Sugar Sabotage: Easy Swaps for a Sweeter, Healthier Diet

Did you know that high-sugar diets boost your odds of tooth decay, heart diseases, and diabetes and weight gain? Even though sugar is added to some of the foods that don’t taste all that sweet, you need to consider consuming a certain amount of sugar every day. According to recommendations from the American Heart Association, women should consume no more than six teaspoons of added sugar per day (or about 100 calories). If you have been struggling to cut the amount of sugar you consume each day, try these tips!

Read Food Labels

When you take your time to read the labels of any product you want to buy, you will be surprised that even the foods you didn’t imagine have added sugar. If you look at the ingredient list of tomato sauce, crackers, condiments, and salad dressings, you will realize that they contain added sugar to make them sweet. Look at the list carefully, if sugar is at the top, that's a red flag.

Learn Sugar's Aliases

When confirming if a product has some added sugar, you don’t have to be more concise on the word ‘sugar.’ You might be consuming foods with high sugar levels if you are not aware of sugar aliases. Fructose corn syrup, dried cane syrup, invert sugar, molasses, sucrose are some of the words manufacturers use to list sugary ingredient. Be cautious and find out if several sugars appear on the label as that is an indication that the food is less healthy than you may think.