Eating Well: Is There Hidden Sugar in Your Child's Diet?

We all try to do the right thing. Time and again, I will ask people, "which is healthier, an apple or a Snickers bar?" There isn't much confusion. As tempting as the Snickers bar might be, we all know that the apple is the healthier choice. The problem is that we are offered so many choices throughout the day that, if we're not careful, we can be making bad choices without even knowing it.

Take, for example, heading off into a restaurant. There are certain words that we recognize as healthy: salad, smoothie, grilled etc. We hear those words and immediately think, "ah, that's a healthy choice." And we try to teach our kids to recognize the same words as being preferable food choices.

So what happens when it turns out that one of those "healthy" buzz words is actually packing more sugar than you know what to do with? All of the sudden, a healthy snack could turn into two or three days worth of dessert.

Diets that are high in sugar can lead to weight gain and various weigh-related diseases like diabetes, high blood pressure and heart disease. The American Heart Association suggests women should probably keep their sugar intake to 25 grams per day; men to 37.5 grams per day; and children to roughly 6 grams per day.

So Michael and Elle decided to have a look at a very popular smoothie to see how much sugar is in each serving. As Elle mentions, smoothies are drinks with fruit and vegetables -- sounds healthy, right? But have a look and see just how much sugar can be found in these smoothies... and before you watch, take a little guess, knowing what you now know about recommended daily intake.

For more healthy ideas, join the Fitness Guru community on Facebook. And if you have any questions about family health and fitness, shoot me an email at Michael@fitnessgurunyc.com and Elle and I will try to answer it in an upcoming video.

Rock on!!