FOOD SPECIAL ..................FOOD FOR THOUGHT

FOOD FOR THOUGHT   Just because it says it's a cheese straw doesn't mean it contains the real variety. 7 foods that are anything but what they claim to be Everything in moderation is fine. Sounds like sound advice, right? But there are items, it's best not to eat. From artificial flavours and colours, there are thousands of ingredients making their way into your food that are hazardous to your health. Here is the mother list of how many ingredients it takes to make a fake food look real. 1 Frozen Dairy Desserts So you think that you have con sumed your quota of calcium for the day by tucking in the frozen yoghurt from the market? Not quite. Most of the packaged yoghurts don't contain dairy. CONTAINS: What frozen dairy dessert contains is plenty of corn syrup, gums and whey -minus all the goodness of whole milk. 2 Peanut Butter So you hear that peanut butter is rich in vitamin E, and all that. But flavoured sugar oil isn't the same. Yes, that's what it is. What shouldn't contain added sugar typically has at least two types, plus partially hydrogenated oil (read: trans fat). So what should be on the ingredients list of the real variety? Peanuts. CONTAINS: Roasted peanuts, sugar, hydrogenated vegetable oils (cottonseed and rapeseed), molasses, salt, sugar and sometimes, honey. 3 Maple Syrup Check out the syr up in your kitchen before you smear it on the slice of brown (read: artificially-coloured) bread.There is a good chance that you will find plenty of corn syrup and artificial flavourings. Remember, you are treating yourself to a nice squeeze of a chemical known as sodium hexametaphosphate. : High fructose corn syrup, cellulose gum, caramel colour, salt, sodium benzoate and sorbic acid (preservatives), sodium hexametaphosphate. 4 Chocolate Chip Cookies The real choco chip cookie contains cocoa butter, but what most companies end up giving you is a flavoured chocolate biscuit made of maida and cheap vegetable oils and partially hy drogenated palm kernel oil (trans fat). You are better off, baking your own. CONTAINS: Enriched flour bleached maida, niacin, iron, thiamin mononitrate, riboflavin, folic acid), sugar, chocolate flavoured chips, sugar, partially hydrogenated soybean andor cottonseed oil, water, contains 2% or less of: molasses, wheat protein isolate, baking powder (baking soda, sodium aluminum phosphate), salt, non-fat milk. 5 Blueberry cheesecake So you think blueberry cheesecake contains the real variety, is it? Well, the cream and crust is not smeard with the ber ries rich in vitamin C, but a host of chemicals and un healthy ingredients that'll make you think twice before hitting your favourite dessert shop. CONTAINS: Enriched bleached flour (wheat flour, niacin, reduced iron, thiamin mononitrate, riboflavin, folic acid, may contain malted barley flour), imitation blueberry pieces (dextrose), fractionated palm kernel oil, maida, citric acid, cellulose gum, maltodextrin, artificial flavour, and colour red 40, blue 1, blue 2), sugar, soy flour, leavening (sodium bicarbonate, monocalcium phosphate, sodium aluminum sulfate), canola or soybean oil, dextrose, salt, mono-diglycerides, and guar gum. 6 Pasteurised Cheese snack To the uninitiated, cheese faking is an art nearly as popular as cheese making. The ingredients in pasteurised cheese snacks--fillers, oil, and emulsifiers, which known as processed cheese. CONTAINS: Whey, cheddar cheese (milk, cheese culture, salt, enzymes), canola oil, milk protein concentrate, whey protein concentrate, milk, sodium citrate, sodium phosphate, salt, calcium phosphate, lactic acid, sodium alginate, autolyzed yeast extract, sorbic acid as a preservative, cheese culture, en zymes, apocarotenal (colour), annatto (colour). 7 Caramel Syrup This product may look and taste like melted sugar, but commercial caramel is very different from the kind you make at home using a sugar base. Some caramel colour is actually processed with ammonia and known carcinogens. Companies don't have to disclose whether they use ammonia in their caramel colour, though. CONTAINS: Corn syrup, high fructose corn syrup, sweetened condensed skim milk (skim milk and sugar), water, contains 2 per cent or less of: disodium phosphate, sodium citrate, salt, artificial flavour, caramel colour, xanthan gum.

MM23MAR15