We all want to be healthy, have more energy, maybe shift some weight. But we also want our little treats, something crunchy, salty, more-ish, every now and then. Luckily for us, the food industry is here to help. They are listening, they have understood that people want healthier snacks and set to work to make products that are good for us. Yes, those bad fatty crisps we used to eat are of course still available, but look more closely and you\u2019ll see vegetable chips, lentil chips, low-fat popcorn, baked potato chips \u2026 The possibilities are endless. So much to choose from for the health conscious snacker!<\/p>\n
\u201cOnly 94 calories per pack\u201d \u2013 \u201cbaked, not fried\u201d \u2013 \u201c50% less fat\u201d \u2013 \u201creal food ingredients\u201d \u2013 \u201cwe only use sunflower oil\u201d \u2013 \u201cnaturally lower in saturates\u201d<\/strong><\/p>\n Those are the messages written on the little snack bags \u2013 many of which now come in a more papery than plasticky feel, no doubt to further emphasise the naturalness of the contents.<\/p>\n But I would recommend remaining suspicious, because at the end of the day the industry is looking after Number One. It\u2019s the bottom line that counts, not the health and wellbeing of consumers, but over the last 50 years or so, the official nutrition guidelines \u2013 not just in the UK, but in the entire developed world \u2013 have been playing into the hands of the industry. We were told to cut back on cholesterol and fat – particularly saturated fat \u2013 to stay slim and keep our hearts healthy. Moreover, everybody knows that you need to eat fewer calories than you burn. Low-fat means lower in calories.<\/p>\n This was great news for the food industry, because they can sell us anything: As long as we don\u2019t exceed our daily calorie allowance, it doesn\u2019t matter what we eat, and the easiest way to cut back on calories is by cutting back on fat, a no-brainer. The food industry was told that it had to use less saturated fat. It listened and switched to polyunsaturated vegetable oils. They\u2019re cheaper, and if hydrogenated, actually easier to manipulate to achieve the required results than butter or other saturated fats ever were. Since fat is an important carrier for flavour, however, low-fat products don\u2019t taste all that good. Solution: Added sugar. This came with the added bonus that sugar is cheap and a natural preservative. Together, hydrogenated fats and sugar increased the shelf-life of food products no end.<\/p>\n But now we know better. Over the last 10 years or so new research \u2013 or indeed reviews of old research \u2013 has come to the conclusion that:<\/p>\n So I recommend reading the nutrition information on those so-called healthy snacks, not the large-print messages manufacturers want us to read. We have been trained to look at calorie and fat content and to worry about saturated fats. Here\u2019s a list of snacks, starting with the \u2018unhealthiest\u2019 to \u2018healthiest\u2019 based on that information:<\/p>\n Vegetable Chips (highest in fat) \u2013 Sweet Potato Crisps \u2013 Potato Crisps (highest in kcal) \u2013 Skinny Popcorn \u2013 Baked Chips \u2013 Lentil Chips<\/p>\n Any surprises? Maybe that vegetable chips \u2013 which sounds so healthy \u2013 appear to be worse than ordinary crisps. But that\u2019s just in terms of fat, not overall calories. Potato crisps are the highest in calories, but frankly, the differences are tiny anyway. There is quite a big jump in the fat content between potato crisps and skinny popcorn: from 32.5g\/100g to just 17.8g\/100g.<\/p>\n But now let\u2019s look at the labels again with the knowledge we have today. Remember fat doesn\u2019t matter as much as sugar and starches. Both sugar and starches are carbohydrates, which is why sugar is always indented underneath \u2018carbohydrates\u2019 as \u2018of which<\/em> sugars\u2019. Fibre, too, is carbohydrate but that is listed individually as we cannot digest it, but our gut bacteria can. All carbs other than fibre become sugar sooner or later and raise blood sugar levels. Bearing this in mind, let\u2019s re-sort the snacks from \u2018unhealthiest\u2019 to \u2018healthiest\u2019:<\/p>\n Lentil Chips \u2013 Baked Chips \u2013 Skinny Popcorn \u2013 Potato Crisps \u2013 Sweet Potato Crisps \u2013 Vegetable Chips.<\/p>\n It\u2019s the exact opposite! This time the gap between Skinny Popcorn and Potato Crisps is not quite so pronounced, but there is a huge difference in total carbohydrates between the lentil chips (67.3g\/100g) and the vegetable chips (44.1g\/100g).<\/p>\n Before buying a \u2018healthy\u2019 snack \u2013 or any processed food, if you must \u2013 ignore the big print on the front of the package and take a look at the nutrition information on the back. Anything with 5g or less of sugar per 100g is low-sugar. Anything above 20g of sugar per 100g is high in sugar. Next look at total carbohydrates, as I did above, and go for the lowest.<\/p>\n Also of interest: the ingredients list. The snacks I chose for this example varied from 5 ingredients (Vegetable Chips, Skinny Popcorn) to 28 ingredients (Lentil Chips). Which one would you rather eat?<\/p>\n So, if you are going to buy snacks, read the label. Better still: Don\u2019t buy them.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" We all want to be healthy, have more energy and shift some weight. But we also want our little treats, something crunchy, salty and moreish.<\/p>\n\n