The Truth About Food Labels: What Does It All Mean?

Last Updated on January 28, 2023 by Lori Geurin

The supermarket can be a confusing place. Often we go there intending to buy healthy food but sometimes we’re not sure what’s healthy and what’s not. The infographic below takes you through what some of the most common labels really mean.

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The Truth About Food Labels

Natural is a very common label on food but the truth is it means very little. The FDA has no official guidelines on its meaning and it’s only a healthy-sounding term more than anything else as any guidelines for natural foods are only recommended.

Organic is really what you should be looking for as foods with this label must contain at least 95% organically produced ingredients.

Another very difficult area is bread. Some of us will try to stay off bread completely and when we do buy it, we will try to avoid white bread. However, the differences between multigrain, wholemeal and 100% whole grain are a bit more confusing.

Remember that multigrain is generally to be avoided because all it means is that the bread contains more than one grain – not that it is more nutritional. What you should buy is 100% whole grain as this means all nutrients in the grain are accounted for in the bread.

Find out more about a wide range of food labels in the infographic below!