A Mom's Guide to Decoding Food Labels

It can be very scary going to the grocery store when you have young children. Danger seems to lurk in every aisle - sugary cartoon breakfast cereals and juice "drinks" with no real juice in them are just mild offenders compared to the killer hydrogenated oils lurking in the pastry case and pesticide-laden everything. Fortunately, parents have a formidable ally in the fight against bad-for-you foods: the nutrition facts label.

Red Flags:

First of all, you should pretty much completely ignore claims made on the front of the package. Most of the terms they use, even "all-natural," aren't regulated by law and are essentially meaningless. The only term you should be on the lookout for is "USDA Certified Organic."

Eating organic is more important for young children, because pesticides reach higher concentrations in smaller bodies. The effects of the multiplicity of chemicals used in large-scale food production on small children haven't been studied very well, but little kids consume more pesticides for their weight than grownups, because they eat more fruits and veggies - little kids who go on applesauce binges, for example. Only certified organic foods are guaranteed to be grown without harmful pesticides and chemicals, although the USDA recently relaxed the rules for foods to be labeled organic (call your senator about it).

Now, down to the meat of the matter. The nutrition facts label on the back of the package is required by law to be factual, and to list ingredients in order of most to least. So, if a product bills itself as having "whole grains," and whole wheat is listed near the bottom of a long ingredients list, skip it.

Pay close attention to the serving size. Serving size is set by the FDA to be the same for all similar products (for example, potato chips), but it might surprise you how many servings of a food are in a package compared to how much you usually feel like eating. Many soups and beverages, for example, are 2 servings to a can or bottle. Do the math to see how much fat, sugar, and sodium you and your kids are really getting.

Avoid at all costs hydrogenated and partially hydrogenated oils. In a recent article for Fit Fare, I went into the global negative impact these man-made fats have on the body. They're so bad, many cities have considered banning them altogether. Hydrogenated oils often hide disguised as "vegetable shortening," and while some shortening isn't hydrogenated, most of it is. Avoid it.

Another red flag is high-fructose corn syrup, which is just refined sugar in a bad suit. Most food producers know that the public is trying to avoid sugar, so they dress it up as "crystalline fructose," or even "organic evaporated cane juice." You have to look at the Total Carb. line of the nutrition facts label, to see how many grams of sugars are in the food.

Vitamin-fortified foods are often fortified with vitamins because they're missing something else - sugary breakfast cereals are a big offender here. Naturally occurring vitamins and minerals are more bioavailable and better for the body than vitamins artificially added to a food. Use your common sense here. Reconstituted orange drink fortified with vitamin C isn't as healthy as fresh-squeezed.

A good rule of thumb is, the closer the food is to its natural state, the more nutritious it is. More processed foods are not as good for you as foods that are minimally processed. This is reflected in the nutrition facts label. If the ingredients list is long and full of weird words you can't pronounce, look for a substitute food with an ingredients list you can actually understand. Cookies made with unbleached flour, sugar and butter are much better for a kid than cookies made with partially hydrogenated and/or hydrogenated corn and/or cottonseed oil, natural and artificial chocolate and other flavors, yellow # 72, and pyridoxine hydrochloride.

So when your toddler screams "ME WANT COOKIE!" in aisle five, keep a cool head and scan the back of the pack before you tear open the box in the middle of the store. Your grandkids will thank you.

For more information about food labels, visit Dr Sears' website.