Why It’s Important To Check The Ingredients In Your Food

yogurt-bowl

These days I find myself checking ingredients a lot more than I used to. I was on a mission in the supermarket, like I usually am when I need food, and made my way to the last aisle in search of milk,  cheese and yogurt. The “normal” size of yogurt is too big for me to eat in one sitting,  I’m not that big of a yogurt fan,  so I was checking out some kid sized yogurts.

Now some of you might be asking yourselves, why don’t I just buy a large container of yogurt and scoop some into a small cup? My answer, longevity.  I just can’t seem to keep the large tub from going bad. Smaller containers work best for me.

I stayed at a Hampton Inn hotel once and part of the breakfast buffet was a small sized Yoplait yogurt.  The perfect size that I can’t seem to find in any of the markets by me. (sigh)

So as I was perusing the kids sized yogurts, one “natural” yogurt caught my eye.  The container was the perfect size. The yogurt was strawberry flavored and I expected a natural yogurt to include strawberries in its list of ingredients. Wouldn’t you?  To my surprise,  strawberries were no where to be found on the list.  Instead, it had natural flavors. I’ve read up on natural flavors and as far as I could interpret the info,  almost any type of preservative can be added to that natural flavor and it can still fall under the umbrella of “natural flavors.”

So I passed on that brand. Things like that have made me much more skeptical about reading ingredients and to be much more mindful about what I’m eating.

So did I find a yogurt that day? Yes I did. I came across an organic yogurt.  All the ingredients appeared ok and the sugar content was low,  12 g.  I prefer the blueberry.

Mission accomplished.