EXPOSED: Toaster Pastries, A Closer Look at our Favorite Snacks

While grocery shopping today, I decided to pick up some snacks for a gift basket that I am making for my friends 25th birthday. After seeing the ingredient list, I decided to start an expose on a list of other favorite foods. Here is the goody list in toaster pastries.

Before I get to the wonderful ingredient list, let me point out that the serving size is 1 pastry...even though they come pre-packaged with two pastries in them so you are already eating twice the serving without even realizing it. You are consuming:

400 calories
32 grams of sugar
4 g of saturated fat
360 grams of sodium

Pastry: Enriched wheat flour, palm oil, sugar, corn syrup, salt, leavening, pyridoxine hydrochloride
Filling: corn syrup, high fructose corn syrup, glycerine, modified corn starch, precooked yellow cornmeal, salt, artificial flavor
Frosting: sugar, gelatin, modified soy protein, titanium dioxide
Crunchlets: sugar, enriched wheat flour, yellow corn flour, palm oil, modified corn starch

So basically: sugar, sugar, and more sugar. Here is a breakdown of the ingredients

Modified corn starch- Modified corn starch is a food additive which is created by treating starch, causing the starch to be partially degraded. Modified corn starch can be used as a stabilizer, thickening agent, or an emulsifier. Starches may be modified to change texture of a food. 

Enriched wheat flour-WHITE FLOUR. When they finish milling the flour, there are NO vitamins,minerals, or FIBER left, they are all removed in the milling process. In order to give it some nutritional value, they then add-back some vitamins and minerals, but the result is not as nutritious as if they had simply ground the whole wheat grain into flour.

Corn syrup/high-fructose corn syrup- Corn syrup is a sweetener that is chemically similar to table sugar. However, too much added sugar can contribute unwanted calories that are linked to health problems, such as weight gain, type 2 diabetes, metabolic syndrome and high triglyceride levels. All of these boost your risk of heart disease.

Titanium Dioxide- read more here it is basically a carcinogen but has been used in cosmetics and vitamins

Pyridoxine Hydrochloride- Pyridoxine hydrochloride is important in the production of the brain chemicals serotonin and norepinephrine, according to the Mayo Clinic. Vitamin B6 is also a building block for myelin, the material that insulates nerves. HOWEVER, too much of it can lead to nausea, vomiting, and loss of brain nerves with long term use

Palm Oil- Palm oil is high in saturated fat, and it is often very close to solid at room temperature, unless it is specially treated.

Glycerine- used in soaps and lotions so what is it doing in your food?!

If you still NEED to have a carbohydrate based breakfast, why not try whole wheat waffles with a fruit cup instead?!

-Eating Clean in College