Are healthy snacks making you fatter? Here are the top ten "confusing snacks"

The weather is getting colder recently. Do you feel particularly greedy? But when you look at the time, it’s not time to eat yet! So you start searching for "healthy snacks" around you and eat them without restraint.

Image credit: SOOGIF

It’s okay to eat snacks to fill your stomach, but there are not many truly healthy snacks. Some snacks may seem “fresh and refined”, but in fact they are “scheming”. Don’t be fooled by them.

In this issue, we will take stock of the top ten "confusing snacks" and see if your favorite snacks are on the list.

Fruit and vegetable crisps are both fruits and vegetables. They sound like the epitome of health and deliciousness, right?

Let’s take a look at the ingredient list first~

Wow! With so many calories and fat, if I eat this whole pack, will I still be able to eat lunch?

Fruit and vegetable crisps generally contain oil, which is related to the processing technology of fruit and vegetable crisps.

Vacuum frying is a common process used in domestic fruit and vegetable chips. This type of fruit and vegetable chips is fried at high temperature, and the fat and calories are all off the charts, and the vitamins in the fruits and vegetables are also greatly reduced.

Of course, in addition to frying, dried fruits and vegetables can also be freeze-dried. No oil is used in the processing process. The resulting fruit and vegetable chips not only have color, fragrance, taste and shape, but also can preserve the vitamins, proteins and other nutrients in fruits and vegetables to the greatest extent.

However, after the fruit is dried, the sugar content is concentrated, but we don’t feel it is sweet when we eat it. Some businesses even add sugar/salt to adjust the taste, making people unable to stop and want to eat more after one bag.

If you really like crispy fruits and vegetables, you can buy them in small bags and eat a little at a time.

Fruit and vegetable juice refers to the fruit and vegetable juice obtained by squeezing, extracting, centrifuging or concentrating fruits or vegetables and adding an appropriate amount of water to reconstitute the fruit and vegetable juice.

Fruit and vegetable juice drinks refer to beverages made with fruit and vegetable juice as the base material and mixed with water, sugar, acid or spices.

Fruit and vegetable juice is naturally a healthier and more natural drink than fruit and vegetable juice drinks. However, fruits themselves are rich in sugar. After being squeezed into drinks, not only will some dietary fiber be lost, but the free sugar in the juice is also easier to absorb than chewing the fruit.

The sugars in fruits are all in the cells, called "endogenous sugars", and when the juice is squeezed, the cells are destroyed and these sugars become free sugars. Free sugars have a much greater impact on blood sugar and tooth decay.

Therefore, the GI (glycemic index) of fruit juice is higher than that of fruit, and the sugar content is also higher.

Moreover, compared with eating fruit, the feeling of fullness from drinking juice is also greatly reduced. For example, eating one or two oranges alone is enough, but for orange juice, the juice squeezed from five oranges can be finished in minutes.

If you can eat fruit, it is recommended that you eat it directly.

Fruit yogurt seems to give people the wonderful impression of eating fresh fruit and drinking fresh yogurt.

But in fact, just look at the ingredient list and you will understand that fruit yogurt is not as simple as yogurt + fruit pulp.

This type of fruit yogurt, in addition to jam and fruit, also contains a lot of white sugar, thickeners, etc. It is not only sweet, but also has a lower protein content than ordinary pure yogurt.

I suggest that you try DIY Real Fruit Yogurt - buy low-sugar/zero-sugar yogurt and add some fresh fruits to it.

We all know that konjac is low in calories and high in dietary fiber, making it a good friend for people who want to lose weight. Therefore, various konjac foods have appeared on the market.

But please note that although konjac is low in calories, the ingredients may not be low in calories.

For example, konjac is high in oil and spicy, and has a high sodium content. It's okay to eat a little bit occasionally to satisfy your craving, but don't be greedy.

There are also konjac cold noodles or konjac noodles, be sure to pay attention to their seasoning packets!

For example, in the nutritional composition table below, except for konjac cold noodles, the calories of other foods are not low. It is recommended that those who want to lose weight may wish to make simple vinaigrette at home, which is convenient and delicious.

Many plant protein products claim to be healthier because they do not contain cholesterol, trans fatty acids or hormones.

Indeed, plant protein products are much lower in fat than similar meat products. However, like konjac products, although the food itself is low in calories and fat, the ingredients are difficult to avoid and are high in oil and salt.

Therefore, before choosing plant protein products, be sure to read the ingredient list and nutritional composition table carefully. You can choose those with simpler ingredients and the lower the sodium content, the better.

Nuts themselves are good snacks and can provide us with many nutrients, such as unsaturated fatty acids, protein, minerals, vitamin E and B vitamins.

However, some salted nuts may contain too much salt and other seasonings for the sake of taste, and some are even fried, which are high in salt and fat.

You should know that the calories in nuts themselves are already quite high. If they are over-processed, they will become a calorie bomb.

Friends who like to eat nuts are advised to buy original nuts as much as possible. However, it is more important to control the amount of intake. The dietary guidelines recommend that we eat an average of 50 to 70 grams of nuts per week, which is about 10 grams per day (note! This amount refers to the weight of the nut kernel after shelling).

We use an adult woman's hand as a measure to show you how much this recommended amount is equivalent to eating in a day.

There are many popular oatmeals on the Internet now, which add nuts, dried fruits, and yogurt cubes to the oatmeal. Although they taste good, they also bring more sugar and fat.

The sugar content of a certain fruit cereal on the market reaches 62g/100g. Even the reduced-sugar version still has a sugar content of 36g/100g.

It is recommended that friends who like oatmeal consider buying pure oatmeal, or using oatmeal as the main ingredient without adding additional flavorings such as white sugar.

The hawthorn slices are original, sweet and sour, and I thought they could help improve the stomach and digestion, but I didn't expect that the first ingredient in the list was white sugar.

Wow, I really can’t tell whether I’m eating hawthorn or candy.

In fact, as a fruit, hawthorn is not very cost-effective. It is a kind of fruit that does not taste sweet but has a high sugar content.

The sugar content of hawthorn is as high as 22%, which is even much higher than that of sweet foods such as watermelon, strawberry, and apple.

Therefore, it is not an exaggeration to say that foods such as hawthorn slices and fruit leather are actually "candies".

In the eyes of many people, whole grain biscuits are healthy and low-calorie snacks.

It is true that whole grains are rich in dietary fiber, but they are not easy to process and taste rough when eaten directly, so some businesses add a lot of sugar and oil to adjust the taste of biscuits.

To be honest, many whole grain biscuits on the market are regular biscuits with a little bit of bran or whole wheat flour added, but the taste of real whole grain biscuits is not very satisfactory.

If you want to fill your stomach before a meal, you can eat some whole grain biscuits, but if you want to reduce calories and lose weight, forget it.

As a synonym for "high oil, high salt, and high calories", fried potato chips have always been a food that many children dare not eat freely.

So, are “non-fried” potato chips really healthier?

not necessarily!

For instant noodles, the fat content can be more than double that of fried and non-fried instant noodles.

But for potato chips, the fat content of non-fried and fried chips is not much different. After all, potato chips need a fluffier and crispier texture, and they still need the "resource" of fat.

Therefore, when we choose potato chips, we should still consider those with low calories and low fat, and not just those that are “non-fried”.

Wow, after reading these ten "confusing snacks", do you suddenly feel depressed and think there is no love in the world?

There must be people who say: I already eat snacks, why should I care about my health?

In fact, snacks are not foods that are eaten frequently. Unlike staple foods, they should be eaten in moderation rather than being eaten to your heart’s content.

Finally, healthy living is an attitude. We do not advocate overly strict self-discipline. This article is mainly to remind those friends who love to eat/hoard snacks that it is okay to eat snacks occasionally.

Editor | Rebecca

Design | Sour

Source: Dad Review