Cranberry sauce and salad dressing rank as the biggest sugar culprits, according to Label Insight, which analyzed its product and ingredient database to find how much sugar a typical Thanksgiving dinner plate would contain. Findings showed that people consume about 30 grams of sugar when they have a single serving of salad dressing, gravy, stuffing, cranberry sauce, dinner roll and turkey – well before dessert. To put that into context, the American Heart Association recommends a limit of 24 grams for women and 36 grams for men per day.
Label Insight identified the top 5 culprits for hidden, added sugar at the Thanksgiving table.
#1 Cranberry Sauce — Every cranberry sauce product in the Label Insight database includes added sugar and on average contains 21 grams of sugar.
#2 Salad Dressings — Of the more than 4,200 salad dressings in the Label Insight database, 91% contain added sugar. For a two-tablespoon serving size, there can be as much as 24 grams of sugar. Women can reach a full day’s recommended amount of sugar in just one serving of salad dressing.
#3 Dinner Rolls — There are 542 dinner roll products in the Label Insight database and 89% contain added sugar. On average, dinner roll products contain over 2.5 grams of sugar per serving. Hawaiian rolls average twice that amount.
#4 Stuffing and Stuffing Mix — There are 689 stuffing products in the Label Insight database and 96% contain added sugar. On average, stuffing products contain about 2.5 grams of sugar per serving.
#5 Gravy and Gravy Mix — There are nearly 700 gravy products in the Label Insight database and 91 percent contain added sugar. On average, gravy products contain 1 gram of sugar per serving.
SOURCE: Cathy Summers, Summers PR, cathy@summers-pr.com, 415-483-0840