The Toronto Star presents an incomplete picture of child-oriented cereal

More critique of the Toronto Star is on the way.

Today, they present a story about how the least nutritious breakfast cereals and those containing the most sugar and sodium, and the least fibre, are the ones most likely to be marketed to children.

First of all, this is not news. Who would think otherwise?

But, beyond the obvious, I struggle to find meaning in the story: I struggle to find out what they mean by "nutritious". Although they present a table of the "Top 10 Least Nutritious" showing the percentage of sugar in the cereal, and comments in the text about high sodium and low fibre content, as far as I know, sugar, sodium, and fibre are not actually nutrients. So what do they mean?

Most cereals are artificially fortified with nutrients -- iron, B-vitamins, and others. Nothing about this is mentioned.

And, if it was mentioned, I would still be concerned. Because if you cross-reference with other information, such as this article in The Economist, you see that added nutrients are not necessarily benign at worst.

In the above article, they contrast the government requirement that folic acid be added to grains and cereals with the finding that the liver is only able to convert a set amount of folic acid into folate in a single day. Beyond a certain threshold, apparently, folic acid circulates in the blood unmetabolized and this may exacerbate certain types of cancers. Folic acid is unconditionally added to refined grains and cereals because the natural nutrition in the germ and bran is stripped from them in order to improve malleability and increase shelf life, and folic acid is important for the healthy development of a fetus. Since women don't know when they will become pregnant, it is added across the board for insurance with the assumption that it wouldn't negatively affect those that don't need it. This may be a false assumption.

It also says that a single serving of some breakfast cereals may have twice the amount of folic acid that can be metabolized in a day. Contrast with the Star story, which says that many children eat two servings and not one, and you have the makings of a question unanswered.

When you consider the general principle that the body may be able to process nutrients only within limits, what else might this apply to? Is this why variety in our diet is important? From my own experience, I know that I can't completely metabolize the caffeine content of a cup of coffee in one day. If I drink one cup of coffee daily for a week, there is an accumulation that leads to a strangely wired feeling by day 4 and I have to have a break. It's as if there are some cycles in the body that take more than 24 hours to complete.

Another reason to avoid white flour? Whole wheat flour, having its parts intact, is usually not fortified. Although I have seen whole wheat pasta that does have artificial nutrition added to it.

The top cereal in the Star story is "Kashi Puffs - 7 Whole Grain Puffs". But how do puffed grains come to be? By extrusion -- by heating under pressure at very high temperatures, which probably destroys much of the natural nutrition and may cause some components to be mildly toxic. There is certainly a debate to be had and it seems as if the quality of the extrusion process is important, but I have no idea of the quality of each manufacturer's process or the effect of extrusion on the particular ingredients used in different cereals -- heat affects different ingredients differently.

My conclusion? Pretty much all boxed cereals may be bad for you, and you are better off eating the box (I don't post this in complete seriousness -- but it is interesting). And artificial vitamins might be bad for you, too. How about dry, rolled muesli instead? That's what I've settled on for cereal at the moment.

So, Toronto Star, you have let me down once again. And if I were to read only your paper, I would act in this world as if lobotomized.

[ note: a site accompanying the report that the Star story is based on can be found here. The full report is available here. ]