Study finds cheap way to get a good breakfast

By KATHERINE HOBY

Sometimes cheapest is best.

When it comes to buying cereal, the Consumers Institute says there is nothing wrong with No Frills Cornflakes.

The product was given a gold star as the most affordable in the "cornflakes and puffs" category in an institute study.

The results have been published, under the heading "breakfast candy", in the institute's magazine, Consumer.

The institute tested 181 breakfast cereals.

Some of the winners might surprise - budget lines such as Signature Range and No Frills rated well in several categories.

And old favourites, including Sanitarium Weetbix - the biggest selling breakfast cereal - porridge, and cornflakes rate highly in the health stakes.

The institute gives its big tick to some of the cheapest options on the supermarket shelves.

Pam's Rolled Oats, Budget Breakfast Biscuits, Pam's Wheat Biscuits, and Signature Range Cornflakes all rated well.

But some more expensive brands lost points because of their sugar content.

Price, dietary fibre, sugar, fat, energy, and overall nutritional value were the factors assessed.

High-sugar cereals included Pam's Honey Snaps, Hubbard's Cocoa Cornflakes, and Basics Cocoa Poppas.

Sugar made up half or more of their content.

Dietitian Jeni Pearce says it's no surprise that cereals with added honey, cocoa, or fruit have high levels of sugar.

"Once you start adding fruit or honey coatings, you start to get up there in sugar content."

The Consumers' Institute measure of a nutritional cereal was that it should be high in fibre, low in fat, have low amounts of added sugar and be not excessively high in energy.

It says just over a third of the cereals assessed got the seal of approval.

It was disappointing, it noted, that very few of those aimed at children, and only one "sports cereal", were good enough to recommend.

Sustain beat other "sports cereals" which were deemed to have too much sugar.

It also noted that some of those in the budget cereal range - Pam's, Basics and Signature Range - did not have enough information about the product written on their packaging.

Two-thirds of the children's cereals tested had at least 2 1/2 teaspoons of sugar in each 30g serve.

And none of the 21 children-oriented choices got an institute tick.

Breakfast bars and liquid breakfast drinks were also assessed.

The drinks rated well for calcium, but did not provide fibre and other nutrients.

"They do not measure up to a sit-down breakfast with a bowl of cereal, milk and fruit," the institute concluded.

Quality test

To qualify as a Consumers Institute "good cereal" each 100g of a product will have:

* More than 5g of dietary fibre (and not more than 15g for children).

* No more than 5g of fat (10g is acceptable if saturated or "bad" fat is not more than 20 per cent of total fat).

* Less than 15g of sugar (or 25g if the sugar comes from dried fruit).

* Less than 600mg of sodium if blood pressure is an issue.

* An energy content of between 1400 and 1600 kilojoules.