Household Ingredients Compared › Packaged Cakes and Muffins (Singapore)

Packaged cakes and muffins: what's actually in them?

A packaged cake is a long-life sponge: flour, sugar and egg, plus vegetable oil or tallow, glycerin to hold moisture, and a long list of raising agents, gums and preservatives that keep it soft for weeks. Sugar is often the first ingredient. A Swiss roll is the same sponge rolled around a filling; a muffin is a single-serve cake in a cup. This page keeps sponge cakes, filled cakes and Swiss rolls separate, because the filling changes the list.

This page does not give a health score or a "best" pick. It shows the ingredient list as printed, with the country of manufacture as printed where a source states it.

Completeness statement — checked 12 November 2026

Stores/channels checked 12 November 2026: FairPrice (web search of its product pages), Cold Storage (availability only — Cold Storage publishes no ingredient lists), Giant, Sheng Siong, Don Don Donki, Mustafa, Meidi-Ya, Le Petit Depot, RedMart, Lazada SG, Shopee SG, Open Food Facts (secondary). Panelled: 3 products. Seen-but-not-verified: 8 products. This is extensive at the check date only — stock and formulations change, and no page claims permanent 100% completeness.

At a glance

Product	Pack size (as printed)	Group	First ingredient	Added sugar / sweetener?	Country of manufacture (as printed)
Hostess Twinkies — Golden Sponge Cake	10 ct, 13.58 oz (385g)	Sponge cake, filled	Sugar	Yes — sugar first, plus high fructose corn syrup	USA
Hostess Twinkies — Chocolate Cake	10 ct, 13.58 oz (385g)	Sponge cake, filled	Water (US list) / sugar	Yes — sugar, corn syrup, high fructose corn syrup	not stated
Ego Swiss Roll — Chocolate	176g (8 per pack)	Swiss roll	Wheat flour	Yes — sugar, maltose	not stated

Panelled with verbatim lists: 3 products. Seen-but-not-verified: see the list below. No prices are shown: they change weekly and would go stale.

Hostess Twinkies — Golden Sponge Cake

Pack size: 10 ct, 13.58 oz (385g) · Made in: USA (as printed)

Ingredients (Open Food Facts / EWG LabelINSIGHT, US list (secondary) — SG pack not transcribed): Sugar, Enriched Flour (Bleached Wheat Flour, Malted Barley Flour, Niacin, Ferrous Sulfate or Reduced Iron, Thiamine Mononitrate, Riboflavin, Folic Acid), Water, High Fructose Corn Syrup, Tallow, Dextrose, Egg, Contains 2% or Less of: Soybean Oil, Modified Food Starch, Glycerin, Whey (From Milk), Corn Starch, Salt, Corn Syrup Solids, Sodium Acid Pyrophosphate, Hydrogenated Tallow, Baking Soda, Cottonseed Oil, Soy Lecithin, Cellulose Gum, Sorbic Acid and Potassium Sorbate (To Retain Freshness), Sodium Stearoyl Lactylate, Polysorbate 60, Mono and Diglycerides, Xanthan Gum, Monocalcium Phosphate, Enzymes, Natural and Artificial Flavors, Yellow 5, Red 40.

Sugar is the first ingredient; tallow is the fat. Yellow 5 and Red 40 are the colours. Sugar first Tallow Allergen: wheat, egg, soy, milk US list only

Hostess Twinkies — Chocolate Cake

Pack size: 10 ct, 13.58 oz (385g) · Made in: not stated (as printed)

Ingredients (Open Food Facts, US entry (secondary) — SG pack not transcribed): Water, sugar, enriched flour (bleached wheat flour, malted barley flour, niacin, ferrous sulfate or reduced iron, thiamine mononitrate, riboflavin, folic acid), corn syrup, high fructose corn syrup, palm oil, tallow, cocoa processed with alkali, glycerin, contains 2% or less: modified cornstarch, soybean oil, egg white, egg, baking soda, corn starch, natural and artificial flavor, hydrogenated tallow, salt, defatted soy flour, dextrose, sorbic acid (to retain freshness), cellulose gum, cottonseed oil, mono and diglycerides, whey, calcium caseinate, sodium caseinate, soy protein isolate, guar gum, sodium aluminum phosphate, sodium acid pyrophosphate, monocalcium phosphate, fumaric acid, enzymes, polysorbate 60, soy lecithin.

The chocolate version swaps the golden cake's sugar-first order for water first, and adds cocoa processed with alkali; palm oil joins tallow as a fat. Added sugar: sugar, corn syrup, high fructose corn syrup, dextrose Allergen: wheat, egg, soy, milk US list only

Ego Swiss Roll — Chocolate

Pack size: 176g (8 per pack) · Made in: not stated (as printed)

Ingredients (FairPrice Singapore ingredient section): Wheat Flour, Sugar, Eggs, Maltose, Salt, Vegetable Oil (Palm Oil), Milk Powder, Salt, Cocoa Powder, Maltose, Raising Agents (Ammonium Bicarbonate E503, Sodium Bicarbonate E500), Food Additives (Caramel, Shortening, D-Sorbitol, Margarine, Vanilla Flavour, Sorbic Acid), (CONTAINS: Gluten (Wheat and Oats), Milk and Soya Bean Product), ALLERGEN INFORMATION: Contains Wheat Flour, Peanut and Walnut, Manufactured in a facility that processes Peanuts and Other Free Nuts.

Salt and maltose each appear twice in the FairPrice list as printed. Eight individually wrapped pieces. Via: FairPrice SG Added sugar: sugar, maltose Allergen: wheat, milk, soy, peanut, walnut

Seen but not verified — do not panel until checked

Gardenia muffins and packaged cakes — Sold in Singapore; no FairPrice ingredient section was retrieved in this pass.
Sunshine packaged cakes and muffins — Sold in Singapore; no SG verbatim list retrieved in this pass.
Hostess CupCakes / Ding Dongs — US Hostess lines; SG sale not verified in this pass.
Little Debbie packaged cakes — US brand; SG sale not verified in this pass.
7-Eleven / Cheers packaged cakes and muffins — Sold in Singapore convenience stores; no verbatim list retrieved in this pass.
Donki / Meidi-Ya imported cakes (Japanese / Korean packaged cakes) — Parallel-import cakes may be on these shelves; no list was retrieved in this pass.
Bakery-counter cakes and muffins (FairPrice / Cold Storage in-store bakery) — Loose bakery items have no pack and no list; out of scope for verbatim panelling.
FairPrice house-brand packaged cakes — Listed in-store; no ingredient section retrieved in this pass.

Nutrition — what the numbers say

All figures in the sortable table are as sold, per 100g or per 100ml, as printed by the source. Click a column header to sort low to high; click again for high to low. Cells marked "not stated" always sort last — a dash is missing data, not zero. No per-100g nutrition panel was verified for any cake in this pass; the table is all not stated rather than filled from another variant.

Salt and sodium: salt = sodium × 2.5. The table shows sodium as printed (in mg) with the salt equivalent in brackets. Sodium is not presented as salt, and salt is not presented as sodium.

Total vs added sugars: most Singapore packs list total sugars, not added sugars. A total-sugars figure is never labelled here as "added sugar". Where a source states an added-sugars figure separately, it is noted. The ingredient list remains the evidence for added sugar (sucrose, sugar, glucose syrup, maltitol) versus naturally occurring sugars (lactose in milk, fructose in fruit).

Open Food Facts is a community database and is flagged as secondary where used: the pack and the retailer nutrition section take precedence if they disagree. Figures marked "not stated" were not in the source retrieved; they are not estimated, borrowed from another variant, or copied across flavours.

Product	Basis	Energy	Protein	Total fat	Saturated fat	Carbohydrate	Sugars	Sodium (salt equiv.)
Hostess Twinkies — Golden Sponge Cake	Per 100g, as sold	not stated	not stated	not stated	not stated	not stated	not stated	not stated
Hostess Twinkies — Chocolate Cake	Per 100g, as sold	not stated	not stated	not stated	not stated	not stated	not stated	not stated
Ego Swiss Roll — Chocolate	Per 100g, as sold	not stated	not stated	not stated	not stated	not stated	not stated	not stated

Seen but not verified (nutrition): all three panelled cakes — no per-100g nutrition panel was verified in this pass.

How to read a label — the jargon, in plain English

Tallow: Rendered beef fat, used as the fat in US Twinkies; hydrogenated tallow is tallow hardened by hydrogenation.
Glycerin / glycerol: A humectant that holds moisture in a packaged cake so it stays soft for weeks.
High fructose corn syrup: A liquid sweetener made from corn starch; an added sugar, listed separately from sugar.
Maltose: A sugar made from starch; an added sugar in the Ego Swiss Roll, listed twice as printed.
Raising agents (E500, E503): Baking soda and ammonium bicarbonate, which make the sponge rise; E500 is sodium bicarbonate, E503 is ammonium bicarbonate.

What this page is not

Not a health score, and not a "best" pick. This page does not rank products.
Not a taste test, and not a price comparison. Prices change weekly; ingredients change less often, but still change.
Not complete. The products in seen-but-not-verified are not yet panelled, for the verification reasons given, not hidden.

Sources and method

Checked 12 November 2026 from: Open Food Facts US entries and EWG/LabelINSIGHT for Hostess Twinkies Golden and Chocolate (secondary, flagged as US lists); FairPrice Singapore ingredient section for Ego Swiss Roll — Chocolate. Cold Storage publishes no ingredient lists. No SG pack was transcribed in this pass.