Frosted Mini-Wheats

Frosted mini wheats have always been one of my favorite cereals, plus they are one of the healthiest with the iron and fiber they provide.  I was looking through the ingrediatents today and noticed that it is listed as having high fructose corn syrup.  I know that HFCS is the main reason soda is so bad for you.  Should I be hesitant about eating my mini wheats every morning because of this?  Or is a small amount of HFCS ok if its in a healthy food that isn't empty calories like soda?

Anyone know?

Do you know why people say HFCS is bad? 

I can't say I do.  Perhaps you can explain and help me answer the original question I had?  I would really appreciate it, seeing as I eat this cereal every day.

I don't think there's anything inherently wrong with it, but it is a processed sugar made from cornstarch using enzymes.  Fructose doesn't supress appetite the way some other sugars do, so it may make you hungrier faster.  You get a similar effect eating other high fructose natural sugars like honey or fruit juice.  Moderation is the key - watch the portion sizes - my experience with frosted mini wheats is that it's easy to overeat them.  Add fruit, but don't add any extra sugar.

Info from the Mayo Clinic.

The short of it:  It's best to stay away from it, but a little bit won't harm you, so enjoy the mini-wheats.

As a side note, if you're looking for high levels of iron and fiber in a cereal, there are ones out there with higher levels and no HFCS.  But the mini-wheats are still good.

"Do you know why people say HFCS is bad? "

Haha... I think most of the people who say "aaahhh HFCS!!!" wouldn't even be able to tell you why. All the things I personally try to avoid (HFCS is not one of them), I have a legitimate explanation for.

Original Post by moscovite82:

"Do you know why people say HFCS is bad? "

Haha... I think most of the people who say "aaahhh HFCS!!!" wouldn't even be able to tell you why. All the things I personally try to avoid (HFCS is not one of them), I have a legitimate explanation for.

 Sorry.  Not everyone is a nutritionalist, or tries to be.  I don't know the science behind why certain things are good and other bad.  I just go by the most reliable information I can get, and I think I do well enough that way.

I used to eat Frosted Mini Wheats all the time, until I had to cut my triglycerides which respond to sugars per serving (<8 gm), and cardio exercise. Its to high in sugars for me. Could be the HFCS

Oh I love them!  I'm sad I read this post and lost my ignorance :(

That's exactly why I was asking, dakatz.  There is a lot of hype spread around this site, and a lot of it is spread by people who don't even know why they believe it, they only believe it because someone else believes it, but if you were to ask them why they couldn't tell you.

I try to encourage people to do their own research so that they know why they believe what they do. 

Now, i'm not pro- or anti- HFCS, but I do believe if you did a little research on HFCS you could probably answer this question for yourself and take charge of your own health and body.

It's really easy to find these type of answers also.  Google searches are remarkably easy once you know how to use search engines.  Just type in the words that are important like "High Fructose Corn Syrup research health study" and you'll get back a lot of information.  You can even include words like "bad" or "good" to find specific reports tailored to that type of information.  Try to look for medical sites and reports and stay away from biased websites.  An example of a biased website would be, if you're searching the health benefits of meat and you found a report on a vegetarian website.  Well, that's likely to have a bias. 

Take charge and be smart!  Don't just follow the crowd :)

Thanks for the help.

High Fructose Corn Syrup is in EVERYTHING. It is in Wheat Thins, Fiber one bars, Candy bars, Soda pop, literally almost everything bought in a package has HFCS.

 

YOU HAVE TO TRY FROSTED MINI WHEATS BLUEBERRY MUFFIN!!!! THEY ARE REALLY GOOD AND BRAND NEW!!!  mmmmmmm......

OOOOH, yes - the blueberry muffins ones are very good.

Yes, there might be better stuff out there with less sugar, but a person doesn't have to eat twigs all the time to be healthy, ya know?

mmm i wish they sold mini wheats in smaller packets instead of boxes.

They look soo good and id love to try them.

however i am a known sugary cereal binger.... i can eat the whole box in one sitting all too easy :( so i can't buy it... sigh

someone should mail me some to try :D

If you're wary of HFCS, Kashi has mini-wheats that are delicious. Not frosted, but sweet.

I never really knew why HFCS was so bad for you...but has anyone seen those commercials where they say it's not as awful as it's hyped up to be (like the one where a guy and his girlfriend are having a picnic and he doesn't want to eat the popsicle until she convinces him that it's okay?)

Original Post by mars_0112:

If you're wary of HFCS, Kashi has mini-wheats that are delicious. Not frosted, but sweet.

 They also have a new one out Island Vanilla Wheats its awesome!!

Try Kashi Harves Cinnamon wheat cereal.  It has a great sweet taste but is all natural.  It has an A rating on this website.

I was shopping last night for cereal. I was going to try the new Kashi Cereals, but, they averaged 15 grams of sugar. I started doing the math. 150 calories a serving, 1 cup serving, 15 grams of sugar is 3 3/4 of a teaspoon. 56 of the calories are sugar. Some were even worse. A new quaker "natural" cereal had 15 grams of sugar in a 1/2 cup serving. Only 110 calories but "half" of those were sugar. You would be starving and hitting a major sugar crash 30 minutes after breakfast. That means technically you only had 54 calories of the grains and carbs that could be keeping you full and satisfied for a few hours instead of binging on more sugar. I really think the big problem with HFCS is that it helps hide the actual amount of sugar you are eating. If the company uses sugar, honey, and HFCS, then they can list the whole grains first in the ingredient list, but the cereal is still mostly sugar. I ended up buying Total, adding blueberries and milk to the 5 grams of sugar already in the cereal brought my sugar total to 20 grams, almost half of my daily target for sugar. The Uncle Sam's cereal has 0 grams of sugar, adding fruit and an equal packet its not bad, but I've been eating it for 3 weeks now, i needed a break.