A couple of months ago I wrote about the importance of Reading the Ingredients on food labels and how the nutrition facts don’t really matter but what DOES matter is what you are actually eating…
The ingredients!
Are there preservatives?
What kind(s) of fat(s)?
Made up of tons of chemicals?
Artificial colors?
Artificial flavorings?
etc?
If you don’t read the ingredients you can be deceived in today’s food market. Industries marketing strategies are to spend the least amount of MONEY to get the most MONEY. Their labels can be misleading because they might contain a tiny bit of what you think you are buying but the rest is made artificially!
The case of the missing blueberries in blueberry muffins!
Take a look at this AWESOME Video:
Missing Blueberries Recap:
Here are just some of the misleading products that contain little or NO BLUEBERRIES:
Total Blueberry Pomegranate Cereal
Kellogg’s Blueberry Pop Tarts
Kellogg’s Frosted Mini Wheats Muffin variety
Special K Blueberry Fruit Crisps
Betty Crocker’s Fiber One Blueberry muffin mix
Target brand bagels
What these products DO contain are “blueberry bits,” “crunchlets,” or other artificial or FAKE blueberry flavors MADE UP of red #40, blue #2 and other artificial colors, sweetened with sucralose, high fructose corn syrup, fructose, sugar, along with partially-hydrogenated vegetable oils and other stuff.
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What can you do?
“Read the ingredients. If you see artificial colors on the list — and they’re usually found at the very bottom of the ingredients list — just don’t buy that product.” And I say better yet, if it says the word ARTIFICIAL then don’t get it!
Or…. if you really want Blueberry muffins, make your own! Check out these blogs for some great recipes:
Lisa at Happy in Dole Valley’s blueberry muffins and blueberry cream cheese muffins.
In Daniela’s Kitchen you can get an awesome recipe for gluten & sugar free blueberry muffins made with almond flour, a recipe I added to my list to make ASAP!
Or here for healthy blueberry protein muffins! Sounds good to me!
*Linked to: Women Living Well, Homemaking Linkup, Traditional Tuesdays, Titus 2sdays, Works for Me, Melt in your Mouth Mondays, Simple Lives Thursday
About Rachel
This is just such an awesome post!! I am so glad that you are helping people be aware of this! We just don’t buy anything much at all that comes in a box at the grocery for that very reason!!
THANKS Alicia! We don’t but many boxes either, but it also can be hard in other packaged foods like salad dressings & cereals. That’s why reading the ingredients is SO important! Thanks for stopping by!
Rachel – You are so sweet to share two of my recipes. 🙂 This week we made raspberry muffins with some wonderful organic berries we picked last Friday. It’s sad to me that our grocery stores are full of junk — much of it is not even food. No wonder we’re such a sickly nation. Loved the video; thanks for posting it! Blessings, ~Lisa
Lisa, I was glad to share your recipes!
Time for bed! It’s 11:47pm here!
Gag. This stuff always ticks me off. And to think that we are such a gullible nation because so few people want the responsibility of thinking for themselves. And look where we’ve let that take us!
Hi Rachel,
I shared my GF Zucchini Pancakes and some article I hope you enjoy!
What a good reminder to check ingredients! I love homemade blueberry muffins. 🙂
Thanks for this post! I still remember when I first woke up to the reality of labels. Most health advice says focus on the numbers on the label. Few people ever say we should learn about all those ingredients. No blueberries in blueberry muffin mix? No lemon in lemon cookies? No orange in a packet of orange water flavoring? Whose idea is all of this?
Hi Rachel – thanks for the invite to join in! I am definitely looking forward to checking out the other posts here. 🙂 What a great idea!
Isn’t it so crazy how scary our food has become. We’ve stopped buying cereal all together and make it at home along with many other things but breakfast food I think is one of the worst categories of packaged food, ingredients wise.
Thanks for your comment’s guys! We can make a difference if we don’t BUY that other stuff and help teach others (friends, family, etc.) about this info & knowledge we have!
Thanks! I am linking up this week for the first time. I appreciate you hosting.
Enjoy the rest of your week!
Blessings,
LaVonne @ Long Wait For Isabella
Thanks for inviting me to link up! We have a dozen blueberry bushes and I’m always looking for new ways to use them up so thanks for sharing the recipes!
Great post! I get so tired of all of the artificial, fake hullabaloo in boxed goods. There is nothing quite as yummy as a real blueberry muffin.
Great post! This kind of stuff makes me angry. It makes me angry for all the people that don’t have access to fresh food. It makes me angry for the people that don’t realize they need to read the ingredients to ensure their are actually blueberries in their blueberry muffins. It make me angry that what we think food should look like has been so tainted by artificial colors. Grr.
My ten year old altered a recipe to make banana-blueberry muffins today. Everything was real, and it tasted so good.
Those fake-berry foods disgust me.
Thanks for a great post and the link-up. Hope I’m not too late to join!
Heidi, I’m so glad you joined!
What a crazy video! I had no idea…
I was just thinking yesterday how “fake” the blueberry muffins I grew up on were!
I read that many artificial food additives are banned in Europe, but are still legal in the U.S.
Are artificial blueberries banned in Britain? What about in Canada?