You Won't Believe How Much Sugar Is In These Supermarket Pasta Sauces

Sugar likes to hide in mysterious, unexpected places like sauces, crackers, frozen entrées, breads, and even salad dressings. It helps to balance out flavors and add texture to finished food products, but if you're not careful, the extra grams from added sugar can really add up.

A 15-year-long study published in JAMA Internal Medicine showed that people who received more than 25 percent of their daily caloric intake from added sugars were "more than twice as likely to die from heart disease as those whose diets included less than 10 percent added sugars."

Since 1 gram of sugar is only equivalent to 4 calories, you would need to eat around 125 grams (500 calories) to reach 25 percent of a standard 2,000-calorie diet. But 125 grams of sugar really isn't all that much — a typical day could consist of a 6-ounce Yoplait blackberry yogurt for breakfast (26 grams of sugar), a cup of Campbell's Zesty Tomato Soup for lunch (12 grams of sugar), a Quaker Oats granola bar for a snack (7 grams of sugar), all washed down with a 16-ounce Coca-Cola (52 grams of sugar) — that's already 97 grams of sugar! All of this added sugar has compelled the Food and Drug Administration to mandate food companies to display added sugars on their nutrition labels.

Since sugar is everywhere, shoppers have to be especially vigilant when analyzing nutrition labels. Although some pasta sauces benefit from a hint of sugar, some brands go overboard. Here are five sugared-up pasta sauces you need to watch out for at the supermarket.  

1. Bertolli Vidalia Onion With Roasted Garlic Sauce

8 grams of sugar per ½ cup serving

2. Ragu Chunky Tomato, Garlic & Onion Sauce

10 grams of sugar per ½ cup serving

3. Prego Heart Smart Traditional Sauce

10 grams of sugar per ½ cup serving

4. Del Monte Tomato and Basil Pasta Sauce

11 grams of sugar per ½ cup serving

5. Prego Organic Tomato & Basil Sauce

11 grams of sugar per ½ cup serving