Sun Chips Look to Be the #1 Healthiest Snack for People and the Environment

Suppose they created a healthier potato chip and nobody really noticed all that much for close to 20 years? Well, some might disagree that it's been that way with Frito-Lay's Sun Chips, but it's always seemed that they've just been around and not the #1 choice people grab in stores when in the mood to shovel in a snack. And based on the eating habits of Americans since Sun Chips started, the last half of that last sentence is an understatement. The thought behind this, though, isn't in promoting a product. I assure you I don't work for Frito-Lay or have any affiliation with any snack food company to make my writing biased. This is more to do in examining why a healthier snack didn't get noticed a little more until just recently when Sun Chips started advertising for a completely different reason.

At the time of this writing, you're probably seeing ads on this very page for Sun Chips being the first in the snack industry to create an innovative biodegradable bag that can turn into compost after a number of months. While it's obviously a wonderful gesture toward the environment that puts a step forward for other snack companies to do the same thing, it's also a great marketing move on the part of Frito-Lay to get Sun Chips into the #1 spot of favorite snacks in our great and overweight land.

For those of us who've been eating them all along, we know how good they taste. Even though I didn't discover them until just the last few years, they've been around since 1991 where they've generally been treated as a health food due to the use of multi grains in their ingredients. Because that moniker flashes a warning light in the minds of those looking for a saturated fat fix in their snack food buying, these particular chips haven't always sold out on the shelves like the more saturated fat or sugar-laden counterparts sitting on the shelf nearby.

It's really a shame that Frito-Lay didn't long ago push the idea that you could get an addictively tasty snack that was still reasonably healthy for you. Snacks designed to be slightly healthier are far and few between as it is and always have been. But once obesity started to become an epidemic here in America, getting the word out a little stronger that there's good-tasting and healthy things available should have been emphasized. As I insinuated, the packaging might scare people away, particularly when you see that famous little heart logo at the top of the package that says a particular snack is free of trans-fats and cholesterol.

Of course, those who pay attention to the labels of supposedly healthy items know that many snack companies say low cholesterol and zero fat--yet don't tell you that eating more will give you the same amount of calories as you did with the fat-laden product. There's been dozens of examples of similar products that mistakenly gave the impression to the gullible who horded them that eating the product's low-fat version would make them healthy. The big difference with Sun Chips is that all of these snacks are automatically devoid of trans-fats and cholesterol along with also being low calorie.

Then there's the healthful beauty of those multi grains...
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If there's one solid thing missing in most foods, it's getting essential multi grains and fiber in one's diet. Not getting enough fiber in a diet is one of the contributors to Diabetes, obesity and every other health problem facing adults and kids today. The best place to get multi grains is unsurprisingly in eating whole grain wheat breads. No, I'm not talking about that cheaper artificial wheat bread many people are duped into buying; I'm talking about real whole wheat bread that says 100% whole wheat on the front of the package. Preferably, one that says multi-grain is the best buy and isn't always that expensive. As you might guess, in the snack aisle, it's quite rare to see the same thing on a package of a well-known snack food.

That's why Sun Chips have always stood alone other than a few unpopular exceptions. Coming from Frito-Lay who's been for years putting out potato chips loaded with saturated fat, Sun Chips have long been in the shadow of the far less healthy Doritos or Lay's potato chip line. Not really chips per se, Sun Chips are really a consolidation of a cracker and a chip. Square-shaped and with ridges to qualify as a chip, the ingredients in this product are what makes the magic of the taste. If you've ever had Sun Chips before, the multi-grains are something you can't even taste.

Whatever those magic ingredients may be, it tastes akin to the addictive flavorings of something from Keebler. Anything from Keebler, however, is far from good for you. They live up to the example of anything tasting good generally being bad for your...well, everything. With Sun Chips promoting the very real fact that 18 grams of multi grains in their product is equivalent to one slice of wheat bread, you have true reason to eat a snack that looks unhealthy from all appearances. All those other flavors such as Harvest Cheddar, Garden Salsa and French Onion only add to that illusion.

Now that the Sun Chips line will be creating a bag that breaks down into compost, it's a good chance this snack will finally get noticed a little more. All it takes is one other important thing to take notice of another. Both the environmental impact of the packaging and the healthier components of Sun Chips are both profoundly important that ultimately brings something we've never seen before in relation to a snack food. As we start to see a lot of the snack industry begin to change due to a slow, overdue awareness of eating healthier and a shaky economy, you may just see others hop on the Sun Chips pedestal.

The unfortunate reality is that most other snack foods will just play up the environmentalism of a biodegradable bag rather than making their products any healthier. It's all the more reason to reach for a reasonably-priced bag of Sun Chips when you're in the mood to eat something that tastes unhealthy, but won't punish you with weight gain or raise your cholesterol...

Visit the official site of Sun Chips here:

http://www.sunchips.com/index.shtml