14 Jun, 2010
Know More Do More Monday: reading labels
Posted by andrea tomkins in: - Know More Do More
This is the KMDM activity we did this past week:
Read the nutritional panel and ingredients of every grocery store product for the week. Did you know that the vast majority packaged products contain crap that isn’t very good for you?
Once again I must re-iterate that this tip was one of my own. The kind folks behind this campaign would never use a word like “crap.” ;)
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Canadian Living (a magazine I really like and respect) has a regular feature called “Off the shelf.” The author of this column is Cara Rosenbloom, R.D. (Which stands for Registered Dietitian.) The July column is about ranch salad dressing.
“Our nutrition expert looked for ranch dressings, and here’s what she found. (All comparisons are for one tablespoon of dressing.)”
The article compares four brands: No Name, Renée’s, PC Blue Menu and Kraft Fat-Free. There’s a breakdown of each brand in bullet list format which briefly covers (1) calories/sodium/fats (2) main ingredients (3) points of interest for each brand i.e. one brand might be a source of omega-3, has the lowest amount of sodium per serving etc.
Canadian Living is such a respected publication. It is the final word on so many issues and can bring about huge changes in our society. The “off the shelf” column is a perfect opportunity for Canadian Living to really step up to the plate and inform people about healthy eating – what’s good, what isn’t – and how to read a label. Yet in this column, there is no added editorial information (Cara! You must have an opinion!) to help people understand why one particular ingredient in a bottle of salad dressing is better (or worse) than another.
Is it because they don’t want to alienate potential advertisers?
Renée’s is tied with No Name for the highest number of calories per serving (at 70/tb) BUT Renée’s contains canola oil, buttermilk, sour cream, egg yolk and spices. The Kraft Fat-Free Ranch contains water and corn syrup. It also contains the most sodium … YET many people will buy it because it’s deemed to be “fat-free.” But at what cost?
If you are reaching for the fat-free version of your favourite food it almost always means you are trading fats for highly-refined sugars and/or an extra dollop of sodium. And that, my friends, is what’s making us all so fat, and many of us so ill.
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There was a scene in Jamie Oliver’s Food Revolution in which he confronts the lunch ladies about the pre-packaged chicken they’re serving to the kids at their school. The camera zooms in on the list of ingredients on the side of the box of frozen chicken. The small type basically covers the whole side of the box. Jamie Oliver asks the lunch ladies if they are concerned about any of these totally unidentifiable ingredients.
No, they said, it says CHICKEN.
But what about all these other things, he asks.
Doesn’t matter, they say, it says CHICKEN.
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I consider myself a regular label reader. When I’m looking at a label I look for the following things:
- The ingredients. Does it contain a bunch of ingredients I don’t recognize and can’t pronounce? Does it contain glucose-fructose? Anything that ends with the letters o.s.e.? Does it contain anything hydrogenated? Or made out of palm oil? Anything derived from corn? If the answer to any of these questions is yes, I put it back.
- The nutrition panel. I check for sodium, sugar and fibre. My motto: IF IT’S OUT OF WHACK, PUT IT BACK
I also read the labels on our dog food and dog treats, because I don’t think dogs should be eating corn or flour. We try to keep her diet as unprocessed as we can too.
So yes, I’m a big-time label reader. Yet at the same time, there are a few products – for whatever reason – that I’ve just taken to throwing into my grocery cart without a second thought.
Like margarine, for example. I finally took a close look at the label of Olivina. Ugh. And jam! I was shopping for jam (it’s not something we normally buy, we are lucky beneficiaries of Nana’s homemade jam supply) but holy crap, almost every brand has glucose-fructose in it instead of sugar. (I prefer the sugar!)
And salad dressing. And Heinz tomato juice (ugh – check that sodium level, it’s terrible). And bread. I am having a bread crisis right now and am having problems finding one I like. We were buying rye for awhile but it’s just as refined as anything else. I’ve been buying “bakery bread” lately (as opposed to big factory loaves) and the seedy whole-grain Euro loaves. It’s too hot to bake my own right now. And I just haven’t had time.
Sarah asked for lemonade when we were at the grocery store, so I picked up one of those containers of frozen stuff and showed her the ingredients. I pointed out all the stuff that didn’t need to be in there, and then reviewed the ingredients of the lemonade I make at home. I think she got the point.
Related: I’ve stopped reading magazine and newspaper articles about so-called “superfoods.” The media has a holiday every time a new study comes out. It’s impossible to keep track. One week it might be walnuts, the other week it’s pomegranate. I think we all know what they are now. MAYBE walnuts are marginally healthier than almonds. Or is it the reverse? Regardless, LET’S JUST EAT MORE NUTS AND VEGETABLES and WHOLE FOODS AND CALL IT A DAY.
I think it’s loony, our obsession with superfoods, yet the entire grocery store is filled to the rafters with processed pretend foods trying to trick us into thinking they are good for us because they are “FAT FREE.”
What do you think?
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This post is part of the Know More Do More initiative spearheaded by the Champlain Cardiovascular Disease Prevention Network. KMDM is about empowering parents and inspiring them to take charge of their children’s health by taking easy steps to increase activity levels and improve eating habits. I’m one of two champion families who has been asked to take this challenge. You can join too. Check out the official website for more information. You can also get healthy tips by following @knowmoredomore on Twitter. If you’re blogging about your participation, please let me know so we can cheer each other on!
