When checking food labels stops being helpful

Something that comes up quite often in my cancer nutrition clinic is just how much checking can start to surround food.

Reading labels in the supermarket or online. Spending a long time comparing different products. Checking labels at home before you eat something. Scanning foods into an app. Looking up particular ingredients.

When you're navigating cancer, it makes complete sense to want to do everything you can to support your health.

But there can come a point when the level of checking stops being helpful. I sometimes describe it as having the dial turned up too high. You may recognise that feeling.

This can be a good time to pause and recalibrate and think about what really deserves your attention and where your energy is going.

Use food labels to answer the question you actually have

Food labels can be really helpful.

For example, if you're choosing between three yoghurts and want one that provides a good amount of protein, the nutrition information can help you compare them. If you've been advised to reduce your salt intake, you might use the labels to compare the salt content of similar products. If you have a food allergy, you'll already be familiar with checking ingredient lists carefully.

Let the label answer the question you actually have.

The difficulty comes when we're no longer looking for particular information and instead we're scrutinising everything. An ingredient prompts a search. An app gives the product a score. Something is highlighted as good or bad. Before long, choosing a yoghurt, oatcake or cereal bar has become a research project.

The closer and closer we zoom in, the easier it can be to lose sight of the bigger picture and what matters most.

An ingredient isn't a diet

Nutrition can become very reductionist when we zoom in on one ingredient and allow it to determine how we judge the product as a whole.

Sugar is bad. An additive is bad. An emulsifier is bad. A sweetener is bad. A food is ultra-processed, so that must be bad too.

But this isn't how I assess somebody's diet in clinic.

I'm interested in the overall pattern of what somebody eats. Are they eating a varied, nourishing diet? Are they getting enough protein? What about fibre, wholegrains, fruit and vegetables, nuts and seeds and other plant foods? Are they meeting their nutritional needs?

And all of this needs to be put into context.

Are you in the midst of treatment? Are side effects making eating more difficult? How is your appetite? What are your energy levels like? What is realistic for you at the moment?

The answers will be different for different people and at different points during treatment, recovery and beyond.

A single ingredient in one food can't tell us whether your overall diet is nourishing and balanced.

Be careful when a score replaces context

I can see the appeal of food-scanning apps. Scan a product and you get what feels like a quick health check.

But, as you'll often hear me say, nutrition doesn't easily lend itself to a single answer.

A product can be given a score or rating based on particular characteristics, but that score can't give you the full picture. It can't capture your individual nutritional needs, the overall pattern of what you eat, or why you've chosen that particular food.

It can give you a very precise-looking answer to a very narrow question.

That doesn't mean you should never use an app. But if using one leaves you checking more, questioning more and feeling less confident about choosing food for yourself, it's worth asking: How much is this actually helping me?

Not everything can be made from scratch

Cooking from scratch with whole and minimally processed foods can provide a brilliant foundation for eating well. You know what's going into your food and can make it exactly as you like it.

But how realistic is it to make everything we eat from scratch?

There are plenty of nutritious foods many of us routinely buy ready-made: wholegrain bread, oatcakes, hummus, cereals, tinned pulses and countless other everyday foods. These foods have all been processed to some degree.

And I think an important point is that processing itself isn't inherently a bad thing.

It can make food safer, help it last longer or make nutritious foods easier to use and include regularly. It can also add nutritional value, for example through fortification with vitamins or minerals.

This is where conversations about ultra-processed foods can become too simplistic.

Ultra-processed foods are a very broad group. Some are made to be highly palatable, often with combinations of salt, sugar and fat that encourage us to eat more of them. Others can provide useful nutrients, including fibre, vitamins and minerals.

Putting everything into a category of ultra-processed = bad doesn't tell us enough.

What does the food provide, and where does it fit within the rest of your diet?

Convenience is an important consideration

There may be times when you have the energy and inclination to cook from scratch, and if you enjoy it, that's great!

There may also be days when you've spent hours at the hospital, you're tired after treatment, food tastes different, your appetite has disappeared or you just don't have any energy left in the tank.

At those times, a ready meal you can heat up might be what makes having a nourishing meal doable when preparing one from scratch isn't.

And this isn't only relevant during treatment.

You may be recovering, back at work, caring for other people, exercising, trying to sleep well and doing all the other things that support your health.

Food has to fit into your life. Eating well shouldn't become a daily negotiation with yourself.

Sometimes convenience is exactly what makes eating well possible.

When trying to eat well stops helping

If you've already built a varied, nourishing way of eating, there can come a point when repeatedly checking and comparing individual products starts to take on more importance than it deserves.

And rather than settling things, it can keep you questioning your food choices.

Nutrition is an important part of looking after your health, but it's one part of a much bigger picture.

We are whole people. We need nourishment, but we also need sleep, movement, strength, rest, relationships, enjoyment and, importantly, enough mental space to live our lives.

Life may already be asking a lot of you. The more attention and energy food checking takes, the less you have available for everything else.

Eating well doesn't need to become a source of high alert. Your energy is precious. We want more of it going towards nourishing and supporting yourself, rather than trying to perfect every food choice.

Keep caring about nutrition but keep it in proportion with everything else that supports your health and your life.

A balanced way to use food labels

Food labels are there to be used. The key is to use them to find information that is helpful to you.

Start with the question you actually want the label to answer. Want to compare the protein in a few yoghurts? Compare the protein. If you're keeping an eye on your salt intake, look at the salt.

If you're buying something new or choosing between a few different products, have a look and compare them. You might spot something useful that helps you make your choice.

Try not to give every ingredient the same importance. Something being unfamiliar, or not something you would use in your own kitchen, doesn't automatically make the product a poor choice.

Think about what the food brings to your diet too. Does it provide something useful nutritionally? Does it add variety? Does it make eating easier or make something possible that otherwise wouldn't be? Is it something you enjoy? The fact that you like it is a valid reason too!

Use the label to help you make a choice and keep that information in proportion with the bigger picture of how you eat.

This blog is for general information only and is not a substitute for individual medical or dietetic advice.