Q. I find the information on packaged food hard to understand. What is an acceptable level of sugar per 100 grams?

A. What are acceptable and desirable levels in an individual food will vary depending upon the type of food (compare sugar at 100% sugars to milk with only 4% sugars), how big the portion is that you eat, and your own dietary goals. For example, are you trying to lose weight? How physically active are you? How old are you?

Here’s my general rule-of-thumb for you to use:

Look for products with 15 grams sugars per 100 grams (equal to 15 per cent) or less

Remember that the label doesn’t distinguish between natural sugars from fruit or milk and added cane sugar. It's all lumped in together under the plural term 'sugars' on the label.

It's not the fault of the label - it's just that it's expensive and time-consuming to analyse each and every product for its individual sugar content.

Many products (like muesli bars or blueberry muffins or cereal with apple and cranberry) contain more sugars - around 20 to 25 g sugars per 100 g due to the sugar from the fruit.  So somewhere either under 15 or under 25 per cent is about right, depending on the food category.  When shopping, compare two brands side by side and choose one that is the lowest in sugars.

Examples - here’s how the sugar content ranges

    (in descending order)  

Foods with only added sugar (all in grams per 100 grams):

Foods with a mix of added and natural sugars (all in grams per 100 grams):