How to Read a Food Label

How to take the confusion out of reading a food label and optimize your health. 

We are constantly bombarded with health slogans on food packages “low fat” “low sodium” “no added sugar”,  but does this mean they are the best option for you. The best option you have for ensuring the packaged food you eat is right for you is to read the food label. But understanding food labels (that section on the back of the pack) can be so confusing. So here are some general guidelines to take the confusion out of reading labels.

 1.      Do not believe the big health claims on the front of the label. Many of these can be misleading and are designed by marketers to get you to buy the product.  

 For example, Nutri Grain is labelled “Iron fuel. Made with corn, oats and wheat”  but has 32 grams ( 8 teaspoons) of sugar per 100 gram serve and Just Right is labelled “Low in Salt, High in Fiber. Goodness of whole grains” but has 28.7 grams (seven teaspoons) of sugar per 100 grams. Yes, they are high in fibre, making you think they will be the right choice, but they are incredibly high in sugar, making them an unhealthy choice.

Just because the label says “Gluten-free”, “Vegan”, Organic”, “Low Carb”, “Low Fat”  does not make it necessarily a healthy choice if it is a processed food then it can still be the same as junk food in some instances. Always go to step two and read the ingredients list.

 2.      Go to the ingredient list and read the ingredients. The ingredients are listed in order of percentage of content, with the highest content ingredients listed first.  Try and select food that has whole food listed as the first three ingredients and has limited numbers or words you cannot understand.  

Be AWARE sugar has many different names including dextrose, corn syrup, fruit juice concentrate, molasses, glucose syrup, glucose, sucrose or lactose, barley malt, malt powder, to name a few.  Fat can also have various names including oils, vegetable oil, coconut oil, palm oil, shortening, milk solids.

3.      Look out for food additives and preservatives, these are listed by name and approved number in the ingredients list. Be aware, even if it’s listed as “no artificial flavours or colours” it can still have natural food additives, or colours added such as monosodium glutamate (No.621), lactic acid No. 270), sodium acetate (No. 262) or beat-carotene (no. 160a).  For more information on additives, Food Standards Australia and New Zealand (FSANZ) provide a list of food additives on their website.

4.      Check the nutritional information panel.  Here is where you can find out how much, carbohydrates, sugars, fat and protein in a serve or 100 grams. It may also tell you how much fibre and how many micronutrients levels, e.g. vitamin C, B vitamins, iron.

5.      Always compare products by looking at the per 100-gram section. As serve sizes vary between products, use the ‘per 100g’ column to compare two similar foods.  However, if you want to know the amount of a particular nutrient that food will give you, then look at the ‘per serve’ column. Remember that the product serves size is intended as a guide but may be different to the amount you choose to eat.

The most important thing to remember is to avoid being misled and getting confused is to buy whole food like fruit, vegetables, unprocessed meats and grains do not need a label.