If you’re trying to cut down on foods or beverages with added sugar, you undoubtedly have a couple of obstacles to hurdle. Food manufacturers have come up with some pretty creative names for added sugar over the past few years, making it nearly impossible to pick them out if you don’t know what you’re looking for.
To help you spot them, I scoured dozens of packaged foods and put together this list of 44 nicknames for added sugar. Feel free to print it or Pin It so you’re prepared the next time you go food shopping. Even taking a thorough look at the list right now will probably help you spot some of these less common nicknames in the future!
A FEW TIPS
- Watch out for anything with “syrup” in the name
- Ingredients ending in -ose (glucose, sucrose, fructose…) are typically sugars
- Agave nectar
- Barley malt syrup
- Beet sugar
- Brown rice syrup
- Brown sugar
- Cane crystals
- Cane juice crystals
- Cane sugar
- Corn sweetener
- Corn syrup
- Corn syrup solids
- Crystalline fructose
- Date sugar
- Dehydrated cane juice
- Dextrin
- Dextrose
- Evaporated cane juice
- Fructose
- Fruit juice
- Fruit juice concentrate
- Glucose
- Glucose solids
- Glycerol
- Golden brown sugar
- Golden syrup
- Grape sugar
- High fructose corn syrup
- Honey
- Invert sugar
- Lactose
- Malitol syrup*
- Malt syrup
- Maltose
- Maple syrup
- Molasses
- Raw sugar
- Rice syrup
- Saccharose
- Sorghum
- Sorghum syrup
- Sucrose
- Syrup
- Treacle
- Turbinado sugar
*Malitol Syrup is a sugar alcohol that provides approximately 3 calories per gram with a glycemic index (52), close to that of sugar (60). Glycerol provides approximately 4 calories per gram.
