The knowledge that we have in regards to our nutrition is better than it has ever been before.
The average person knows so much more about healthy and unhealthy foods and behaviors than he or she did just 20 years ago. One way to improve your grasp of healthy nutrition while you are following a plant-based weight loss program is to understand how to read nutrition labels on food products correctly.
Nutrition Labels Are There for a Reason … So Read Them!
We are so lucky that, in most modern nations, food manufacturers are forced to disclose what they put into the food you are buying. However, manufacturers don’t give up so easily in their attempt to hide harmful ingredients in their food products. Use the following tips to read food labels so you uncover as much information as possible concerning how that product is going to affect your health.
1. Sugar has more than 100 names
Refined sugar is bad for you. Your body doesn’t need it. However, up to 2/3 of all of the processed foods offered by your local grocer are full of it. In many cases, it is hidden. Food manufacturers have to list the ingredient that is most present in a product first.
If sugar is the main ingredient in a food, it is possible to hide that fact by calling it different names. Cane sugar, corn syrup, beet sugar, fructose and any ingredients ending in -ose are alternative names for refined sugar.
2. Don’t fall for the “natural flavors” trick
Have you ever seen the term “natural flavoring” or “natural flavors” on a food label? You probably felt good about the word natural. However, in the United States and many other modern nations, “natural” doesn’t necessarily mean made in nature.
In the US, if a flavor can be created with man-made chemicals in a laboratory, as long as it approximates a flavor found in nature, it is allowed to carry the designation “natural flavor”. If you ever have any questions on ‘natural flavors’, you can always contact the company that made the product. Believe it or not, one such “natural flavor” found in foods, cleaning products and cosmetics comes from the sex glands of beavers.
3. Steer clear of fat-free products
Fat is not bad for you, at least healthy fat isn’t. Sugar is incredibly bad for you. How do food manufacturers replace fat with fat-free products? They use sugar instead to provide the flavor. Fat does not cause you to become fat and sick, but an overabundance of sugar in your diet definitely does.
One simple way to keep food manufacturers from tricking you about their ingredients is to choose plant-based, whole foods over processed foods. Apples, bananas, kale and lettuce, broccoli and cauliflower are 1-ingredient, natural foods, so they need no food label. These foods lead to natural weight loss and other health benefits, as do all plant-based, whole foods.
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