Food Villains #27: Lunchables

We've all seen these at the supermarket: little packages of a "complete lunch" for your kids. It comes with lunch meats, something resembling sliced cheese, and even a little dessert. But do you have any idea what's in the packages? Just looking at the nutritional value, you'll see there's far more in the Lunchables than you'd expect. Each package comes with:

• 28 grams of sugar (thank you weirdly-flavored dessert!)
• 890 milligrams of sodium (more than 1/3 of your daily recommended dose of sodium)
• 22 grams of fat
• 500 calories

If your kid takes this lunch to school and then eats three square meals at home, you're definitely overfeeding the child! [caption id="" align="aligncenter" width="640"] Source: tarirose.com[/caption] Plus, have you ever read the list of ingredients on the back of a Lunchables package? You probably won't be able to pronounce half of them, with names like:

• SODIUM CITRATE
• OLEORESIN PAPRIKA (COLOR)
• ANNATTO (COLOR)
• PARTIALLY HYDROGENATED COTTONSEED OIL
• SOY LECITHIN

A lot of these ingredients are added to make the food "edible" or preserve it, and most of them are either bad or terrible for your child's health. My choice: Brown bag it with homemade turkey ham and cheese sandwiches, with a slice of fruit as dessert.  

 Featured Image Source: www.newimagecamp.com

Resources: http://eatthis.menshealth.com/slideshow/30-worst-foods-america, http://blog.fooducate.com/2009/05/14/inside-the-label-oscar-meyers-lunchables-turkey-cheddar-cracker-stackers/