How to Read Food Labels Without Getting Tricked by Marketing

The front of the package is marketing. The truth is on the back, in the nutrition label and ingredient list. Always check the serving size first — companies often shrink it to make the numbers look better. A bag of chips that says "150 calories" might be per half-bag, meaning you ate 300.

Read the ingredient list from top to bottom — ingredients are listed by weight, so the first three tell you what the food really is. If sugar (or its aliases: high fructose corn syrup, dextrose, maltose, sucrose) appears in the first five ingredients, the product is essentially a sugar delivery system no matter what the label says. Words like "natural," "wholesome," and "lightly sweetened" have no legal meaning. Only the numbers and the ingredient list are reliable.