| Reading Between The Labels |
Fibre
Fibre is one of the most important things to look for on the label. Fibre is found in fruit and veg and we know many children are not fond of these foods. It's also found in wholegrains and cereals.
4 in five of us are not getting enough cereals! It is important to help prevent constipation and more serious bowel disorders. Low fibre diets have been linked to a number of different disorders such as IBS, diverticulitis and bowel cancer.
We are recommended to eat approx 3 servings of wholegrain per day so a wholegrain breakfast cereal can contribute to our overall nutrition as wholegrains contain a combination of protein, fibre, vitamins, minerals and antioxidants for a healthy body and heart.
The GDA for fibre is 24g per day, and in a recent children's survey 61% of Irish children aged 5-12 were found to have inadequate fibre in their diet.
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Energy
Everyone needs a certain amount of calories to function, at school to perform and concentrate, play sports and not tire easily. If we eat too many calories we don't need, we simply store those extra calories as body fat.
Energy is measured by kilocalories, we just call them calories. They are presented as "kcal" on a label.
Children between 5-10 years need approx 1800 calories. When children are having three meals and 2 snacks a day then a breakfast of 300 or 400 calories is a good start to their day. Something quick like a wholegrain cereal, juice, egg and toast is brilliant but if all that you can get into them is a cereal with chopped banana. Make It Count Nutritionally!
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Salt
Cereals contain quite a lot of salt in some cases and the industry has been discussing how to take out the salt and keep the flavour.
The GDA for children between 5-10years is 4g and you can get up to an eight of that in many small bowls of breakfast cereal. A large bowl of cereal or two small bowls can contain ¼ of the child's needs.
**Too much salt is associated with high blood pressure and risk of stroke.
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Sugar
Some sugar is naturally found in dried fruit, and, is fine as part of a cereal. It's the added sugar or the frosted and chocolate covered versions that are the ones to limit. These contain little fibre generally and are really just encouraging a sweet tooth from the start of the day.
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Looking at cereal boxes you can see how much sugar and the kind of sugar in a serving of cereal.
Read the GDA panel on the front of the pack (you can see how much sugar is in a portion) and then look at the ingredients list on the side to see if the sugar is listed as added sugar. If you can't see the word sugar in the ingredients list perhaps it's coming from dried fruit or honey.
If there is no GDA panel, read the nutrition table or box which will say carbohydrates of which sugars and find the value. Sugars are only one type of carbohydrate and possibly the one that most patients want to avoid. Again check the ingredients list to give you a clue as to whether the manufacturer has added sugar to make it taste good or if it's coming from something in the cereal that's naturally sweet.
The guideline daily amount of sugar for Children aged 5-10years is 85g so a breakfast cereal that contains 6-8g is pretty good and can contribute significantly to fibre, vitamin and mineral requirements.
If you see a claim "low sugar", the new EU definition for that will be 5g sugar per 100g so very few cereals will be able to say that - Ready Brek contains 1.8g sugar per 100g (0.5g in a serving) but cheerios contain 21.6g sugar per 100g (6.5g in a serving). Taste is a big factor with children and some sugar in a cereal like wholegrain Cheerios (which is largely wholegrain and is fortified with vitamins and minerals) is better than a bit of white bread toasted with jam.
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| Are cereals better if they are fortified with vitamins? |
| Generally speaking I would encourage the less processed breakfast cereals like wholegrains, porridge and muesli where you can see the rolled oats and identify the seeds and dried fruit. In more processed breakfast cereal they lose some nutrients and the fortified ones are best in that case. Most cereals contain between 17 and 25% of common nutrients. These synthetic forms of vitamins and minerals seem to be more easily absorbed by the body. This can be a good thing and a bad thing. The small amounts added are to protect consumers who may consume a lot of a particular type of food. |
Porridge (or ready brek) is great. It's made with oats which can help to lower cholesterol. This starts to build up on the insides of blood vessels even in children as young as 7 years old.
Try and encourage oats for breakfast rather than wheat as we get wheat in so many other foods such as bread, pasta, crackers, biscuits, cakes etc.
Oat based muesli is fantastic and this is something you can make yourself to your own liking. You can have real fun at home with children making your own muesli or granola. They are also more likely to eat it when they're made it too.
Fibre is definitely important so I would encourage the branflakes over the cornflakes, despite their sugar content. They are very well fortified with iron, and iron deficiency is a big problem for many children and teenagers in Ireland. In fact the recent teenage national IUNA survey found that 74% of Irish girls and 19% of boys are not getting enough iron. A bowl of branflakes makes a significant contribution to iron and fibre intakes, especially for vegetarians.
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