Top 10 Health Foods That Are Not Healthy

Food manufacturing companies are trying to cash in on the health movement of the past 30 years. While this can be a good thing, remember that their goal is to sell as much product as possible for as cheap. Because of this, they do not always have the consumer’s best interest at heart. They get away with this by labeling items as healthy, low fat, low sugar, etc. when in fact, they are just selling healthy foods that are not healthy. The key is to do your research to find out what is healthy. Let’s discuss the top 10 health foods that are not healthy.

Low-fat Salad Dressing

When discussing low-fat salad dressing, you want to look at the ingredients. More times than not, low fat means high sugar. Stick to olive oil and vinegar-based dressing to maximize the health benefits of eating salad.

Gluten-Free Cereal

I was walking down the cereal aisle the other day and saw that Cocoa Pebbles has a banner on the box that says Gluten Free. So it must be healthy, right?!

Wrong!

Most gluten-free cereals are just replacing the wheat flour with another type of processed starchy flour (corn or rice). While this may be helpful to those suffering from Celiac disease, it is still a highly processed, sugary mess for most.

Stick to something similar to a Kashi Gluten-free cereal with low sugar or some type of Muesli.

Remember that the less processed, the better.

Fruit Juice

While there are some health benefits to an occasional fruit and vegetable juice fast, processed fruit juice bought in the store is not the best choice.

Juicing removed a lot of the fiber and nutrients from the juice, which helps keep insulin levels stable. Eat the entire fruit instead of just juice for maximum health benefits.

Veggies Chips

These are becoming very popular with consumers. Our work recently started a snack bar, and these popped up. I looked at the ingredients: potato chips with a sprinkle of veggie flour.

If you want something crunchy, carrot sticks and hummus is awesome!

Soy Milk

While soy milk is very high in protein, it can affect estrogen levels in both men and women.

For you vegans, we recommend sticking to unsweetened almond milk. We love using almond milk for our smoothies!

Protein Bars

While some protein bars can be good when you are in a pinch for time, most protein bars are highly processed, contain high amounts of chemicals, and generally do not have the best sources of protein, carbs, and fats.

Even the bars touted as being low carb have a ton of sugar alcohols.

If you have eaten a lot of sugar-free candy, you know there can be a laxative effect by eating too much sugar alcohol. There is a reason why you have digestive issues. Your body doesn’t want it in there!

If you do want a protein bar, we recommend our 4 ingredient homemade protein bars consisting of:

• 2 cups Gluten Free Quick Cooking Oats
• 1/2 cup Natural Peanut Butter (no sugar or added oils)
• 4 scoops Natural Chocolate Protein Powder (Sweetened with Stevia)
• 1/2 cup of Water or Unsweetened Almond Milk

• Line 8”x8” glass baking dish with parchment or wax paper
• Flatten mixture onto glass baking dish
• Mix everything into a bowl by hand
• Freeze for 30 minutes. Cut into 6-8 bars. Refrigerate.

Fruit and Yogurt Parfaits

You can find these are fast food restaurants (golden arches, I’m looking at you) and also at grocery stores. These taste really good and for good reason. They are full of pureed fruits and sweetened yogurt. This is one of the worst health foods that are not really healthy.

We recommend making your parfait with frozen fruit, non-fat Greek Yogurt, and healthy granola like Bear Naked All Natural Whole Grain Granola

Healthy salads

When you go out to eat and decide you want to be healthy, you feel good about yourself for making a great choice and ordering a salad.

While that intention is all well and good, take a look at what’s actually in that salad.

We went out to Chili’s last week, and I noticed one of the salad options. It is called the Quesadilla Explosion Salad. This thing clocks in at 96g of fat, 17g of sugar, and 1430 calories!

More like Calorie Explosion!

Instead, opt for the soup and salad lunch.

My wife did this and had the southwest chicken soup (230 calories) and the house salad with no croutons and ranch dressing.

The total Calories for that lunch is 407. Honestly, it was a very satisfying lunch (I snuck in a bite )

Diet Soda

Diet Coke and Pepsi Free came out in the 1980s diet craze to cash in on consumers. While these sodas have 0 calories, the body does not know how to process the artificial sugars.

So what happens is they get stored as fat.

This is less than ideal.

While we don’t encourage drinking soda all of the time, an occasional soda is okay.

When we get Mexican food, we drink the Coca-Cola made in Mexico. It is made with real cane sugar(no high fructose corn syrup) and just tastes better.

You may not be able to get it depending on where you live.

If you do want something fizzy and with some flavor, we recommend looking at either the Bubbly or La Croix brand sparkling water.

Rice Cakes

Like Diet soda, Rice cakes also became popular in the 1980s health movement. The problem with rice cakes is that they cause a strong insulin response (which is bad for weight loss).

Even worse, many rice cakes are covered in fat and sugar.

Bodybuilders use rice cakes to spike their insulin before a contest. Great for them, but not so much for the average person.

If you want something crunchy and healthy to snack on instead of rice cake, celery sticks with a small amount of natural peanut butter are a great alternative. Just make sure to use a PB with no added sugars or oils.