of fiber per serving, and as you probably know, breakfast cereals are expected to be an important source of fiber.

The rainbow of artificial colors (Red No. 40, Blue No. 2, Yellow No. 6) are of a dubious nature, as some may contribute to hyperactivity in kids. Europe is twisting manufacturers’ arms to get rid of the colors voluntarily.

And another note, on marketing to kids. Froot Loops, like many other kids focused “food”, has a thoroughly entertaining website filled with games and activities, all of which are embedded with froot loops and other branding messages. What a way to burn a brand into our children’s young and impressionable minds. To ease some corporate guilt, or most likely at the advice of their legal team, Kellogg’s has a tiny disclaimer at the bottom of the page that we’re sure all kids read before playing:

KIDS: This page may contain a product or promotion advertisement.
Remember, you should get a parent’s permission before you try to buy anything online or give information about yourself.

Please, please food industry executives – stop indoctrinating our children to eat crap. You have kids too!

What to do at the supermarket:

Do not trust health claims or cutesy checkmarks and recommendations on product packages. Look at the ingredient list and the nutrition panel. There should be less than 6 grams of sugar per serving, 3 grams or more of fiber, NO partially hydrogenated vegetable oil, and no artificial food colorings.

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If you’re reading nutrition labels and ingredient lists, you’ve probably come across “soy lecithin” more than a few times. It’s actually a very popular item, in the top 10 most used ingredients in processed foods.

But what exactly is it? What does it do? And most importantly, what are its health and nutrition characteristics?

What you need to know:

Lecithins are oily substances that occur naturally in plants (soybeans) and animals (egg yolks).

Soy lecithin (E322) is extracted from soybeans either mechanically or chemically. It’s actually a byproduct of the soybean’s oil.

Some people use it as a supplement, because it has a high value of the nutrient choline. Choline is good for heart health and brain development.

But that’s not the reason soy lecithin is used as an additive in foods. It possesses emulsification properties. This means it can keep a candy bar “together” by making sure that the cocoa and the cocoa butter don’t separate. It is also used in bakery items to keep the dough from sticking and to improve its ability to rise.

Since soybean are one of the cheapest crops in the US (thanks in part to federal subsidies to growers), it makes sense to use a cheap, natural soy derived emulsifier in food processing.

People with soy allergies needn’t worry about products containing soy lecithin, because it is derived from the soybean oil, whereas the allergy itself relates to the soy protein.

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Very healthy! Or at least that’s what new research, sponsored by ConAgra, has shown. Here’s the press release:

ConAgra Foods announced today new research that shows people who ate Healthy Choice(R) really did get healthier. Participants in the 24-week study, on average, lost 18 pounds – all as fat – trimmed their waistlines by about three inches, and lowered their cholesterol by 12 points. Leading cardiologist Dr. James Rippe, founder and director of the Rippe Lifestyle Institute, led the research team that conducted the study, which was presented during the 2009 Experimental Biology Conference April 18-22 in New Orleans, La.

get it all here…

Excuse us while we scratch our heads. How can The Rippe Institute conduct a truly objective study when it is being heftily paid by a company with a vested interest in a specific outcome?

Reading into the study, the people eating Helthy Choice got healthier because they were forced to excercise, eat only fruits, vegetables, lean meat and dairy, and whole grains. Oh, and one Healthy Choice meal once a day. How can the weight loss be attributed specifically to the frozen meal?

This press release is part of a huge rebranding of the Healthy Choice empire, including the introduction of new products, reformulation of some existing lines, and new packaging. ConAgra is estimated to be spending close to $100 million on this effort, including National TV Ads starring Julia Louis-Dreyfus and web activities.

What you need to know:

While frozen dinners have made some headway over the past few years in terms of nutritional content, they still lag far behind home made food on several fronts:

1. high levels of salt – in the clip above, Julia Louis Dreyfus is stuffing herself silly with Sweet Asian Potstickers containing 600mg of sodium. That’s a quarter of the daily maximum value.

2. high levels of sugar – 19 grams or 4 teaspoonfuls. Hey, is this dessert?

3. too many ingredients* – here’s what’s inside the Sweet Asian Potstickers:

Vegetable Potstickers: (Filling [Cabbage, Vermicelli {Mung Bean, Water}, Baked Tofu (Tofu [Water, Whole Soybeans, Nigari], Tamari [Water, Soybeans, Salt, Alcohol, Wheat], Natural Flavors, Spices), Bulgur Wheat, Precooked Rice, Water Chestnuts, Green Beans, Onions, Carrots, Soy Sauce (Water, Wheat, Soybeans, Salt), Sesame Oil, Evaporated Cane Juice, Salt, Xanthan Gum, Spice], Wrapper [Wheat Flour, Water, Corn Starch, Soybean and/or Canola Oil]). Cooked Whole Grain Brown Rice, Water, Sugar, Carrots, Red Peppers, Sake, Rice Vinegar, Scallions, Corn Starch, Wheat, Soybeans, Spices, Sesame Oil, Garlic Puree, Salt, Locust Gum

To be fair, most of the list above is actually understandable, and there are no freaky additives or preservatives in this dish. So when the food scientists want to, they can dish out healthy fare…

* We could not find the ingredient information on the Healthy Choice website. The customer support group did reply promptly to our email, though.

What to do at the supermarket:

If you really really can’t prepare your own food, and must grab something from the Frozen Dinner Aisle, take a look at health brands such as Healthy Choice and Lean Cuisine first. The brand does not automatically promise you’ll get a nutritious dish, but it improves the chances.

Proceed to check the ingredient list, scanning for unpronounceable chemicals, and then look at the sodium count. It should be in the neighborhood of  400-500mg or less. The sugar count should be lower than 12 grams. Usually the calorie count will be decent, because manufacturers know that’s the only number most people look at.

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Americans consume 31 BILLION lbs. of oil a year.

That’s about 100 lbs. per man woman and child, or half a cup of oil every day.

And almost half of the oil we consume is hydrogenated to degree, meaning it contains trans-fat.

But there is hope, according to a recent article in USA Today:

What may be the next big thing in the quest for the perfect low-fat french fry will sprout from Iowa ground this summer.

Pioneer Hi-Bred says its genetically engineered soybean will make an oil that has no artery-clogging trans fats. The high-oleic oil is supposed to last three to five times longer in commercial fryers than most zero-trans-fat oils.

The Johnson, Iowa-based company, the second-largest producer of hybrid seeds for agriculture, will put the soybean through tests to determine whether those claims are true. If so, then McDonald’s, Frito-Lay and other companies may snap up the oil and promote heart-healthy fried foods and chips.

Read more…

What you need to know:

There is a lot of controversy around genetically modified foods, which we won’t get into in this post. Creating an oil that won’t become trans-fat when hydrogenated sounds interesting, but it will probably take years to prove it is safe and does the job. In the meantime, a few things to know:

Trans fat is found in shortenings, margarine, snacks such as crackers, candies, and cookies, fried foods, pastries and other foods prepared with partially hydrogenated vegetable oils

Trans fat labeling on food packages has been mandatory since 2006. But, if a serving has less than o.5 grams of trans-fat, the label may state ZERO. Yes, that includes 0.49 grams in a serving size even a 2 year old would find ridiculously too small. This is a loophole being exploited by some food manufacturers.

What to do at the supermarket:

Try to reduce to zero your trans-fat consumption by examining food labels carefully. If the nutrition panel says 0 trans-fat, it’s a good start, but always take a look at the ingredient list to spot partially hydrogenated oils.

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Edamame, Soy sauce, tofu, tempeh, cereal, bread, oils, etc… the descendants of the green soybean are found in thousands of supermarket items. For a relatively bitter, beany legume that until the 17th century was unkown in the western world, soy is a very prominent ingredient today. The reason, as bluntly stated by the Philadelphia Inquirer:

Since 1999, when the U.S. Food and Drug Administration approved a “heart healthy” labeling claim for certain soy-based foods, pantry staples like cereal and pasta have been “soy-ed up” and repackaged as health foods. Read the article…

So is soy as healthy as the health claims play it out to be? Read more…