Notice how the food you buy never looks like it does in the picture on the box. Same thing happens when we go to the restaurant, the food comes to the table and never looks as good as it did in the menu. But one thing is usually true… if they show a sandwich in the picture you get sandwich, not just a pile of meat on the plate. This is not the case with a growing number of products. Let’s look at some and you will be surprised.
It seems that blueberries are hard for some product makers to put in their products. Total Blueberry Pomegranate Cereal is a good example. Here is the list of ingredients.
Whole Grain Oats, Whole Grain Wheat, Sugar, Corn Syrup, Barley Malt Extract, Brown Sugar Syrup, Wheat Flakes, Malt Syrup, Rice Flour, Salt, Oat Flour, Whole Grain Rice, Canola Oil Natural and Artificial Flavor, Red 40, Blue 2 and Other Color Added, Soybean and Corn Oil, Sucralose, Molasses, Honey, Corn Starch, Almond Flour, Nonfat Milk, Vitamin E (Mixed Tocopherols) and BHT Added to Preserve Freshness. Vitamins and Minerals: Calcium Carbonate, Vitamin C (Sodium Ascorbate), Zinc and Iron (Mineral Nutrients), Vitamin E Acetate, a B Vitamin (Niacinamide), a B Vitamin (Calcium Pantothenate), Vitamin B6 (Pyridoxine Hydrochloride), Vitamin B2 (Riboflavin), Vitamin B1 (Thiamin Mononitrate), a B Vitamin (Folic Acid), Vitamin A (Palmitate), Vitamin B12, Vitamin D3.
No blueberries in the list. Just food coloring, sugar, artificial flavoring, and lots of added vitamins. But the name of the product has the words Blueberry and Pomegranate in it. One would think that if the name has it in it, it would be there. I found out this is a normal practice with product makers. Kellogg’s Blueberry Pop Tarts show blueberries all over the box, not one is found in the ingredients list. Same is true with blueberry bagels sold by Target, just lots of sugar, food coloring, etc.
People eating healthy read labels to see if there are ingredients they want to avoid, ie. sugar, some certain oils, chemicals, etc. Now you have to check the label to be sure there is honey in the honey you are buying. Yes, I maybe going far with that last statement. If major name producers can leave the blueberries out of the box yet keep then on the box, how long will it be till the smaller companies try to follow?
Reading food labels is something that is very important to learn. This is so important to us that we at Cooking God’s Way have one lesson in the Advancing Your Health with RealFood free eClass focused on it. If you are to eat healthy this is one skill you have to maintain.
Now for the fun part of the article. Here is a video by that will make you laugh. Take a few minutes to watch it and you will be glad you did. Pass this along to your friends to give them a laugh and make their day.
Comedy Skit About “Total Blueberry Pomegranate Cereal”
Source: General Mills Total Mind Games – comedy skit about Total Blueberry Pomegranate Cereal
About Jeff
“Now you have to check the label to be sure there is honey in the honey you are buying.”
This isn’t really that far off either… go to KFC & check their “honey” for biscuits which is labeled honey sauce (I think) & contains high fructose corn syrup (I think- maybe it’s even the first ingredient).
Here’s the ingredients from their website:
http://www.kfc.com/nutrition/pdf/kfc_ingredients_oct10.pdf
Honey Sauce: High Fructose Corn Syrup, Sugar, Honey, Corn Syrup, Natural Flavor, Caramel Color.
pretty sad!
Suzicakes, thanks for posting the ingredients of the so called Honey Sauce. Wow!! they actually put in an item or 2 that is not sugar. It does have some honey in it, but I bet it is not much.
Suzicakes, yes I am not surprised. As long as we buy their products they will keep doing just what they are doing. Glad to see you are looking at labels.