Sweetness and Lite

Supermarket shelves are groaning under the ever-expanding range of ‘lite’, low- or no-fat and sugar-free food options and not everyone is happy about the trend. In his book In Defence Of Food, journalist Michael Pollan says he avoids products that are plastered with health messages or claims that they are ‘lite’ in certain ingredients.

“It’s a whole lot easier to slap a health claim on a box of sugary cereal than on a raw potato or a carrot,” he writes, “With the perverse result that the most healthful foods in the supermarket sit there quietly in the produce section.”

He argues that fruit and veg producers don’t have the budget to spend on expensive marketing campaigns, even though their food is actually the healthiest of all. In comparison, lite/light biscuits, ice-cream, cheese, yoghurt and tinned fruit often contain extra chemicals, additives, or just more sugar, to compensate for the lack of taste resulting from removing fat.

Dietitian Joanna Macmillan-Price, author of Star Foods, says she avoids most lite foods because they contain chemical nasties or hidden ingredients. She also doubts that reduced fat or sugar products help people lose weight. “There’s little evidence that dietary fads help us to lose weight. In fact, it’s the opposite,” she says. “Studies of US diets show that the Americans eat a lot more low-fat and low-sugar foods, yet they have a higher rate of obesity.”

She adds that the ‘lite’ label often confuses consumers, because losing one ingredient from a product usually means adding more of another to compensate. “If a product claims to be lite, extra sugar and syrups are often added to retain the flavour,” she says. “If you take the fat out, you need to add guar gums and sugar to replicate that. Long-term, there’s no evidence they help us lose weight. It all adds up to the same amount of kilojoules.”
 

Consumer confusion

To add to the confusion, the definition of what can be labelled ‘lite’ is fairly flexible. “The rules are extremely loose,” says Joanna. “Consumers think that a light olive oil contains less fat, but really it’s referring to a lighter flavour (or colour).”

The problem is compounded by the fact that we tend to eat more of something if we think it’s healthier. For example, studies have found that people use more low-fat spread than they would a full-fat butter or margarine. Yet it is easy to be seduced by the promises of lite products. Research by The Bailey Group, which audits product placement in 97 per cent of Australia’s grocery stores, found that three in four shoppers choose light or fat-free products, and that the number of lite/light products on sale has doubled in the past year alone. “Yoghurt is a great example,” says Joanna. “It’s very difficult to find a normal yoghurt these days.”

Slimmers meals are another big growth area. But Joanna insists you can put together a far healthier meal for the same amount of money, and in the same amount of time it takes to cook a ready meal. “Pre-prepared meals are often very small, so you get hungry later in the evening,” she says. “They don’t taste very good, and they don’t teach you about food. It’s just as easy to cook up a quick pasta dish in ten minutes than heat up one of these meals.”

Choose wisely

Supermarket shelves are brimming with lite, or low-fat, lollies and biscuits and some do deliver on their promises without adding chemicals or other ingredients. You just need to choose wisely.

“Read the label and look for those with mostly natural ingredients,” advises Joanna. “I buy a brand of oat biscuit without lots of additives or artificial sweeteners and my kids just get one or two at a time. I buy lite milk, as I tend to drink a lot of milk. But nothing’s been added, it’s just the same as skimming the cream off the top.” Lite cream cheese is another favourite, again as nothing is added to replace the reduced fat.

The golden rule, says Joanna, is to read the label. If a lite product contains a list of unpronounceable ingredients, go for something more natural instead. “I’d definitely avoid products with more additives and artificial sweeteners. I’d rather eat the real thing in smaller quantities instead.”

And remember, a lite product is often a packaged, processed food using a clever slogan to win over consumers trying to eat healthily.

“People aren’t satisfied after eating lite foods, so they often end up eating double the amount,” she says. “They just don’t taste as good as the real thing.”