You’ve seen variations on the cereal theme – with banana, blueberries, strawberries, soya milk, goats milk but is your daily cereal EVER healthy?  Recently Kellogg’s announced that they were finally going to add the ‘traffic light’ labelling to ‘some’ of their packets. Pressure from consumers has created this change, but is this enough? With 6 different types of sugar in some packets, clever packaging, and fresh, vigorous images, how do you know it is healthy?  If the sugar content is too high, brands simply reduce their ‘serving size suggestion’ to fit recommendations.

What makes cereal healthy? 

Despite the recent changes cereals are heavily loaded with sugar and are highly processed. The only thing that is really healthy about cereal is the milk you add.

For instance

• • Kellogg’s Frosties contains 37g of sugar per 100g which is equivalent of 9.5 teaspoons of sugar
  • Kellogg’s Crunchy Nut cornflakes 35g of sugar per 100g which is the same as 9 teaspoons of sugar
  • Kellogg’s cornflakes have 8g of sugar and Sainsbury’s own brand have less at 7.2g
  • Weetabix is 4.4g of sugar which is one teaspoon

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One teaspoon a daily Weetabix may sound okay, but if you add a sugary drink to your breakfast like freshly squeezed orange or apple juice that is another two teaspoons PLUS a healthy snack at break of an apple adds a further two teaspoons. Brown bread sandwiches will add another 1 or 2 teaspoons. Or how about a Go Ahead apple bake?   That is 27.7g and 2 teaspoons of sugar.

You can see that your ‘healthy’ lifestyle already has a number of added sugar without your favourite biscuit or chocolate treat.

Sugar comes in many different forms and names and is added to all processed foods in different names to disguise the amount. There are over 50 different names for sugar, look out for these:

• Barley malt.
• Brown rice syrup.
• Corn syrup.
• Corn syrup solids.
• Dextrin.
• Dextrose.
• Fructose

Fructose from fruit is wildly interesting, a whole piece of fruit is going to contain less fructose as the water content and the bulk of the fruit and fibre will help, but healthy sounding fruit sugar is fructose and both of these keep the GI ranking down simply because they are digested directly by the liver, not the digestive system.  High fructose contributes to non-alcoholic fatty liver disease.

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If you want to make nutritional changes but feel overwhelmed and confused by conflicting information and you’re left bewildered where to start then pick up a copy of Gorgeous!

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Treats taken in ‘moderation’ blow your whole day

A 330ml can of Coca-Cola contains 35g (1.2oz) of sugar, while a Mars bar has 33g (1.16oz) — both well in excess of the average 25g (0.88oz) limit for women. A single bar of chocolate, three yoghurts or a fizzy drink would take women over the daily sugar limit.

A single bar of chocolate or three ‘low fat’ yoghurts would take the average person over the proposed daily sugar limit. Three Waitrose low-fat black cherry yoghurts provide 27g (0.95oz) in added sugars, exceeding your allowance.

That is not even going far enough when it comes to sugary drinks, that have absolutely no place in a healthy diet, and that includes fizzy Elderflower cordial. Don’t miss:  Fizzy drinks what you need to know

Children, in particular, become accustomed to this level of sugar in their diet.  With high levels of glucose in their body first thing in the morning, they will be ‘hangry’ all day long – reaching for sugary snacks at break, lunch and before dinner.  With glucose in your body, you can’t burn fat.  Sugar is the only substance in your body that can turn into fat with little effort and your cells adore fat. Despite your best efforts of ‘low calorie’ eating, body fat will not be squandered by your body at the first sign of physical exercise, it is going to hold onto it because it is highly valuable and coats all your nerves make your brain work and you a ‘fast thinker’.

Being hungry all the time, or showing signs of ‘hangry’ are signs that you are burning glucose and/or not gaining enough nutrients.  Don’t miss: Are you hungry all the time? Adding fruit and milk is the only thing that makes cereal healthy. Full fat milk will reduce the GI of your ‘healthy’ looking cereal.  Even granola needs a rethink…

The truth about granola

Whilst granola has oats with added fibre and iron,  yet the total sugar content can be extremely high.   Adding nuts, seeds and some protein helps but granola also contains added sugar with healthy-sounding names pushing it up to 29g which is the equivalent of 7 teaspoons of sugar!

Confused?  Who wouldn’t be?

The Gentle Reset

It’s taken me years (and loads of mistakes) to work out how to fit in nourishing nutrition, fulfilling exercise around my life which includes my coaching business, my Pilates obsession and 3 kids!

And now I coach busy, successful woman over 40 to do the same – via my membership community and The Gentle Reset – and I’d like to invite you to join me see what it is like find out more: read the blog The Gentle Reset

Based on the latest science from the world of nutrition, neuroscience and exercise I’ve created a coaching programme that will create habits that will keep you energised for life.

What results should you expect?

University lecturer and business owner Rachel explains “I am starving, therefore, I must be losing weight, but the scales were going the opposite way – I was confused…”​ Rachel is a busy professional, hardworking and successful who lives life at a “100 miles an hour”. She fits a lot into her day and she was looking for some help with her health that could be “easily absorbed into her day” She noticed she was getting a lot of colds, feeling lethargic, she knew it was because she wasn’t putting the right nutrition in her body. You can hear Rachel talking about how she changed her life click here

Find out more about the success stories click here

How much does it cost?

Your investment is currently £415 but this is for a limited time, the price will be increasing soon. There are big changes happening inside of my programmes and the costs of all my training will be increasing.

If you are interested in finding out more about the costs of working with a Health Coach read my blog: How much do Health Coaches charge?

BE QUICK this programme, along with all my programmes will be increasing in price very soon > Click here to find out why I am raising my prices But you’ll also discover how you can grab a place before my prices go up, but you will need to be fast.

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PS. If you have read enough and you know that this is for you, and you are ready to discover the next stage of your journey  – then click here to join my next round before the prices rise 

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References:

www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-44533752

http://www.madehow.com/Volume-3/Cereal.html