Fiber is the Future

Even whole grain gurus have a tough time deciphering front of package whole grain claims.

With 34,000 new whole grain products introduced in 2012 (compared to just 264 in 2001), it has become increasingly difficult to determine just how different “made with whole grain” really is from “100% whole grain”.

Now, from the Harvard School of Public Health comes an easier way to identify a good source of whole grain: the 10:1 ratio.

The 10:1 ratio maintains that for every 10 grams of carbohydrate you eat, aim for at least 1 gram of dietary fiber.

The recommendation comes as part of a recently published paper in the journal Public Health Nutrition. The ratio’s intention is not to select the MOST healthful whole grain, but rather to give a ballpark estimation of what is a relatively good whole grain choice.

You can, of course, find benchmark foods that surpass the 10:1 ratio.

Take 100% whole wheat bread for example: 1 slice (1 oz, 90-100 calories per slice) has 15 grams carbohydrate and 3 grams fiber, giving it a 5:1 ratio, an even better choice than 10:1.

Here is a quick example of the ratio approach applied to choosing between two General Mills cereals. Ironically, both of these cereals display the same General Mills “Made with Whole Grain” check mark logo on the front, although you can see through use of the ratio, that they are remarkably different products:

• Cinnamon Toast Crunch: 25 grams carbohydrate and 2 grams dietary fiber (12.5:1 ratio – no good)
• Cheerios (yellow box): 20 grams carbohydrate and 3 grams dietary fiber (6.7:1 ratio – good deal)

Make it your goal to meet or beat the 10:1 ratio next time you are selecting whole grain foods.

Stop being scared of the pressure cooker!

That was one of my New Year’s resolutions this year, and at just over the halfway point of February, I can say it’s the one I’m glad I stuck with!

Having lived in Nepal at a time when it wasn’t unusual for Maoist insurgents to deploy pressure cooker bombs, I must defend my fear of this kitchen device as being somewhat based in reality!

But today’s pressure cookers are a far cry from their less-reliable, and more explodable predecessors. If you don’t have someone purposely rigging them to explode, you need not fear the pressure cooker.

Pressure cookers work by increasing the boiling point of liquid. Inside the tightly sealed pot, the boiling point goes from 212 to 250 degrees Fahrenheit. The superhot steam causes food to cook faster. What tastes like it took a full day to boil, is yours in a matter of minutes.

These instruments are great for cooking some of your favorite high-fiber foods, most notably legumes, steel cut oats, and beets.

Here are a few tips for quick cooking dried beans from The Veggie Queen, Registered Dietitian Jill Nussinow and author of the website www.theveggiequeen.com:

• For presoaked beans, cover beans with water in a bowl and let sit for 8-12 hours, drain and then cook
• Presoaked pinto, black, white or kidney beans take 4-6 minutes to cook at pressure
• Garbanzo beans take 12-14 minutes to cook at pressure
• A good ratio is 3/4 cup water for every 1 cup presoaked dry beans

For some great pressure cooker recipes, check out Jill’s book “The New Fast Food – The Veggie Queen Pressure Cooks Whole Food Meals in Less than 30 Minutes“.

To learn about selecting the best pressure cooker for you, view the Cook’s Illustrated video on pressure cookers.

As a follow-up to the “Worst Cereal Awards” post last month, an inquisitive reader wrote to ask about one of her favorite cereals, Kellogg’s Cracklin’ Oat Bran:

“I’m concerned about my fiber intake and I have been eating Kellogg’s Cracklin’ Oat Bran…is this a good source of fiber?” – Jamie from San Diego

Great question Jamie!

So what about this Cracklin’ Oat Bran? Should you be eating it?

A quick glance at the Nutrition Facts panel says, Thumbs Down for Kellogg’s Cracklin’ Oat Bran.

Cracklin’ Oat Bran is one of those sneaky, tricky breakfast cereals that purports to be healthy:

• It looks healthy (because it’s brown)
• It sounds healthy (because it’s name says oat AND bran), and
• Kellogg’s puts a lot of effort into making you think it’s healthy with their “Excellent Source of Fiber” and “Made with Whole Grain” banners splashed across the front of the box

Kellogg’s Cracklin’ Oat Bran would be a great bet – if it weren’t for one thing: the sugar.

There are 14 grams of sugar in a measly 3/4-cup serving. In addition, sugar is pretty prominent in this product, as it is the second ingredient (right after whole grain oats).

Ideally, a more accurate name for this cereal would be “Kellogg’s Cracklin’ Oat Bran and Sugar” cereal. So, how much sugar is in this cereal?

Well, the food label as it is currently designed makes it hard to tell. “Sugars” include naturally occurring sugars (from fruit and milk), as well as added sugars. But the thing is, the food label doesn’t have to tell you how much of which is which.

Fortunately, in Cracklin’ Oat Bran, there are no milk sugars and no fruit sugars. So you can assume that the 14 grams of sugar are all from sucrose, added table sugar.

One gram of carbohydrate (sugar) has 4 calories, so the 14 grams per 3/4 cup serving give 56 calories from sugar (almost 4 teaspoons worth). This works out to 28% of the calories in Cracklin’ Oat Bran coming from sugar.

Now I don’t know about you, but if a food I’m eating has 28% of the calories coming from sugar, I’m hoping it’s dessert – and not a breakfast cereal. A good rule of thumb is to choose cereals that have as little sugar as possible, or at least <20% of calories from sugar.

A better bet is to look for cereals that say “5 g” or less in the “Sugars” spot on the label and “3 g” or more in “Dietary fiber”.

(Now granted, Cracklin’ Oat Bran does have 6 g fiber per serving – but if you have to add 14 g sugar to make 6 g fiber taste good, that’s not worth it).

Some better bets for breakfast cereals that meet the 3 g+ for fiber and < 5 g for sugar are:

• Cheerios (Original in the yellow box, not Honey Nuts!) – 3 g fiber, 1 g sugar
• Kashi’s Heart to Heart Cereal, Honey Toasted Oat – 5 g fiber, 5 g sugar
• Barbara’s Bakery Puffins, Original – 5 g fiber, 5 g sugar
• Post Shredded Wheat, Original – 6 g fiber, 0 g sugar

Thanks for your great question Jamie, and keep them coming!

If you have a gut – it’s trendy to be referring to it not as a gut, but rather as a “Wheat Belly”.

The Wheat Belly craze – based on the eponymous diet book – claims (erroneously) that wheat-containing and processed foods made with wheat act like opiate drugs, promoting addictive behaviors and leading ultimately to all of the ills associated there within.

While it’s certainly true that excessive amounts of refined and processed foods – including grain foods – can contribute to unwanted weight gain, the Wheat Belly diet actually advocates for a reduction in or elimination of other healthy foods, such as whole grains, fruits, vegetables and legumes.

As any savvy consumer knows, a fad diet that either demonizes or glorifies a particular food or food group is not one that is ultimately going to result in sustained weight loss or promote optimally healthy food patterning.

So, for the more evolved consumer who understands that whole grains are a part of a healthy lifestyle, what’s your best bet when it comes to bread? This dietitian says – hands down – it’s Ezekiel 4:9 Sprouted Whole Grain Bread.

Short of baking your own 100% whole wheat bread – Ezekiel is as about as close as you can get to pan perfection!

What sets this bread so far above the bar is its incredibly clean ingredient list, especially when it comes to sugar and salt. The bread has not only no high fructose corn syrup, but no added sugars at all. And there is just enough salt (which effects dough texture and enhances taste) to make it taste like actually bread. (If you’ve ever had salt-free bread, which isn’t bread at all, you know what I mean!)

With 80 calories per slice, 3 grams of dietary fiber and just 75 mg sodium, this is an excellent option for those looking to incorporate whole grains without the added sugars and salt usually found in conventional bread aisle bread options.

To learn where you can purchase Ezekiel – and other Food or Life Baking Company products in your area, check out the company’s store locator here.

The Environmental Working Group’s list of Best and Worst Cereals is out!

While a lot of things go into making a bad children’s cereal – most of the credit must go to the sugar. Based on an analysis of 84 children’s cereals, EWG puts these 10 (with their percent of sugar by weight) on their worst offenders list:

1 – Kellogg’s Honey Smacks (55.6%)

2 – Post Golden Crisp (51.9%)

3 – Kellogg’s Froot Loops Marshmallow (48.3%)

4 – Quaker Oats Cap’n Crunch’s OOPS! All Berries (46.9%)

5 – Quaker Oats Cap’n Crunch Original (44.4%)

6 – Quaker Oats Oh!s (44.4%)

7 – Kellogg’s Smorz (43.3%)

8 – Kellogg’s Apple Jacks (42.9%)

9 – Quaker Oats Cap’n Crunch’s Crunch Berries (42.3%)

10 – Kellogg’s Froot Loops Original (41.4%)

You’ve got to give it to Kellogg’s – they don’t beat around the bush with outlandish products like Honey Smacks, Froot Loops, Apple Jacks and the almost unbelievable Smorz. You know what you’re getting into with Kellogg’s – lots and lots of sugar. So much so that sugar is the first ingredient in 3 of those 4 cereals. At least Smorz has the decency to bump it down to number 2.

Now, granted, spotlighting sugar in kids’ cereals is certainly swinging at the low-hanging fruit. But what you might not catch is that at the same time, Kellogg’s is also trying to soften the blow of that sugar high with their ridiculous front-of-package nutrition claims. These very same super sugary cereal boxes are now regularly plastered with “Good Source of Fiber” and “Made with Whole Grain” claims.

A “good source” of fiber is just one that contains 2.5-4.9 grams of fiber per serving (“high in” fiber is 5 grams or more). You can rest assured that with Apple Jacks, those 3 grams of fiber per 1 cup serving aren’t coming from apples – they’re from added, isolated sources of fiber such as soluble corn fiber and oat fiber. Whether or not these types of fiber convey the same health benefits as naturally occurring, intact fibers remains yet to be proven.

And the “Made with Whole Grain” claim? Also borderline bunk, since it’s made with whole grain, but not entirely from whole grains. You can mix up a batch of the whitest flour you can find, toss in a drop of whole wheat flour – and claim it’s made with whole grain. It is, at best, a disingenuous designation.

So, if these are the worst of the worst – then which cereals are actually good for you? Check out EWG’s list of Best Cereals by clicking here.

Registered Dietitian McKenzie Hall also provides some solid tips for perfecting your breakfast cereal prowess:

• Look for the word “whole” in the first ingredient of your cereal
• Add slivered almonds or Greek yogurt to dry cereal to boost your protein intake
• Make your own high fiber breakfast cereal

To learn how to make your own fiber-packed Muesli – and to view a comparison table of fiber-containing breakfast cereals – check out McKenzie’s article Fiber Facts About Cereal from Today’s Dietitian Magazine.