The packaging that kills me are the ones that only one serving (personal pizza, etc), but then the nutritional info shows 2+ servings. Almost got me yesterday!
let's not forget those labelsare based on 2000 calories or more in a day so if your limit is 1200 to 1600 you got to do the math for that also the lady mary
Oh, and the author missed the latest mislabeling fads.
Organic as in Organic potato chips made with organic potatoes (OK) deep-fried (Not stated but Yikes) in organic canola oil (really? almost all canola is GM and therefore NOT organic) with Organic Sea-salt (What is THAT?)
Gluten-free plastered on fruit products, corn products, vegetable products. Hello? If it's not made from wheat, barley, rye, or some oats, it's gluten free. Period! You don't have to tell me.
I love "Made with Natural Cane Sugar" because there is no such thing. Cane sugar is a highly processed food additive much along the same lines as HFCS and agave "nectar" aka powdered honey (which it is neither nectar or honey). The only only only natural sweetener in raw honey. Everything else is highly processed.
"An example of an unhelpful fat-free claim is a carton of 100% orange juice. Here, a fat-free claim isn’t helpful labeling, even though it is truthful. Oranges are naturally fat-free, so 100% orange juice always has and always will be fat-free, regardless of whether it is highlighted on the label or not. " Why didn't the article tell us about how much sugar is in juice? Not to mention how much fructose. Things to avoid if you're trying to be fructose free are, honey, fruit juices and dried fruit, all are very high in sugar/fructose, and FRUCTOSE MAKES YOU FAT. Do the research yourselves, people. Eat only whole frutit.....Still waiting for SparkPeople to put the relevant sugar content of every recipe on the 1st page of the recipe's nutritional list. I'm fructose free and have lost 9.8 kilos by giving it up. Note, if the sugar grams per 100 gtrams is more than 8 grams, don't buy the product, as that is way too much, especially if you take into account all the other stuff we put into our mouths every day. Aim for no more that 10 grams of sugar a day & you will lose weight, I promise. Sylv from Oz Spreading the Love
This makes me want to be a kitchen goddess and make my own bread, and use only unprocessed ingredients!! HEehee. I love the information here, and it's great to find new ways to try to improve the health of what I choose to consume.
I try to purchase and eat simple ingredients. I don't think I'll have the time to be that kitchen goddess that I envision, but I can be the working version of her, hold her inside me to help guide me, just as SparkPeople does!!
Also, if a product says 30% (or whatever) less fat, the FDA defines this a being only 30% less grams than the original product. Why is this bad? Well those Milky Ways with "less fat" or mearly smaller than the original product, no ingredients are altered.
I got tricked on EDY'S JUICE BARS, since the box said "100% ALL NATURAL INGREDIENTS" "SNACK SIZE", etc. I did look on the label and it said 50 calories each, so I thought "Oh, that is from the natural fruit juice" so I had a couple. Then in the SMALL print it said "Ingredients, Water, SUGAR, Fruit Juices" Yes, sugar is a NATURAL ingredient. SO, I learned my lesson.
CURBEE
6/25/2009 12:38:15 PM
Very good examples of "food foolery".
I wanted to mention something that is a pet peeve of mine when it comes to labels: fat calories. It irritates me to no end when the so called called calculation of fat calories is rounded instead of accurately calculated {total fat grams times 9} The only time I ever see an accurate amount of fat calories is when there is a round number of fat grams (like 10 or 20) otherwise it is rounded up or down, which is misleading. Even my daughter knows her multiples of 9. The easiest way to see that it is an incorrect number is by using a trick I learned about the multiples of 9 -the sum of the digits of a multiple of nine add up to 9!
