Sunday Times article - ‘Natural’ food has more sugar than Coca-Cola

One of the nice things, for me,  about a Bank Holiday Weekend (apart from the wall to wall sunshine we had this weekend!) is the time to read the Sunday paper. An article in the Sunday Times caught my eye this week about supermarket food containing more sugar than Coca-cola:

"SOME bestselling supermarket meals and snacks contain more sugar than a can of Coca-Cola, despite being described as savoury and “natural”.


Ready meals, sauces, soups, high-fibre cereals and low-fat yogurts were found to have sugar levels described under NHS guidelines as “high”.

Some have a sugar content of up to 20%, with one Tesco chicken sauce containing 95.4g, equivalent to 22 teaspoons of sugar, in each jar, compared with 35g or just over eight spoonfuls in a regular can of Coca-Cola.

Food experts say an unwanted by-product of the drive to reduce fat and salt has been the use of extra sugar to improve flavour. They are calling on the industry to combat the problem."

Although this may not be news to people in the dental industry, it is still a worry that the message is still not as wide-spead in the public domain as we would like. Often when we're trying to eat healthily, we are consuming more sugar than is good for our health and good for our dental health.

This article went on to describe how cereals such as All Bran and Uncle Bens "cook in" sauces contained more sugar per 100g than Coca-cola.

It was suggested that the sugar content in food should be highlighted with red labels if the content was high - I think this is a good idea as there are so many foods containing "hidden sugars" (yogurts, soups, sauces) that attention should be drawn to their presence.

Our quest for a healthy diet could mean we are eating less saturated fat and salt - but the flavour has to come from somewhere - and this often means the sugar content is bumped up!

Until these suggested "red labels" are introduced, please do check the food labels for sugar content - but please remember, it won't just be labelled as "SUGAR" in the ingredients list - it will be cleverly "hidden" as one of the following:

■Brown Rice Syrup


■Agave Nectar

■Barley Malt

■Barley Malt Syrup

■Beet Sugar

■Brown Sugar

■Buttered syrup

■Cane Juice

■Cane juice crystals

■Cane Sugar

■Caramel

■Carob syrup

■Castor sugar

■Coconut Sugar

■Confectioner’s sugar

■Corn sweetener

■Corn Syrup

■Corn Syrup Solids

■Date Sugar

■Dehydrated Cane Juice

■Demerara Sugar

■Dextran

■Dextrin

■Dextrose

■Diastatic Malt

■Diatase

■Ethyl maltol

■Evaporated Cane Juice

■Fructose

■Fruit Juice

■Fruit Juice Concentrate

■Galactose

■Glucose

■Glucose Solids

■Golden sugar

■Golden syrup

■Grape sugar

■High Fructose Corn Syrup

■Honey

■Icing sugar

■Invert Sugar

■Jaggery

■Lactose

■Malt Syrup

■Maltodextrin

■Maltose

■Maple Syrup

■Molasses

■Monk Fruit / Luo Han Guo

■Muscovado Sugar

■Palm Sugar

■Panela

■Panocha

■Rapadura

■Raw Cane Sugar

■Raw sugar

■Refiner’s syrup

■Rice Bran Syrup

■Rice syrup

■Saccharose

■Sorbitol

■Sorghum

■Sorghum Syrup

■Sucanat

■Sucrose

■Sugar

■Syrup

■Treacle

■Turbinado Sugar

■Xylose

■Yellow sugar

Feeling overwhelmed!!!!! I think that is often the intention - confuse the consumer!!!! However, if you're like me, and enjoy a game of "hide & seek", until those red food labels are mandatory by food manufacturers, check those food labels carefully and try to avoid those unnecessary sugars.

Diane