Brilliant post from The daily Green.

Here’s an excerpt:

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Made With Real Fruit

Hey wow! That candy has real fruit in it. It must be good for my kid.

The marketing around “real fruit” is so egregious that, for many shoppers, it doesn’t pass the sniff test. But we all get weak-kneed when faced with something potentially yummy, so let’s take a look at some of those misleading marketing techniques.

Case-in-point: Gerber Fruit Juice Treats for Preschoolers. Its package blooming with pictures of ripe oranges, raspberries, cherries, peaches, grapes and pineapple, its only fruit-like ingredient is fruit juice concentrate, which the Dietary Guidelines for Americans considers just another form of sugar. Not surprisingly, the primary ingredients are also sugar and … well, sugar (corn syrup). It’s candy. Similarly, Betty Crocker “Strawberry Splash Fruit Gushers” say they’re made with real fruit, but the only thing approximating fruit is pear concentrate (sugar) with Red No. 40 for “strawberry” color. Overall, the gushers are half sugar (a.k.a., candy).

Bottom line: If you want real fruit, buy real fruit. If you want candy, buy candy.

(And watch out for the same tricky marketing used on supposedly vegetable-rich products like Knorr “Pasta Sides” Chicken Broccoli fettuccini. As the CSPI points out, there’s more salt than broccoli in this pasta dish. Of course, it isn’t called Chicken Salt fettuccini … because presumably no one would buy it.)”

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