Lucky Charms has a higher healthfulness score than ground beef

On Jan. 12, 2023, Good Ranchers published an article on the Good Bloggers website entitled, "New Government Funded 'Food Pyramid' Says Lucky Charms Are Healthier Than Steak."

Many attempted to verify whether that headline of the article was accurate.

We found, in short, that there is not, in fact, a new U.S. government-funded food pyramid chart that promotes to the general public the idea that the children's breakfast cereal Lucky Charms is healthier than steak.

 Despite how it was described, the chart was actually put together to demonstrate the shortcomings of systems used to rank the healthfulness of foods.

What happened was that a paper backed by nutrition scientists challenged the methodology behind something known as a nutrient profiling system (NPS) — in this case, an NPS called Food Compass. Food Compass is managed by Tufts University.

The paper was titled, "Limitations of the Food Compass Nutrient Profiling System." Nutrition scientist Ty Beal was listed as its corresponding author. We'll have more on his personal response to the Lucky Charms rumor later in this story, including an informative Twitter thread that some readers might find to be the most helpful part of this article.