Monday 24 January 2011

Haribo for breakfast anyone??


One of my clients had a very interesting breakfast the other day that consisted of red fruit muesli, mixed with fruit and fibre and Haribo Tangtastics ... yes that's right Tangtastics - she kindly provided a photo for authenticity! I do occasionally see some strange things on peoples food diaries but Haribo for breakfast is a new one!!

However, E numbers aside, this isn't actually much different to sprinkling sugar over breakfast cereal - a pretty common thing to do. However most breakfast cereals already have a high sugar content before you even add any sugar ... or Haribo!!

The red fruit muesli already had 25g sugar per 100g - so it was 25% sugar before the addition of chewy sweets!!!

Personally I don't see any benefit from eating refined sugar full stop unless you're an athlete or do intensive workouts in which case some fast sugars are necessary for post-exercise recovery. There are lots of tasty sugary foods that make a great treat, but are not suitable for everyday food.

It is perfectly possible to enjoy a sugar free breakfast. There are now quite a few non-sugar muesli's available ranging from my favourite, Neal's Yard Muesli from Holland and Barrett ... to the easily available no sugar Alpen. If you're used to very sugary cereals or granolas it might take a bit of taste adjustment, although using apple juice instead of milk usually adds sufficient sweetness. Porridge is also plenty sweet enough if instead of adding sugar you add chopped fruit or even some dried fruit. If you're a toast and jam person St Dalfour jam is delicious but has fruit sugar making it less bad for you than regular jam and also makes a nice topping on pancakes.

Basically there are no excuses for adding sugar (or haribo) to your breakfast ... although my client said it was necessary to deal with a particularly bad hangover!

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