HOW TO READ FOOD LABELS

BY ARANCHA COROMINA

THERE IS AN ever growing variety of processed and packaged foods, and it’s becoming more difficult to decide what to buy.

Packaged food labels provide useful information to consumers that allow them, besides knowing the main characteristics of the products they eat, to get a rough idea of the relationship between price and quality of the food in question. If the consumer is looking for something cheap then price will be the overriding factor. But if they want to eat according to the norms of a healthy balanced diet and do not want to pay more than necessary, it is vital to read the labels carefully.

In packaged food products there are two kinds of information:

? The general information (common to all and compulsory).

? The nutritional, optional and offered only on some of them.

The general information lets you know the main characteristics of what you are purchasing. The nutrition information, that is not mandatory but highly desirable, provides consumer information on the nutritional characteristics of the food: calories, the nutrients it contains, the amount of fibre, vitamins, minerals, etc.

Used correctly, this information can help you make healthier food choices.

What information must be included in the labelling of packaged food?

Product name, as it is known in Spain. This has nothing to do with the filling or trademark, but with the contents. For example fruit juice is not the same as fruit nectar.

Packaged fruit juices are freshly squeezed juices that have been stabilized by approved physical treatments to ensure their preservation; sometimes they add an approved preservative. Fruit nectar is the product obtained from crushed fruit (mashed) to which they added water, sugar and fruit acids, so add more calories.

List of ingredients which are presented in order of importance, the highest percentage content appears first. This way we know what we are buying. We could buy, for example, sheep’s milk cheese which also contains cows or goats milk.

The alcoholic strength for beverages containing more than 1.2%.

The net amount of packaged products is expressed as weight for solids and by volume for liquids.

Expiration date, indicating the day and month for highly perishable products.

Eat by date, with one of the following two expressions depending on the duration of the product: “Best before …” followed by the day and month if the duration of the product is between 3 and 18 months. “Best before end …” followed by the year for products with longer than 18 months.

BESIDES THIS INFORMATION, which is the most interesting, in most cases they also include others, such as special conditions of storage and use, how to use, company identification (name, company name, etc.), batch number, manufacturer and its origin if it comes from a country that is not a member of the European Union.

Currently manufacturers do not have a legal obligation to provide information about the nutrients (fat, sugar, salt, fibre, etc.) unless it is included in the packaging specific nutrition claims.

In Spain it is optional to include a nutritional label on foods and it does not apply to mineral water or dietary supplements.

Labelling is only mandatory for products that refer to a nutritional characteristic, such as “rich in calcium”, ‘low cholesterol” or “vitamin A and E”.

What cannot appear on the label are any properties of the food attributed to preventing, treating or curing a disease.

These are prohibited and are against the law.

You should not trust, therefore, claims such as “strong bones” or “helps regulate cholesterol” in products such as milk. Is also unacceptable to claim that a food has special properties if they are natural biological properties of the food.

Thus a claim such as “no artificial colours or preservatives” in a food that by law cannot use these additives violates the standard.

THINGS TO CONSIDER WHEN READING NUTRITIONAL LABELLING

Foods with statements like “no artificial colours or preservatives” can contain sweeteners and artificial flavour enhancers.

“E numbers” should be included in the list of ingredients, but are sometimes expressed with their name. E300 = Vitamin C = ascorbic acid.

IT’S IMPORTANT TO know the amount of sugar in the food, not just the total carbohydrates, if you want to follow a balanced diet and not exceed the recommendations.

Taking two packets of sugar (20 grams of sugar), a glass of juice (20 grams of sugar) and three chocolate chip cookies (13 grams of sugar) this all adds up to more than half the recommended daily sugar.

Products labelled “no sugar added” may contain high amounts of other sweeteners (syrups, honey ….) Sugars are presented in a wide variety of forms: glucose, dextrose, glucose syrup, lactose, maltose, molasses, fruit juice concentrates, etc.., all are similar to white sugar or sucrose.

Many foods that appear not to contain salt actually do contain it, for example breakfast cereals and bread.

So far there is no law regulating the amount of salt that must be declared in the ingredient list or a table of nutrition information.

Under the guise of “vegetable oil” or “fats” used in the production of many products you can hide coconut or palm oil, both rich in saturated fatty acids.

Also more and more food such as popcorn, crisps, ready meals, cakes, pastries and so on include in their list of ingredients “hydrogenated or partially hydrogenated fats”, which have much more damaging effects on cholesterol, triglycerides and arterial health than saturated fats.

It would be much more desirable that nutritional labelling reflected the fat profile of the product: total fat, saturated, monounsaturated, polyunsaturated and trans.

So that a product can be described as rich in fibre it must contain at least 6 grams of fibre in a half ration. Many products which claim to be comprehensive and rich in fibre are not quite as you would expect if you compare their data with that of their normal equivalent or similar products of different brands.

SOMETIMES IN FOODS high in fibre they add bran. It is best to get fibre from natural sources such as legumes, whole grains, fruits or vegetables, since a high intake of bran can inhibit the absorption of some minerals such as iron.

If after reading the nutritional information and information on the label you do not know what to buy, always check the ingredients list.

Remember that the ingredients are presented in order of importance; the largest amount is the one that appears first.

ARANCHA COROMINA

Nutritionist-Dietician

Short URL: http://www.chroniccat.com/?p=459

Posted by editor on 2010-06-29 Filed under Food, Help and Advice, July 2010. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0. You can leave a response or trackback to this entry