Making healthy choices easier: How to read nutrition labels

I was surprised when I recently looked at a label and found Canola Oil, Modified Food Starch, Sorbic Acid and Calcium Disodium Edta as the main ingredients.  I had been eating some egg-free mayo, because I was not eating eggs for a little while (approximately 7 million people in the US alone have egg allergies or sensitivities).  Having gone back to having eggs in my diet, I wondered about the egg-free mayo and ended up looking at it’s nutrition info and ingredients list. It should go without saying that I quickly decided plain old mayo had to be better for me than those ingredients.  Canola oil contains too many Omega 6’s and can throw off your balance of Omega 3’s to Omega 6’s which results in inflammation. It is also highly refined which not only strips nutrients out but creates free radicals in the oil which can have a negative impact on your health. Having spent a little time checking out mayo nutrition labels, I thought the whole idea of checking nutrition labels might help some people take a little more control of their health.

The how and why of reading nutrition labels requires a little background, and sometimes some research, to know what you’re really eating.  The complexity of just knowing what we’re eating and having to wonder if something is good for us or not is why Robin and I advocate for ‘whole food’ or ‘plant based’ diets.  Not to exclude meat, dairy or eggs, but because if you stick to whole foods, without ingredients lists, it’s much easier to know what’s good for you or not and your body will thank you.  So before I even get to the nutrition info on a label, I’m going to touch on some of the key things we should look for in the ingredients list and why they are important.  The first thing I will point out is that the ingredients are listed in order, by weight. 

Fats or oils:  We need fats in our diets.  The sugar industry fought to demonize fats, resulting in the low-fat and fat free craze that started in the 80’s and continued into the 90’s with people thinking they could eat as much as they wanted if it was low- or no-fat.  Science has proven that wrong, but we need the right kinds of fats.

When I grew up, there was always a bottle of ‘vegetable oil’ in the kitchen.  That was supposed to be an improvement over the big tub of lard that came before vegetable oil.  I learned early in adulthood that ‘vegetable oil’ isn’t great for us because it can be corn, canola, soy, safflower, palm, cottonseed, etc most of which are processed in a way that creates free radicals.  So we were all supposed to switch to canola oil for better health.  It turns out that canola oil isn’t much better for us than ‘vegetable oil’.  (Most vegetable oil sold now says 100% soybean oil. 

There are plenty of studies and articles showing the positive aspects of vegetable oils on our health and I won’t dispute that.  I will question where sites like medicinenet.com get their funding since they don’t mention things like Canola oil being high in Omega 6’s, which when out of balance with (or eaten in larger quantities than) Omega 3’s, cause inflammation.  That’s right – canola and other vegetable oils cause inflammation.  They also have lots of free radicals in them which can end up being a trigger for… cancer, and if we cook with them anywhere close to the smoke point, we create more free radicals. 

 Next, we must mention trans fats. Trans fats are unsaturated fatty acids that are created when liquid vegetable oils are hydrogenated to make them solid and more stable at room temperature. This process is called hydrogenation and trans fats can be found in both industrial and natural sources: Industrial - Trans fats are found in many processed foods, including margarine, vegetable shortening, fried foods, and baked goods.  In the ingredients lists these pop out as hydrogenated oil, shortening or margarine.  Partially hydrogenated oils are banned, but there are still plenty of ways trans fats are being added by manufacturers.    Natural: Trans fats occur naturally in small amounts in some animal products, such as milk, butter, and meat from ruminant animals like cows, sheep, and goats.

 Finally, some reminders:  Don’t heat oils to their smoke points when cooking and they will be better for us.  Know where Omega 3’s and 6’s come from and keep them in check (our ratio of Omega 6’s to Omega 3’s should be 1:1, with some experts saying even more of the Omega 3’s.  We don’t really want to be eating processed foods that are high in Omega 6’s when there are natural foods that have plenty of them, like nuts, seeds, eggs and avocados and avocado oil.  Other vegetable oils also have them, but cooking with those creates other problems and increases our risk of inflammation from them.  Stick with the natural ways to get them. 

Sugars: There are more than 61 names for sugar, and I have heard there are more than 200.

I’ve included the 61 most common at the end of this paragraph, because it t is important to recognize all those names and realize that they are all just sugar, because too much sugar leads to all kinds of health crisis.  Increased sugar intake leads to cardiovascular disease, insulin resistance, type II diabetes, kidney disease and non-alcoholic fatty liver disease.   Yet the government subsidizes sugar crops and production making it extremely cheap for manufacturers to add to their products both as a filler and as an addictive ingredient to keep you coming back for more.  If you’re trying to cut back on sugar for any number of reasons, you have to really look out to find products without added sugar. Manufacturers go to great lengths to add sugar, for a couple of reasons: 1) Purposefully to cover the taste of chemicals that they use to make the food last longer, look better or hold together better and 2) Because they know that sugar is also addictive and they WANT you coming back for more.

Examples of names for sugar include:

Agave nectar, Barbados sugar, Barley malt, Barley malt syrup, Beet sugar, Brown sugar, Buttered syrup, Cane juice, Cane juice crystals, Cane sugar, Caramel, Carob syrup, Castor sugar, Coconut palm sugar, Coconut sugar, Confectioner's sugar, Corn sweetener., Corn syrup, Corn syrup solids, Date sugar, Dehydrated cane juice, Demerara sugar, Dextrin, Dextrose, Evaporated cane juice, Free-flowing brown sugars, Fructose, Fruit juice, Fruit juice concentrate, Glucose, Glucose solids, Golden sugar, Golden syrup, Grape sugar, HFCS (High-Fructose Corn Syrup), Honey, Icing sugar, Invert sugar, Malt syrup, Maltodextrin, Maltol, Maltose, Mannose, Maple syrup, Molasses, Muscovado, Palm sugar, Panocha, Powdered sugar, Raw sugar, Refiner's syrup, Rice syrup, Saccharose, Sorghum Syrup, Sucrose, Sugar (granulated), Sweet Sorghum, Syrup, Treacle, Turbinado sugar, Yellow sugar.

Artificial and natural zero-calorie sweeteners: I’m including some natural, calorie-free sweeteners here because studies have proven that the use of these can increase weight gain or inhibit weight loss.  Certainly not as bad for us as the artificial stuff but should still be used in moderation and with knowledge of what you’re eating and why.   Artificial sweeteners have been implicated in cancers, weight GAIN, and many other health problems.  Like sugars, there are a lot of different names for the same things, so you have to be aware of what you’re looking for – and if you don’t know what something is when you’re reading a food label – should you really be eating it? If you choose to eat it anyway knowing those risks, what about the fact that artificial sweeteners can alter the composition and function of the gut microbiome?  Your gut is responsible for 90-95% of your serotonin production.  Mess up that environment and you’ll literally be less happy.

Also, messed up gut bacteria can lead to glucose intolerance, which makes it harder for the body to move sugar from the blood into muscle and fat, which can lead to weight gain and diabetes.

Artificial sweetener names to look out for are:  Aspartame (Nutrasweet®), Sucralose (Splenda®), Neotame, Acesulfame K, Saccharin, Advantame, Sorbitol, Stevia, Xylitol, Erythritol, Acesulfame potassium (Sunett®, Sweet one®), Lactitol, Maltitol, Saccharin (Sweet'n low®), Steviol glycoside, Isomalt, Sugar alcohols, Cyclamate, Thaumatin, Alitame, Neohesperidin dihydrochalcone, Stevia (truvia® Pure via®, Sun crystals®), Luo han guo extract (natural, but calorie free).

Before we move into the nutrition information, here are a couple of representative ingredients lists for products you may know and love, or at least be familiar with.  I’ll say what each item was at the end of the blog.  I’ve highlighted things that shouldn’t concern us; since that was much easier than highlighting the not so good stuff (almost everything) on the lists.

 #1 Ingredients:

Sugar, water, enriched flour, high fructose corn syrup, palm oil, corn syrup, cocoa, soybean oil, tallow, contains 2% or less: glycerin, cocoa processed with alkali, modified cornstarch, baking soda, salt, corn starch, dextrose, whey, hydrogenated tallow, inulin, egg, calcium carbonate, sorbic acid and potassium sorbate (to retain freshness), calcium sulfate, enzymes, egg white, mono and diglycerides, sodium acid pyrophosphate, cottonseed oil, natural and artificial flavor, sodium stearoyl lactylate, agar, xanthan gum, soy lecithin, polysorbate 60, cellulose gum, locust bean gum, monocalcium phosphate, titanium dioxide (color), disodium phosphate, sunflower oil, chocolate liquor, defatted soy flour.  There are three kinds of sugar and eight kinds of fats/oils in this.

#2 Ingredients:

wheat flour, cheese blend, cheddar cheese, water, bbq sauce (high fructose corn syrup, distilled vinegar, tomato paste, modified corn starch, contains 2% or less of: salt, pineapple juice concentrate, natural smoke flavor, spice, caramel color, molasses, sodium benzoate [preservative], dried garlic, mustard flour, corn syrup, sugar, tamarind, natural flavor, celery seed), diced white chicken meat (white chicken meat, water, modified food starch, salt, sodium phosphate), breaded fried onions (onions, enriched flour [wheat flour, niacin, reduced iron, thiamin mononitrate, riboflavin, folic acid], sunflower, safflower and/or canola oil, salt), contains 2% or less of: yeast, palm oil, brown rice flour, roasted garlic, sugar, salt, baking powder (sodium acid pyrophosphate, baking soda, monocalcium phosphate), vegetable oil (soybean and/or canola oil), hydrogenated soybean oil, malted barley flour, dough conditioner (enzymes, contains one or more of the following: datem, calcium carbonate, wheat gluten, guar gum, ascorbic acid), dextrose, soy lecithin, natural flavor, niacin, reduced iron, thiamine mononitrate, wheat starch, riboflavin, folic acid, ferrous sulfate.

There are seven kinds of sugar and five kinds of fats/oils in these

 Nutrition labels themselves

I’m sure you’ve all seen these since they’ve been around since 1994.  While they seem pretty self-explanatory, there is actually a lot that is worth mentioning, because it’s almost like it was put there to confuse us or let the food manufacturers hide things.  So, I’ll just touch on each area in the order the FDA laid out, but tell you what they neglected to tell us.

1.        Serving information:  This should be straightforward, but it’s not.  Each manufacturer gets to decide how much is in a serving, and how many servings go into a container.

For example, many popular snack cakes and cookies come in two or three to a package – but if you look at the nutrition label, it lists a serving as ONE of those two or three items. Fortunately for us, if a package contains 2-3 times the serving size, the label must include two columns, with the second column listing the nutrition information if you were to eat the entire package 🙋‍♂️.  If the package holds more than that, or only holds one serving, only the first column is required.

2.        Calories.  Pretty self explanatory too, but remember: A calorie is NOT a calorie.  Meaning that if you take in 95 calories from something like a girl scout smores cookie (approximately 1.5 of those cookies), your body is going to treat it much differently than if you eat a medium apple (also about 95 calories).  Check out our blog on sugar for more about that. Also, know that in number 4, daily values, it’s based on 2000 calories per day.

3.        Nutrients:  Here is where the manufacturers really get to play.  If a serving contains less than .5 grams of a fat, sugar or other nutrient, the manufacturer can round it down to 0.  So if your favorite snack contained one gram of trans fat in a serving, they can shrink the serving size and then claim “Zero trans-fats!” without changing a thing about their recipe, and very little about the packaging – save for a couple of tweaks to the nutrition label.

Things EVERYONE needs to watch out for are trans-fats, sodium, fiber and added sugars.  Less on all of those is super important to all of us.  If you have a health concern that you are trying to address then you also need to look out for: saturated fat, cholesterol (see our blog for more info about that), carbohydrates (just to know what kind you’re getting), and fiber.

4.        Daily values: This is another place where the nutrition label can be deceiving.  The nutrient recommendations for fat, calories, etc. are based on a 2000 calorie per day diet.  But for someone small like Robin, an online calorie calculator says she only needs 1600 calories per day to maintain her weight, a 400 calorie per day difference. Keep in mind that an extra 100 calories per day adds 10 pounds of fat to us over the course of a year.  On the other hand, the same calculator says I need 2600 calories per day to maintain my weight.  Then we look at vitamins and minerals in the nutrition label.  The Recommended Daily Allowances that you see are based on the estimated average requirement that will fill the nutritional NEEDS of 97-98% of healthy adults so that they don’t get any sicker.  As an example of how exceedingly low some of those RDA’s can be, Linus Pauling has described the potential health benefits of high doses of vitamin C, in his book “How to Live Longer and Feel Better”, and has prescribed 2 to 6 times the RDA for Vitamin C (6,000 to 18,000 mg daily.  Vitamin C author/expert Thomas E. Levy, MD, JD, advises from 6,000 to 12,000 mg daily.  And these recommendations are to keep you healthy and fight of common colds, etc.  In numerous published books and studies recommendations are for even higher doses when trying to heal or cure something.  The same story exists for almost every vitamin or mineral you would see listed.  This is why eating whole foods and ‘eating the rainbow’ are so important.  Continuing with the Vitamin C reference, if you had one medium orange every day, and ½ cup of a red bell pepper, you would have 150% of your RDA.  Does that REALLY mean that’s all the vitamin C we need per day?  Pauling, Levy and I don’t think so.  The RDA is just enough to keep us from getting scurvy.  While I’m on RDA’s, I’ll hit one more nutrient that is near and dear to my heart – sodium.  The US RDA for sodium is NO MORE THAN 2300 mg per day.  That’s right, in this case they recommend an upper limit.  Great idea unless you are 51 or older, African American, have hypertension, diabetes, or with chronic kidney disease.  All of those people should limit their intake to 1500mg per day.  Biggest problem with those two numbers is that the average American eats 3000mg per day of sodium.  Most of it coming from processed foods. Processed foods don’t necessarily mean snacks, desserts, or lunch meat either.  Look at the two nutrition labels below:

Look at the sodium.  They are both black beans.  They’re both name brands, and neither claims to be seasoned or flavored.  The one with less salt says ‘organic’ on the label.  There are several types available that claim ‘no salt added on the label and have 0mg of sodium.  These are plain black beans.  If they were delicious, refried beans, the sodium on the left would have been around 800 PER SERVING.  Hard to stay under 1500 if one serving of refried beans is 800.

 There are dietary ingredients that are trying to make us sick.  Most of it has been brought on by food manufacturers trying to make things taste better, last longer or look more appealing, or all the above. Sugar, salt and fat occur in nature; but are generally accompanied by fiber and there are very little trans-fats, because hydrogenated fats and oils do not occur in nature. Not so in processed food.  Manufacturers routinely add hydrogenated oils and strip fiber out.  They work hard to get the “Bliss point” of just the right combo of sugar, salt and fat to get you to come back for more.  It’s up to us to choose food and products that support our health, not detract from it.   If over the course of one day we ate a bagel and a Caffe Mocha ® for breakfast, a ‘burrito supreme’ for lunch and had just two slices of a frozen pizza for dinner, followed by one cupcake, we would have had

2033 calories (about what is used on nutrition labels), 3836 milligrams of sodium, and 89 grams of sugar.  The American Heart Association recommends men consume no more than 36 grams of added sugar per day, and women no more than 25 grams.  Sugar is inflammatory.  The lower you can keep added sugar, the better.

I know that is a lot to digest (pun intended), and it is SO important, for our health, to be educated about what we’re eating.  I welcome comments and feedback and would love to talk to you about what’s up with your health, feel free to reach out.

The spoilers for the two ingredients lists above:

Hostess Chocolate Cup Cakes

Red Baron Fully Loaded BBQ Recipe Chicken Hand Tossed Crust Frozen Pizza