Ready breakfast cereals are the perfect way to start the day? Are you kidding me? Are you serious when you say that! They are full of sugar and the crunchy version is also extremely fatty. And that’s just one of seven supposedly healthy products.
Actually, our alarm bells should ring particularly loudly when certain products are sold to us as particularly healthy. Because often enough they are not – on the contrary! FITBOOK lists seven supposedly healthy foods that are actually unhealthy.
Most breakfast cereals
«Muesli is healthy.» Somehow that got stuck in our heads. That’s true if you mix it yourself from rolled oats, oat bran, fruit and nuts. However, what is found on the supermarket shelves is in most cases quite a sugar bomb and therefore unhealthy. A small example: some “crunchy muesli” contains 24 grams of pure sugar (from glucose syrup, honey and refined sugar, among other things). There are also around 15 grams of fat (per 100 grams), much of it from sunflower oil. With around 450 calories, such a crunchy muesli differs only slightly from a bar of milk chocolate in terms of energy balance.
Artificially reduced fat products
The natural fat content of some foods, especially dairy products, makes sense. It ensures a good taste and also ensures that certain vitamins can be metabolized by the body. What tastes good is also satisfying and keeps you full for longer. If fat is artificially removed, a bland and unnatural product remains. What to do? Exactly, a lot of sugar and sometimes artificial flavors are mixed in to cover up the fact that «low fat» or «reduced fat» actually tastes like nothing. However, the body is pretty smart and rightly feels cheated by such a sham. The result: hunger. Thankfully, word has slowly spread that certain fats are important for staying lean and healthy.
Also interesting: nutritional myth! Why fat doesn’t make you fat
Energy and protein bars
They promise instant energy or advertise the high protein content. Athletes in particular believe that they are doing something good for themselves with such bars. A look at the list of ingredients already reveals that these cannot be healthy: 20 to 30 different ingredients are not uncommon. These often include glycerin or sugar substitutes such as maltitol (E 965). Above all, however, hardened palm fat, which is both health and ecologically questionable. Food that is heavily processed and thus deprived of all its naturalness can only be unhealthy. Rather snack on a spoonful of peanut butter with a banana. Also gives power!
Also interesting: Do sweeteners make you fat instead of thin?
sports drinks
Staying with sport: Drinking enough is the be-all and end-all during training. The range of different sports drinks is correspondingly high. Among other things, they advertise that they can compensate for the sweated-out minerals, including an extra energy boost. The «screaming» colors in which these drinks come should already make you suspicious. You can safely do without even more colorings and sugar. The best thing about exercising is still pure water or the good old apple spritzer. Pro tip for athletes who perspire heavily: Sweated out salt is easy to replace by adding two pinches of salt to the drinking bottles.
Also interesting: Before or after training? The right time for the protein shake
ready-made smoothies
Another unhealthy food sold as “healthy” is smoothies. In particular, cheap ready-made smoothies are real (fruit) sugar bombs. The recommended daily limit of 25 grams is quickly exceeded with a bottle that also contains more than 250 calories. Poured down in a few minutes, they also mess up the blood sugar level. Smoothies are only healthy if you mix them yourself and contain lots of green leafy vegetables in addition to fresh fruit.
Also interesting: Fatty liver – the dormant health hazard
Couscous Salad)
Miraculously, couscous salad has made it pretty close to the superfood shelf. Couscous is not a power grain in its own right, but consists of white, grated durum wheat. This is basically the same as pasta. And that makes the beads anything but nutritious. The only really healthy thing about a couscous salad is the vegetable snippets and herbs it contains, especially parsley. Our tip: Better to switch to quinoa, millet or buckwheat as a base!
Also interesting: What is seitan made of – and is it the perfect meat substitute?
Packaged, vegan sausage and Co.
Vegan sausages based on soy or seitan (pure wheat gluten) have been pretty hip for a while. This is how meat substitutes always make it to barbecue parties. But the health value of most of these products is shockingly bad: Ökotest 2016 found too much salt, flavor enhancers, genetically modified soy and even mineral oil residues in vegan and vegetarian meat substitutes. Seitan, which tastes the same as meat, lacks the essential amino acid lysine, which means it has a lower biological value than soy, dairy products or eggs.
Also interesting: Are flavor enhancers unhealthy?
Conclusion: Many supposedly healthy foods are unhealthy
Ultimately, a product is not only healthy because it is sold as particularly beneficial to health. It is always advisable to take a look at the list of ingredients – and this often shows that the sugar content is unfavorably high. As a rule of thumb, the less processed a food is – i.e. it is as original as possible – the healthier it is. Accordingly, many processing steps and non-natural ingredients mean that the food could be unhealthy.