This vs that: Liquid breakfasts

Sanitarium Up&Go Vanilla Ice

Sanitarium Reduced Sugar Up&Go Vanilla Ice

Anchor Fast Start Vanilla

Energy, protein, saturated fat

The Sanitarium Up&Go products are made from skim milk powder, so they’re low in saturated fat. Anchor Fast Start uses standardised ultra-filtered milk, which is higher in protein, fat and kilojoules. More protein is good, but we prefer low-fat milk to reduce saturated fat intake.

Sugars

A 250ml serve of milk by itself provides between 11.5—13g sugars. This is from lactose, the natural sugar in milk. So while the Sanitarium Reduced Sugar Up&Go lists sugar in the ingredients list, it’s likely to be very little. The others have the equivalent of around two or more teaspoons of added sugars. We prefer foods with low amounts of added sugars.

Fibre

Milk does not contain fibre. If we had this as our breakfast, we’d really need some fibre so Up&Go has added inulin, which can disagree with people with IBS. Fast Start adds dextrin, which is also used in the fibre supplement Benefiber®.

Other nutrients

Each of these has 400mg calcium per serve, and added B vitamins.

Verdict

Although something is better than nothing for breakfast, we would not recommend any of these as a regular breakfast. Real food, such as eggs, wholegrain cereals, yoghurt, vegetables and fruit and nuts are more satisfying and sustaining. As for a snack, for an emergency standby choose the Reduced Sugar Up&Go for its balance of protein and fibre with little added sugar and low saturated fat.