NutritionDoc

To zip up your salad greens and veggies, add a handful of cut up grapes, peaches, pears, kiwis, cantaloupe, apples, strawberries, or oranges. Or toss in some blueberries, raspberries, clementine sections, pomegranate seeds, or dried cranberries.

Hard red winter wheat, oats, rye, triticale, long grain brown rice, barley, buckwheat, sesame seeds. Most cookies do not start out with anything close to a blend of those whole grain ingredients.

 

But then, Kashi TLC (Tasty Little Cookies) are not your usual coffee dunkers.

 

Whether you choose the Haqppy Trail Mix, Oatmeal Dark Chocolate, or Oatmeal Raisin Flax, each chewy TLC delivers little sat fat (1 1/2 grams or less), no trans fat, a nice dose of fiber (3 or 4 grams) and less sugar (7 or 8 grams)  than your average cookie (10 to 12 grams).

 

Best of all, TLCs do not taste bland or overly sweet, like some health food store cookies and muffins. And they use honest to goodness, recognizable ingredients like cranberries, sunflower seeds, peanuts, coconut strands, honey and chocolate chips.

 

Each cookie has 130 calories, so you can not munch your way through a box in one sitting. And you have to keep the package wrapped after you open it, unless you want your TLCs to go from chewy to crunchy.

 

But you will not find healthier, yummier cookies without pulling out your old recipe file, mixing bowls and cookie sheet.

Sandwich cookies, fruit filled cookies, oatmeal cookies, choco chip cookies . . . whatever your favorite, cookie manufacturers have likely reformulated it in response to the latest health concern - artery clogging trans fats.

But simply removing trans containing oils does not a healthful cookie make. Low trans fat cookies can still be high in total fat, low fat cookies can be high in sugar, and low sugar cookies can be high in fat. Face it, with few exceptions, most cookies are not paragons of good nutrition. And few of us expect that; cookies are an occasional indulgence ( emphasis on occasionsal) - a treat that we allow ourselves. But to prevent the occasional treat from turning into a total nutrition disaster, LABEL READING IS A MUST.

 

7 COOKIE JAR TIPS

 

1. Check serving size. the number of cookies varies widely and nutrition numbers are based on this amount.

2. Know your trans rules. Cookies that list "0" trans on the label may not be 100% trans free. The government allows those with less than 0.5 gram of trans fat per serving to boast "zero grams trans" or "trans free". With experts recommending a 2 gram a day limit on trans, just a few servings of "trans free" foods can add up.

3. Check ingredient list for partially hydrogenated oils, which indicates the presence of at least some trans fats.

4. Find out what fats are in your cookie. Fat hierarchy: Canola and sunflower oils are better than soybean and cottonseed oils,  which beat out palm oil. Palm kernel oil and partially hydrogenated fats come in last.

5. Look for nutrition pluses. Cookies containing real fruit like fig bars or whole grain flour may have a nutrition edge over those that do not. But they still can be high in fat or contain hydrogenated oils.

6. Be as vigilant reading labels on "organic" and "natural" cookies.They are not necessarily healthful.

7. Do not expect "sugar free" cookies to be low calorie. they typically contain "sugar alcohols" which still provide calories, and they may be higher in fat or calories than regular cookies.

 

Choose wisely . . . live well.