Live Well Update: Sneaky sugar

Reading food labels is one of the best ways to monitor your intake of added sugar. Companies try to sneak extra sugar into their products by disguising it under scientific names, using words like syrup or nectar, and substituting artificial sweeteners or sugar alcohols, making sugar easy to overlook. But, don’t be fooled, these are all still sugar and we should do our best to avoid them!

Look for these names on labels commonly used to disguise sugar:

In plain sight:

Sugar, brown sugar, cane sugar

Scientific names:

Look for words that end in “-ose”: dextrose, fructose, glucose, lactose, maltose, sucrose

Look for words that end in “ide”: disaccharide, monosaccharide, polysaccharide

“Natural” names:

Agave, coconut sugar, honey, maple syrup, fruit juice

Artificial sweeteners:

Stevia, aspartame, nutra-sweet, splenda, equal, truvia

*Stevia is our personal exception because it is a natural substitute that has no effect on blood sugar. However, regularly using artificial sweeteners confuse our brains and can lead to severe cravings for real sugar. So use sparingly!

Sugar alcohols:

Look for words that end in “-ol”: erythitol, glycerol, maltitol, mannitol, sorbitol, xylitol

Other:

Rice malt, molasses, high fructose corn syrup (HFCS), malt syrup, rice syrup, corn syrup

The food industry clearly knows that extra sugar is not good for us. Why else would they try to hide it under all these names? Don’t let product labels trick you!

#kilotrained #livewell