Neither 'light', nor 'without sugar', nor 0%: this is the great deception of diet nougats

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When one goes to the supermarket shelf for Christmas sweets, in addition to

that coexist with the most traditional ones, it is easy to find

or

in recent years. .

But

are they healthier?

I invite you to continue reading while your mouth waters thinking about these Christmas delights.

What ingredients do you usually have?

are the nougat?

Basically, almonds and sugar or honey.

That is if we analyze the traditional varieties, but if we go to the newest ones we will find that almonds are replaced by other nuts such as hazelnuts, walnuts or peanuts and sugar is accompanied by ingredients such as cocoa butter, milk or cream.

What audience are they intended for?

Its recipients are generally

.

But they are also aimed at people with pathologies such as

They must have control over the sugars they eat.

The problem is that they hardly provide any advantages over the original options.

The "no added sugar" trick

It is impossible for a nougat to have a zero amount of sugar.

His recipe is based on nuts such as almonds, walnuts or peanuts, whole or ground, and therefore zero quantity is not possible.

Manufacturers often choose to put on the packaging that they do not contain added sugars, something that

, but they have not been added in an extra way to those already present in the nuts themselves.

And if it says "no sugar"?

He is lying.

For a processed product to be truly "sugar free" it cannot contain more than half a gram of sugar per hundred grams.

, a figure that drops to 2.6 grams per hundred in the case of walnuts but in no case does it reach less than half a gram.

And if it has sweeteners?

In the case of nougats that are sold as

It is what they usually incorporate to give them a sweet flavor.

It is usually about

.

But this does not mean that it is free of kilocalories either, because if 1 gram of sugar provides 4 kilocalories, 1 gram of maltitol provides almost 3. The difference is very little.

Does a diet nougat have fewer calories than a normal one?

Barely.

If we take two nougat tablets of the same flavor from the supermarket shelf, but one is conventional and the other says "no added sugar" we will be surprised that, on average,

between one and the other per hundred grams.

It can happen

, and it is not uncommon for this type of nougat to add more percentage of butter to improve its flavor.

Is it better to buy conventional nougat than "light"?

Yes,

clearly, and it is

If we consume a diet nougat we will tend to think that we can eat more of it for that very reason, because it is diet, and we are not going to cut ourselves.

If, on the contrary, the nougat is conventional, most likely

.

And in the case of people with diabetes?

If a person with diabetes wants to eat conventional nougat, they can do so, but always

.

fall into buying

, thinking that this way he will be able to eat it without limitations,

that each year ends with a

Christmas Day.

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