There’s a fairly regular conversation within the Whitehall-Coplay Hunger Initiative Food Pantry about what cereal gets placed on which shelf. Our standard practice is to use a sort of reverse stoplight strategy: to put the things that are the healthiest on the top shelf (green = choose frequently) and less healthy items on the middle or bottom (yellow/red = choose sometimes/rarely).

With some products, this is very simple; however, assigning a location for cereal can be a bit of a challenging task since not all cereals are equally nutritious.

Let’s start with something that is an easy decision for the top shelf — whole-grain rolled oats, found in the traditional round canister. Because they are a whole grain, plant based and all natural, they get the green light. They contain no added sugar or sodium and also offer 4 grams of dietary fiber and 5 grams of protein per half-cup serving.

That covers all the bases of what we look for in a natural, healthy food. The high dietary fiber in oats may help decrease blood cholesterol levels and may decrease heart disease risk. Fiber is also helpful for bowel function.

Oats are versatile. They can be cooked and eaten hot, flavored and toasted to become granola or soaked in milk or yogurt as “overnight oats” with added fruit, raisins, nuts, cinnamon and spices. Adding your own extras allows you to personalize the flavor and control the nutritional values.

Remember that nuts and seeds are good in small amounts since they are calorie dense and dried fruits are naturally sweeter. Oats can also be ground into flour for baking to increase the benefits mentioned above. Remember the tagline for grains is to “make half your grains whole grain.”

Popular boxed cereals usually have many added ingredients, which make it tricky to determine which choice is healthiest. Some general guidelines for cereal suggest the first ingredient be a whole grain, contain at least 3 grams of fiber per serving, 2-3 grams of protein, 6 grams or less of added sugar and less than 140 milligrams of sodium per serving.

These values are usually not reached when cereals are “frosted” or contain honey coating, chocolate flavor, fun-shaped marshmallows or clusters. When too much sugar is added, the product starts to lose its benefit, and it really becomes a sugary snack, even with grain as the main ingredient. Some guidelines also suggest sugar not be among the top five ingredients.

In the process of this search, I came across a chart that will become a guideline for us in the pantry. This chart is used by the Child and Adult Care Food Program, a federal program that provides reimbursements for nutritious meals and snacks to eligible children and adults who are enrolled for care at participating child care centers, day care homes and adult day care centers.

It focuses on approving cereals for its program by reading the nutrition label and looking first at the number of grams in a serving and then checking the chart for the limit of added sugar for that serving size. You can find the chart at fns.usda.gov and look for CACFP information.

Limiting added sugar is a great start for improving all area of our diets. In our food pantry, it is also a key to the top shelf.

Resources include myplate.gov and fns.usda.gov.

Editor’s note: This column was written by Jenn Dietz, Healthy Pantry Initiative chair and pantry comanager.