Normally in our daily life we mostly eat foods loaded with free sugars to cope with our food cravings . Free sugars include added sugars and those that are naturally present in honey, syrups and fresh fruit juices. Food items like biscuits, cakes, chocolates, sweets, flavored yogurts, cereals used in breakfast and fizzy drinks contain free sugars in the form of added sugars.
Foods like honey, nectars, syrups, fresh fruit juices and smoothies contain sugars occurring naturally but they too are counted as free sugars. Although sugars present in milk, fruits and vegetables are not considered as free sugars.
The term “Total sugars “ means all sugars present in the diet also including sugars naturally present in fruits, vegetables and milk. We do not need to cut down on these sugars, but remember that they are included in the “total sugar” figure found on food labels.
In what quantity sugars are good for health
According to a rough estimation, adults should take up to 30g of free sugars almost equal to 7 cubes of sugar per day. Children of age 7-10 years should take 24g free sugars or 6 sugar cubes per day. Children of age group 4-6 years can have 19g of free sugars or 5 sugar cubes per day .
Free sugars in the form added sugars are not good for health. Quantities, we consume more than the recommended daily amounts and need to cut down for a healthy body. Those types of sugars that occur naturally in foods such as fruit, vegetables and milk should not be cut down. But these are included with free sugars in the “total sugars” figure. This is the thing we mostly see on food labels.
Ways to cut down on sugars
As we already talked that there is no need to cut down sugars present naturally in foods. But as long as free sugars are concerned whether in the form of added sugars or those present in honey, syrups, fresh fruit juices and smoothies, really need to be reduced for the sake of health .
Once you get addicted to sugary stuff, it’s really very hard to get rid of them .Here we share some ways to avoid extra amounts of sugars from our diet.
Avoid Sugary Foods and Drinks
- The most common and easy source of added sugars come from sugary drinks, like sodas and sugary fizzy drinks or sugary squash. Instead we must prefer water, sugar-free or no-added-sugar drinks. Amount of sugar present in whole and low-fat milk is the same, but preferring low-fat milk helps reducing your saturated fat intake.
- Fresh fruit juices and smoothies are also having sugary content, so limit the amount up to 150ml a day.
- If you are adding sugar in hot drinks or to your breakfast cereal, reducing the amount gradually and then cut it out altogether can be helpful.
- We can make right choice for breakfast and rather than using high-sugar content in jam, marmalade, syrup, chocolate spread or honey, use a lower-fat spread, fruit spread, sliced banana or lower-fat cream cheese instead.
- Always check for nutrition labels, and read the mentioned details about sugar content present in the particular food item. It will help you to pick the foods with low amounts of added sugar.
- Also try to reduce amounts of sugar being used in kitchen in different recipes. It works for most recipes except for few things.
- Prefer fresh fruits in juices rather than syrup.
- Unsweetened wholegrain breakfast cereals that are not frosted, or coated with chocolate or honey are a good choice.
- To sweeten your breakfast add some fruit or dried fruits for sweetness. Sliced bananas, dried fruit and berries are all good options.
Avoid sauces
- Sauces commonly used in kitchen like tomato ketchup, barbecue sauce, sweet chili sauce and spaghetti sauce are containing sugar content and mostly people don’t know about this fact. 100 gms of ketchup contains 22g sugars.
- Always try to purchase sauces with label “no added sugar” to avoid hidden sugars. Alternatives can be used for seasoning purposes like herbs and spices, chili, lemon juice, mustard and vinegar.
Prefer full-fat and whole food
Now a days low fat varieties of most of the food items are available. To avoid weight gain people go for these low fat versions without knowing the fact that high sugar content is present in these products, hence more chances of weight gain. So instead of these low fat products ,prefer full fat forms and enjoy the nutrition present in foods.
The idea of eating whole foods not only cuts down extra sugars but also helps to control weight. Whole foods are good for many reasons like they are not processed or refined and are also free of additives or artificial substance. Whole foods include whole fruits, whole grains, vegetables and legumes. On the other hand processed foods contain salt, sugar, fat and additives. Examples of processed foods are soft drinks, fast foods, chips and cereals.
How Nutrition labels tell about sugars
Always check information on nutrition labels and ingredients lists to help you make a healthy choice. Information about nutrition may be present in different forms, including on the front and the back of packs.
Labels on the back of packaging:
Usually we see a label “of which sugars” on the backside of packaging. This is the term representing “the total amount of sugar that is present in the product” and describes all the sugars including added sugars, free sugars present in honey, syrup, unsweetened fruit juices etc. as well as those that are naturally occurring in milk and fruits.
So reading labels carefully is quite helpful to choose foods that have less sugar content. Another benefit of label on the back of pack is that it will tell you the total amount of carbohydrates. Products containing more than 22.5 g of total sugars per 100g are considered to be high in sugar content, those having 5 g or less of total sugars per 100 g are low in sugar content. Whereas medium category falls between 5g-22.5 g of total sugars per 100 g.
Labels on the front of packaging:
These labels show information about nutrition on the front of food packaging. Also called traffic light labels, usually use red, amber and green colors. While reading the label on the front of pack, red color indicates the product containing high sugar content, amber is for medium and green is for low sugar content in the particular product.
Some labels on the front of packaging will display the amount of sugar in the food as a percentage of the RI (Reference intakes). The term actually represents guidelines for the approximate amount of particular nutrients and energy required in a day for a healthy diet.
Reference values are quantitative estimates of nutrient intakes that are used for planning and assessing diets for healthy people. The value for total sugars is 90g a day, which includes 30g of “free sugars”.
Conclusion
Keeping in mind all the facts about sugars as mentioned above can be very helpful to live a healthy and a better life. The only thing is when we make up our mind and follow all these rules. Remember, living a simple life is the best thing we can do to ourselves. To know about healthy and balanced diet in details, click here.
