How Food Labels Trick Us

You might already know this, but food labels are very tricky in some instances.

For instance, if a product is labeled "high protein," it would be natural to assume it has lots of protein in it, right? Well, it might have lots of protein and it might not.

You'd also assume if a company made several different products and labeled one as "high protein," it would be the one with the most protein, right? But not always. In the case of Slim Fast, for instance, the "low carb" shakes have more protein than the "high protein ones."

Labels may use the word "diet" but still have lots of sugar. They may say "low fat" and really be low in fat but still be very high in sugar. They may use the word "light" but still contain lots of sugar and even have ingredients like high fructose corn syrup (light yogurts sometimes do this, for instance).

Labels may say "no sugar added" but that does not mean sugar free. It means they don't stir in that white grainy stuff or pour in high fructose corn syrup. If it's made from milk or fruit or something, it can still be high in natural sugar, though.

Labels also use many different words to say "sugar." If you read the list of ingredients, you may or may not see the word "sugar" but you might see words like sucrose, high fructose corn syrup, honey, dehydrated cane juice, malt syrup, maltose, dextrose, glucose and xylose. Those are all types of sugar.

Vitamins often put the word "Complete" on the label even though they are missing many important vitamins and/or minerals. They may put the word "bariatric" on the label even though they contain forms of vitamins that gastric bypass patients can't absorb or don't absorb well at all, like calcium carbonate and beta carotene. Or gummy vitamins slap the word "adult" on the package and we might assume they have all the vitamins and minerals adults need, but really they are missing B2, B3, zinc, copper, selenium and other important stuff all grownups (and kids) really need.

Labels also trick us with serving size. One package of something may say it has 200 calories per serving but if you read carefully, you'll see one package also contains 2.5 servings, which means that package has 500 calories. Or a calcium supplement will say on the package it has 630 mg calcium per serving but if you read closely you'll see one serving is TWO pills.

Sources:

About.com. http://lowcarbdiets.about.com/od/whattoeat/a/sugars.htm. Sugar's Many Disguises.