Food Labels Made Simple: Added Sugars And T1D

Welcome back for another round of intense nutrition training! Ha - just kidding. I actually wanted to spend this month’s blog on a topic I feel needs further explanation. If you follow the blogs that we put out, you’ll know a couple of months ago, I dedicated my time to discussing artificial sweeteners. While it was comprehensive and jam packed with information, I fear I didn’t do enough justice to its sister topic: ADDED SUGARS! If you’ve come across a nutrition label in the past year or two, you have likely seen new formatting, especially as it concerns sugars. People often get confused about how to interpret it. Because of this, I couldn’t think of a better topic to dive into this month!

The Basics

First and foremost, let's put a visual image to explain exactly what I’m talking about. 

Source:https://www.fda.gov/food/new-nutrition-facts-label/calories-new-nutrition-facts-label

As you can see there are two lines as it pertains to sugar: Total Sugar: 12g and Includes 10 g Added Sugar. When the word “total” on a food label is present, that really is the TOTAL amount. You don’t need to add or look elsewhere - total is total. Where it gets confusing is the grams of ADDED sugar. In this example there are 10 grams of added sugar. What this means is that these are NOT natural sugars found in the product - food companies have added in this 10 grams to make their product more tasty and appealing.

Another way you can think about this, is that if those 10 grams of sugar had not been added, then the TOTAL sugar would only be 2 grams. And that means this product has 2 grams of natural sugar before it undergoes processing.

Natural Sugars

So what foods have natural sugars? These include fruits, cow’s milk, honey or agave nectar, as well as yogurts. Simply because they have sugar does not mean they are unhealthy for us, however as diabetics we do need to be conscious of the portion sizes of these foods. 

I find dried fruit is the best example of this. Now fresh apricots have roughly 4 g of sugar. This is NATURAL sugar and will not include any added sugar. Dried apricots on the other hand can contain up to 30 g of sugar per serving because the dehydration process causes the sugar to be more concentrated. Not only that, but after dehydrating the fruit, some companies choose to add extra sugar into their products. YUCK! 

Does this mean that all dried fruit is bad? Heck no I love to snack on dried fruit, but it does mean we need to understand how to read labels and choose the better products. Ways to combat this is to choose foods that do not contain high amounts of added sugar and of course always be sure to compare the labels of the products you plan to buy. This can help you make a more informed decision and ultimately healthier selection.  It also means we need to remember our very basic foundation for building healthy meals/snacks and balance this type of snack with a protein such as nuts, plain yogurt or peanut butter. When in doubt, always refer back to your basics and if you need a refresher, don’t forget my Nutrition Basics blog: https://www.ftfwarrior.com/fight-blog/2020/1/21/nutrition-basics-every-diabetic-needs-to-know

Where it counts

If you’re eating a sweet treat, you probably wouldn’t be surprised to see a high amount of added sugar, however when eating common foods like granola bars, trail mix, tomato/pasta sauce, or salad dressings, you start to see how food companies have been quietly sneaking sugar into their products. 

Often the foods I recommend to people: granola bars, trail mix, yogurt, plant based milks, peanut butter end up having a high amount of added sugar especially when they come flavored. It paints a confusing image and becomes hard to keep track of what is healthy and what is not. For this reason, I find it extremely important to understand how to read what is in front of you. 

While we won’t be able to avoid sugar completely and we definitely won’t have time to read every single label, this information can help us figure out which product contains less sugar and is healthier for us. 

Obviously I am preaching to the type 1 choir so I don’t need to go into detail on why we want to limit the amount of sugar we are consuming, but like I always say, we are more than our diabetes. We need to care for our heart, our kidneys, our lungs and every other part of our bodies. While it is easy to get boxed into our type 1 diabetes, we have to remember we are whole humans who could end up getting more than one chronic disease. Limiting the amount of excess sugar is a great step you can take to help the rest of your body function at tip top shape.

Common Foods with Added Sugars

Always be sure to be extra conscious and read the labels of the following items as they are notorious for having added sugars!

• Salad Dressing 

• Condiments (ketchup, mustard, BBQ)

• Granola Bars 

• Flavored yogurts 

• Tomato/Pasta Sauce 

• Cereals, Flavored Oatmeals

• Nut Butter (peanut, almond, cashew)

Hope this helps and you found something new to use in your kitchen and day to day diabetes management. While it may be overwhelming, breaking down these topics into bite sized chunks is the best way to make sense of the information that is out there. 

Let us know of any new foods you try or notice are high in added sugar and as always keep up the fight!

Taylor, PA-S, T1D