Sneaky names for sugar

Have you ever wondered how much sugar you were actually eating without even realizing it?

The food industry would prefer that you don't wonder, but if you did they also want to make sure that the amount of sugar in their products isn't that obvious to the average consumer.

So what do they do?

Instead of listing sugar on the list of ingredients they have come up with some sneaky ways of letting it slide by your radar. Check out the list of all these names on food labels that actually mean sugar:

• agave nectar
• beet sugar
• brown sugar
• cane crystals
• cane juice
• coconut sugar
• corn syrup
• crystalline fructose
• dextrose
• disaccharide
• erythritol
• evaporated cane juice
• fructose
• fruit juice concentrates
• galactose
• glucose
• high fructose corn syrup
• honey
• invert sugar
• lactose
• maltose
• malt syrup
• molasses
• monosaccharide
• polysaccharide
• raw sugar
• rice syrup
• sucrose
• syrup

That is quite a list! Start to notice how often one, or more, of these words show up on the food labels you eat on a regular basis. You might be surprised.

Now I would love to hear from you! What is one food item that surprised you with how much sugar it had in it? Leave a comment below and I'll be back next week with another edition of Doctor as Teacher Tuesday!