Dessert For Breakfast?

I find a lot of misleading nutrition related articles on yahoo often, but sometimes they have some worth reading. This morning I read an article about cereal, specifically cereal marketed to children. Luckily, WIC has a large variety of cereals to choose from if you are on the program, all which are healthy and made of whole grains. But for the rest of America, it's open season. Unfortunately, most of the cereals marketed directly to children are packed with sugar and void of any nutritional value. The company's suck them in with fun commercials and toys and silly cartoon characters. I find it really sad that companys are brain washing our little ones and helping to set them up for a lifetime of unhealthy food choices.

The article on Yahoo, New Report Slams Kids' Cereals, discusses a new report done by the Environmental Working Group (EWG) about the sugar content in children's cereal. It lists the top 10 worst children's cereals based on sugar by weight.

At the top of the list is: Kellogg's Honey Smacks with a whopping (55.6% sugar) You may as well give your child a Twinkie for breakfast!

The report states, "more than half of the 84 brands tested contained at least 12 grams of sugar, or the equivalent of three teaspoons, per serving. That's more sugar than three Chips Ahoy! cookies"

They go on to say, "only one out of four cereals tested met the federal government's proposed guidelines for food nutritious enough to be marketed to children. These guidelines were established to combat the childhood obesity epidemic.

If you're going to eat cereal, stick with those that have a first ingredient of whole grains and no added sugar.

To check out the rest of the cereals on this list, as well as their top 10 cereals that DO meet the nutrition guidelines, click the article link at the top.

Quotes and picture taken from the referenced Yahoo article.