Marshmallows in Your Cereal
Quite a long time ago, I heard a program on the radio about “putting the sugar bowl back on the table”. The speaker was describing various aspects of our daily eating habits that have contributed to childhood obesity. One of his major exampleswas that cereals now contain so much sugar, that we should be buying “plain” cereals and allowing our children to spoon on sugar from the sugar bowl. To paraphrase, “They’ll never put as much sugar in their bowl as is contained in most cereals when you buy them.”
This fact is what prompted me to change my habits when purchasing cereal. I now look for a 4 to 1 ratio when comparing total carbohydrates to the amount of sugar. (The ratio helps eliminate the variable of weight of a cereal since nutrition information is presented in volume.)
I also allow my children to put either a spoonful of sugar, or a few really tiny marshmallows on their cereal if it is really low in sugar to begin with. It takes a bit of time at first because their aren’t a lot of cereals geared toward kids that aren’t filled with sugar. However, once the change has been made, it is easy to spot which cereals fit the requirements and which are to be avoided.
Honestly, I though my children would rebel at the change, but they loved being able to put on their own sugar or, even better, adding marshmallows to their cereal.
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Written by Laura on July 27, 2011
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