Lying, Cheating Foods

You’re pretty sure you’ve got your diet down to a tee.

You eat plenty of fruits and veggies, always making sure you get your five portions each day. You choose wholemeal bread and pasta over the highly refined white varieties and drink plenty of water. You avoid fizzy drinks, chips and biscuits and you certainly avoid saturated fat at all costs.

So why aren’t you looking any better or losing weight?

The scary truth is that almost everything you’ve been told about eating healthily could be completely wrong.

The health food industry is huge, and worth billions. Plus, the government is under pressure to make us healthier as a nation, by reducing obesity, and diseases related to an unhealthy lifestyle. We’re bombarded from every angle by adverts for how to eat better, what foods we should be consuming, what the ones to avoid are, and why we all need to be taking so and so supplement, or looking out for the latest super foods.

Next time you’re in the grocery store, or visit a health food shop, take a look at the ingredients of these so-called healthy foods. Often, foods that are advertised as natural, low fat, low sugar, wholegrain, or targeted at the weight loss and healthy eating market contain copious amounts of additives and ingredients that sound like they have more place in a nuclear laboratory than on your dinner plate.

Companies are very clever at using persuasive wording on their products. Words such as “natural,” “organic,” and “un-refined” are emblazoned across packaging and jump out at us. You automatically think how great said product must be if it’s got so many positives going for it, but what do these words actually mean?

Just because a food is natural doesn’t mean it’s healthy. Gasoline is a natural substance, but you wouldn’t drink that in your quest for weight loss.

Likewise, anything can be organic if it’s not been sprayed with artificially manufactured pesticides, but it this doesn’t do anything to reduce the calorie content or make what you’re eating any healthier.

There’s also some sneaky labeling in place.

Something can be labeled as zero calories, even if it’s not. The regulations differ between countries, yet many products that have a small amount of calories just pass by as being labeled as calorie-free. The same goes for trans-fats. Likewise, companies play around with serving sizes. If you actually weigh out how much cereal, rice or salad dressing you have, you’ll see that you can easily eat double or triple the recommended serving size without feeling full.

With that in mind, it’s clear to see that some foods aren’t quite what they’re cut out to be. Let’s look closer at some of these lying, cheating foods.

The Healthy Foods That Wreck Your Diet

Fruit

Surprisingly, most peoples’ number one health food makes the top of the list of lying, cheating foods.

We’re always told to eat more fruits and vegetables, as they contain a high amount of vitamins and minerals.

There’s no arguing this point, and vitamins, minerals and antioxidants are certainly extremely beneficial, yet the main problem that fruit poses is the sugar content. Fruit has to get its sweetness from somewhere, and that somewhere is the natural sugars that fruit contains.

This is a prime example of when “natural” isn’t always a good thing.

Foods such as bananas, pineapple, raisins, dates and figs are massively high in sugar, meaning they contain a lot of calories too.

When choosing fruit, stick to lower sugar ones, like berries, melon, kiwis, plums and apples.

Fruit Juice

Fruit juice is a convenient way to get plenty of nutrients in, right?

Wrong.

Fruit juice is even worse than fruit, as all the fiber has been removed and you’re left with pure sugar. Fruit juice may as well be soda in disguise.

Cereals

This one relates to the serving sizes mentioned earlier.

The average recommended serving size for most cereals isn’t enough to feed a squirrel. While a box may state that a bowl of cereal contains only 150 calories, most peoples’ idea of a bowl of cereal can constitute in the region of 500 calories. Add to that that cereals are pure carbohydrate (possibly with added fat too if you opt for a chocolate or nut based cereal) and you’re definitely on to a loser.

If you want to keep your cereal in the morning, switch to oats or a porridge main with quinoa, buckwheat or oat bran, or make your own muesli (going easy on the dried fruit.)

Health Bars

The word “health” is seriously misplaced here. Few dieting or meal replacement bars are healthy in any way whatsoever.

The one plus they have going for them is that your calorie intake is controlled. One bar is one portion, and they’re not usually that high in calories. However, they contain very little in the way of nutrients, and are again, predominantly carbohydrate based.

Protein meal replacement bars are slightly better, as the added protein increases satiety, and has a positive effect on your metabolism, however you should still watch out for the carb and sugar content.

Energy Drinks

Energy drinks are definitely lying to you.

The idea behind energy drinks is that they boost performance, allowing you to work harder in the gym. This sounds like a good thing – working harder in the gym means you’ll burn more calories and thus lose weight faster.

Unfortunately though, this is not the case.

A standard energy drink will contain around 8 to 12 grams of carbs per 100 milliliters of fluid. That’s 40 to 60 grams of pure sugar in each bottle. Or to put it another way – 160 to 240 calories.

The performance boost you’ll get from an energy drink is minimal at best. It certainly won’t give you so much energy that you’ll offset the increased calories by working harder. Add to that the fact that increasing your consumption of carbs during a workout can stop your body from burning stored fat, and you’re on to a real loser.

Low Fat Foods

Low fat may seem fantastic, but when a food loses its fat content, manufacturers generally replace it with sugar, so as not to impact on taste.

This doesn’t mean that all low fat foods are bad. Naturally low fat foods like vegetables, meat, fish, dairy products, beans, and so on are all great. Likewise, it’s not an excuse to deliberately choose high fat foods, or gorge on butter all day long, but be sensible when choosing your groceries, and don’t always assume that a low fat product is better.

Summary

Remember, the food companies could be lying to you, and cheating you out of your money – so keep an eye out and be vigilant against these fake health foods.