Canned Fruit: The Good and The Bad

It's a pretty common story.  You buy a bunch of fruit for your new, healthy diet (good for you!), and stick it on your counter in a nice, decorative bowl.  However you don't end up eating it as fast as you had originally planned, and it ends up sitting for just a little too long.  In the end you have to throw out a good quarter of the fruit because of that nasty fruit rot.  What a waste!  How the heck can you get more time out of that healthy, delicious fruit?

Can it!  Canned fruit will last, for all intensive purposes, indefinitely.  It's cheap, tastes great, and is readily available at your local grocery store.  Fruits don't lose any sort of nutritional benefit upon being canned.  They may lose a little of their original texture, but once you get past that you're virtually golden.  What a great way to get more of those essential vitamins and other nutritional benefits back into your diet!

BUT HOLD ON!  Don't run out to your grocery store and buy a whole cartload of canned fruit just yet.  There are a few little things that you should be aware of before splurging on canned fruit.  When it comes to the cans, not all are created equal.  NOT BY A LONG SHOT.  How is this possible?  Well, it's actually quite simple.  Some canned fruit is canned in syrup (either heavy or light), and some is canned in the natural juice of the fruit.  I'll give you one wild guess as to which one is better for you.  I'll even give you a hint...it's not the syrup, and here's why:

Canning syrup isn't composed of much except a whole BUNCH of added sugar.  This is something you really don't need, especially if you're trying to keep blood insulin levels low and your body from storing excess fat.  To give an example of what I mean, here are the nutritional facts for three different varieties of canned peaches:  

Peaches Canned In Fruit Juice:

Nutrition Facts
Calories 43	(180 kJ)
% Daily Value 1
Total Fat	0g	0%
Sat. Fat	< 0.1g	< 1%
Cholesterol	0mg	0%
Sodium	4mg	< 1%
Total Carbs.	11.4g	4%
Dietary Fiber	1.3g	5%
Sugars	10.1g
Protein	0.6g
Calcium	5.9mg
Potassium	125.4mg

Peaches Canned In Light Syrup:

Calories 53	(221 kJ)
% Daily Value 1
Total Fat	0g	0%
Sat. Fat	< 0.1g	< 1%
Cholesterol	0mg	0%
Sodium	5mg	< 1%
Total Carbs.	14.3g	5%
Dietary Fiber	1.3g	5%
Sugars	13g
Protein	0.4g
Calcium	2.9mg
Potassium	95.1mg

Peaches Canned In Heavy Syrup:  

Nutrition Facts
Calories 73	(303 kJ)
% Daily Value 1
Total Fat	< 0.1g	< 1%
Sat. Fat	< 0.1g	< 1%
Cholesterol	0mg	0%
Sodium	6mg	< 1%
Total Carbs.	19.5g	7%
Dietary Fiber	1.3g	5%
Sugars	18.3g
Protein	0.4g
Calcium	2.9mg
Potassium	90.2mg

Note that all these nutrition facts are for a 3.5oz serving.  

Wow, 8 extra grams of sugar between heavy syrup and fruit juice?  That's pretty impressive.  And considering that's only about half a can, by the end of it all you'll be getting 16 grams more sugar than you would if you were eating raw peaches canned in their natural juices!  That's ridiculous honestly, nobody needs that much extra sugar, especially in fruit.  With fruit, you want to look for sources that are as truly natural as possible, filled with all the fiber, simple carbs, and vitamins and minerals you need.  While it's true that canning may alter the vitamins you take in slightly, there's no reason that canned fruit has to be any less nutritious.  Here's how to avoid all that extra sugar:

Remember my favorite phrase?  Well here it comes again.  READ THE INGREDIENTS!!!  It's pretty obvious which varieities of canned fruit are the ones filled with syrup.  They will either say.

-"Made with/packed in heavy/light syrup" right on the front (look a little harder for this title, it may not be quite as visible)

-Or on the ingredients, it might say "sugar."  Simple right?  That means there's added sugar on top of all the natural sugar in the fruit already.  Steer clear!  

-To determine that there isn't any added sugar/syrup, look first on the front of the can for phrases like "packed in fruit juice" or "no added sugar."  These are good indications that the fruit is packaged only in its natural juices with no sugary syrup surrounding it.

-Look again on the ingredients.  If it says anything other than the fruit, the fruit juice, and maybe some water, you know there's something fishy.  Raw, canned fruit will have an extremely simple ingredient list.  

-Look for other forms of sugar on the ingredient list.  If it has something like glucose, fructose, dextrose, or sucrose, come to think of it pretty much anything ending with "ose," then there's a good chance it has added sugar.  

-Watch for calories!  If you think that a particular can of fruit has an unusually large amount of calories for being well, fruit, then there's a good chance there's added sugar.  Take a second to look at the calorie figures posted above, notice how the fruit juice variation has 40 less calories per 3.5 oz.  The more natural the fruit, the fewer calories.  Keep that in mind!

So that's it!  I'll suggest fresh fruit over canned fruit all day long, but I understand the need to have long lasting food that has no risk of spoiling before you get to enjoy it.  Just be careful with your canned purchases, and enjoy all the nutritious benefits of a fruity snack!

Be scrutinous, watch for sugar, and as always, good luck!