5 ‘Healthy’ Breakfast Foods That Aren’t Good for You | Dr Fazal Mahmood
Even if you don’t believe breakfast is the most important meal of the day, it can absolutely set the stage for a day’s worth of healthy eating. Some experts even suggest prioritizing your morning meal since your willpower is strongest just after you rise. With so many nutritious breakfast foods on the market, starting the day off right seems almost inevitable. But you might want to be a little more skeptical of the products you toss into your shopping cart. Marketing departments at food companies already know we’re all looking to eat a little better, so they appeal to our desires by using certain buzzwords on packaging. Just because a box says the food is healthy doesn’t make it so. If your grocery list includes these five foods, your morning meal could use a makeover.
1. Flavored instant oatmeal Instant oatmeal is a favorite breakfast food for the health-conscious crowd because it’s a quick and easy way to start your day with fiber-rich whole grains. The problem comes when you reach for the flavored options. One popular version of this breakfast staple contains a whopping 12 grams of sugar per serving. In fact, sugar is the second ingredient on the nutrition label.
Juice drink blends With so many highprofile celebrities and nutritionists giving juice the green light, it’s tempting to load up on fruit-based beverages. But not so fast. Take a closer look at that carton or jug, and be wary of anything that has the word blend, drink, or cocktail because many of them aren’t 100% juice.
Turkey bacon Very few people would argue bacon is a healthy choice for everyday eating, but turkey bacon is another story. Because the plain poultry is so lean, many automatically assume the same is true when you turn it into a substitute for your favorite morning meat. According to Cooking light, turkey bacon varies quite a bit and some varieties contain just as much fat and even more sodium than pork varieties.
4. Fiber-added baked goods eakfast pastries usually contain sugar, fat, refined flour, and not much else. Several years back, though, food companies began toying around with certain types of food additives to boost the fiber content of their baked goods. Suddenly, a chocolate muffin that sounded more like a dessert than breakfast was able to boast 6 grams of fiber. The secret ingredient in this case is polydextrose, which is made from glucose and sorbitol. Other common additives used to boost fiber include inulin, maltodextrin, and soy fiber.
Egg substitutes • Egg whites have been adored by dieters and bodybuilders for decades thanks to high levels of protein and almost no fat. The downside comes when you realize skipping the golden center means skipping many vital nutrients like lutein and carotenoids, plus more of that beloved protein. As a way to work around the nutritional shortcomings of only whites, companies started crafting egg substitutes fortified with vitamins as well as a bunch of additives in an attempt to recreate the same flavor, color, and texture of whole eggs.