Juicy Juice | The Role of Juice in a Healthy Diet

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The Role of Juice in a Healthy Diet

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A recent article from the medical journal Pediatrics found that preschoolers who drank at least one serving of soda, fruit juice or other sweet beverages every day were more likely to become overweight if they were already overweight or at risk for being overweight.

It appears that for children who are overweight or at risk for being overweight, moderating sweetened beverage consumption and of course, watching their diet and exercise, is important. However, this study did group all sweetened drinks together, which may not be a fair comparison. There is a difference between beverages. Juice that is 100% juice can be a healthy part of your child's diet and can serve as one fruit serving, according to the USDA Food Guidelines. The new Food Guide Pyramid at Mypyramid.gov recommends 100% fruit juice as a way to add a fruit option to a child's diet. Read nutrition labels, and look for 100% juice, such as NESTLÉ JUICY JUICE. Avoid beverages with words like "ade," "beverage," "cocktail" or "drink" in the name. These words indicate that a product is not 100% juice. For example, many "fruit juice drinks" contain only 10% fruit juice and contain added sugars, artificial sweeteners, preservatives and artificial flavors.

Parents should follow the American Academy of Pediatrics policy guidelines for juice consumption, which states that fruit juice should be limited to 4 to 6 ounces a day for children 1 to 6 years old and 8 to 12 ounces a day for children 7 to 18 years old. The guidelines also differentiate between 100% fruit juice as opposed to fruit drinks, favoring the use of 100% fruit juice.

Posted on: 2/9/2011 3:28 PM

Posted by: Whitney H

City: Aurora

I am a Juicy Bunch Member and I couldnt agree more. With our society becoming more and more overweight we really need to push this issue on junkfood. I love that juicy juice is 100 juice and not loaded up with sugar or empty calories.

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Posted on: 4/13/2008 7:31 AM

Posted by: James S

City: boston

Health-minded people often turn to fruit juice-sweetened products (such as juices, jams, and cookies) as a "healthier" alternative to those sweetened with sugar or corn syrup. It is generally assumed that if it's from fruit juice, it must be healthier, and that's an image food manufacturers aren't likely to argue with. However, what you see on the ingredient list is not necessarily what you get. In fact, much of the commercially used fruit juice concentrate (apple, pear, and white grape being the most popular) should hardly qualify as such. Fruit juice concentrates appear in different forms. Most people are familiar with frozen juice concentrates that people buy for reconstitution at home. Additionally, most juices you find on the shelves are reconstituted from concentrate. Juice concentration involves evaporating most of the water out of the juice, leaving out most of the flavor, color and nutrients. Water is then added back in to reconstitute the juice. Concentrated juices are easier to store and have a longer shelf life as well. Not much to argue with there. However, to make fruit juice concentrate into a production-friendly sweetener, it has to go through a lengthy and expensive process called "stripping". As the name implies, everything is stripped out of the juice: vitamins, minerals, color, flavor, etc. Then it goes through a deionization process similar to the one that turns cornstarch into corn syrup. What's left is essentially glucose syrup-sugar water that looks and behaves a lot like corn syrup. It is sweet, but it is colorless, flavorless, and doesn't alter the pH of whatever is being sweetened, all of which are highly desirable in the manufacturing process. Although it no longer resembles anything close to a fruit juice concentrate, thanks to loopholes in the FDA's guidelines it is still considered a fruit juice concentrate. Marketers can still put "100% juice" or "no sugar added" on the package.

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