Tuesday, January 16, 2007

Chocolate Cereal - Your new Weight Loss Weapon?

Nothing says weight loss like chocolate cereal!

Special K, in that special way they have of marketing refined carbohydrates and sugar as a powerful weight loss aid, have now extended their never-ending wisdom to chocolate, or at least the suggestion of chocolate, because despite the name "Special K Chocolatey Delight", the cereal doesn't actual contain any chocolate. Instead it contains "chocolatey" chunks that include sugar, partially hydrogenated palm kernel oil, cocoa processed with alkall, cocoa, soy lecithin, artifical flavor and milk. I suppose that's why it's a chocolatey delight and not a chocolate one.

The news release is a quobesity goldmine, starting with the fact that the entire news release is written only about women.

Here are some of my favourites:

"Research shows by replacing a higher-calorie evening snack with a lower-calorie snack, like a bowl of Special K(R) Chocolatey Delight(TM) cereal, women may lose weight."
You don't say. Eat less calories and lose weight?
"Women's eating habits can swing dramatically good to bad throughout the day, including during the evening hours, according to an August 2005 study by Insight Research Group for Kellogg Company."
Not men though. We're immune to "eating habit swings".
"We know from talking with women that they want simple tips and tools, not rules, to help them meet their weight-management goals"
Ummm, isn't "Eat a bowl of cereal instead of another snack" kind of like a rule or something?

How about this for a rule, look at the Calories in your usual foods and try to replace them with foods lower in Calories.

Here's another one. Don't fall prey to the marketing machine that promotes refined carbohydrates and sugar as either healthy choices or weight loss options.

[Hat tip Nutrinformation Blog]