Appendix C: Label reading

Look for the nutrition information panel on the product to help you decide whether a product is suitable.

Ingredients Wheat flour, meat (minimum 25%), water, animal and vegetable fat, onion powder, hydrolysed vegetable protein, egg, thickener (410), sugar, mineral salt (450), salt, colour (150a), herbs, preservative (223)

Tips to understand the nutrition information panel

Use the 100 gram column to compare between products.
Look at fat (including type of fat), sugar and salt and choose those products with the least amount of these.
Look at dietary fibre and choose those with the most amount.
If a product contains fat, choose the one with the least amount of saturated fat compared to polyunsaturated or mono-unsaturated.
Use the serving size to get an idea of the amount to eat or use.

Tips to understand the ingredients list

Ingredients are listed from most to least in quantity.
Characterising ingredient – the percentage of the main food ingredient in that product e.g. a meat pie must state the percentage of meat; jam must state the percentage of fruit.
Fat, sugar and salt can be disguised as:

Fat (*high in saturated fat)	Sugar	Salt
beef fat*	raw sugar, brown sugar, corn syrup	sodium, sodium bicarbonate
coconut, coconut oil	golden syrup, maple syrup, honey	booster, stock cubes
copha, dripping, lard*	sucrose, dextrose	celery salt, garlic salt, onion salt
cream, sour cream, mayonnaise*	disaccharides, mono-saccharides	monosodium glutamate, (MSG)
nuts	fructose, glucose, lactose	meat / yeast extract
oven fried / baked, toasted*	malt, maltose	baking powder, rock salt, sea salt
palm oil, oil, vegetable oil	mannitol, sorbitol, molasses	sodium metabisulphate

Ingredients in disguise

The Australian Dietary Guidelines and the Dietary Guidelines for Children and Adolescents recommend that we eat less fat and sugar and that we eat more dietary fibre. All these substances can appear on food labels ‘in disguise’.

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