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Oatmeal, particularly the slow-cooked kind, is generally healthier than Cheerios.
Both are made from
whole oats, but the difference comes down to processing. Unprocessed
whole oats, like those in steel-cut oatmeal, take a while for the body
to digest.
With Cheerios and
other processed cereals, “you basically have rapidly digested sugar
mixed with bran and germ,” said Dr. Dariush Mozaffarian, dean of the
Friedman School of Nutrition Science and Policy at Tufts University. “It
provides fiber and minerals, but also digests in the mouth almost
immediately.”
That gives you a quick spike in blood sugar, but no energy for later.
One 2013 study,
for instance, found that people who ate oatmeal felt fuller and had
better appetite control than those who ate the same number of calories
of processed cereal.
Both oatmeal and
Cheerios are whole grains, which puts them ahead of cereals like Corn
Flakes and Special K, in which the bran and germ have been removed, Dr.
Mozaffarian said. Whole grains have more fiber and a wider range of
vitamins and minerals.
As a practical
rule-of-thumb, Dr. Mozaffarian suggests using the total
carbohydrate-to-fiber ratio to find more healthful breakfast foods –
aiming for a ratio of less than 10 to 1, which is comparable to the ratio in whole wheat flour.
A serving of Corn
Flakes, for instance, includes about 24 grams of carbohydrate and 1 gram
of fiber, a less-than-ideal ratio. Cheerios achieves the desired ratio
of about 10 grams of carbohydrate for every gram of fiber. Instant
oatmeals that contain lots of added sugar may be worse than Cheerios
using this standard.
For his own breakfast,
Dr. Mozaffarian eats Kashi Good Friends cereal along with fruit and
full-fat milk. Kashi has more sugar than Cheerios or oats, providing
about 42 grams of carbohydrate per serving. But it also has 12 grams of
fiber, giving it a better carb-to-fiber ratio than many other cereals,
Dr. Mozaffarian said.
The fruit adds even more fiber, and the full-fat milk digests more slowly than low-fat milk.
“If you eat a
breakfast of refined cereal and skim milk,” Dr. Mozaffarian said, “your
blood sugar is going to crash a few hours later, and you will be
hungrier and eat more for lunch.”
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