Serving Size & Calories
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(HealthNewsDigest.com) – Every food in the US, both imported and domestic, that is larger than a Lifesaver package and has a food label, must display an ingredient listing and a nutrition facts panel, more commonly known as the nutrition label. Understanding and using these effectively offers you a wealth of information to make healthy food choices.
The Nutrition Facts Panel is chockfull of valuable information but few of us use it effectively, because it can appear both complicated and confusing. Let’s divide the nutrition label into 7 sections: serving size, calories, know what to limit (fat, cholesterol and sodium), make healthy choices (carbohydrate, fiber, sugar, and protein), what to get enough of (vitamins A and C, calcium and iron), and % Daily Value (%DV). At first these sections may seem unusual but over the next few weeks as we decode the nutrition label I think you’ll see they do make sense.
We’ll start by looking at serving size and calories and in future features we will decode the remainder of the nutrition label.
Serving Size — this one is a biggy – no pun intended. There is the serving size listed on the package, there is a standard serving size, which could be slightly smaller or larger, and there is the amount you eat. If the serving of organic, unsalted, baked potato chips is 1 ounce or 15 chips, it doesn’t matter how healthy the chips are if you decide to eat the entire bag. And, how many of us count out 15 chips or weigh an ounce before we dig into a bag of chips?
Another common serving size distortion happens with small packages. You might buy a candy bar, or a small bag of sunflower seeds thinking its one portion, but on the nutrition label a serving may be defined as only 3 squares of the candy bar or 2 tablespoons of the sunflower seeds. Once you’ve opened the package are you really going to eat just the serving size listed on the label?
Servings are often unrealistically small in comparison to what you’ll actually eat. A classic example is cereal. The serving size listed can vary anywhere from ½ cup to 1½ cups. Most of us eat a soup bowl full of cereal, which is about 2 cups. The smaller serving size can make the cereal look more appealing because it seems to have fewer calories. It does – but only if you eat the small amount.
We haven’t said anything about Servings Per Container because quite frankly, this information is usually meaningless. If the serving size is unrealistically small the amount of servings per container has little meaning. If you eat more than 1 cup of cereal at time, does it matter that the box says Servings Per Container 14? The amount you usually eat is all that counts.
Calories — two calorie values are given. The first is the amount of calories in one serving. Remember, if you usually eat more than a serving the calorie value multiplies! The second value is Calories from Fat. This is the amount of calories in one serving that comes from fat.
Calories come from protein, carbohydrate and fat. Protein and carbohydrate have 4 calories per gram. But fat is far more calorie dense, with 9 calories per gram. If you multiply the Total Fat grams times 9 you should come up with the same number as Calories from Fat. The number may be slightly off due to rounding but you’ll be very close. You can break this down even further. If you want to know how many calories come from saturated fat, which you should try to limit, multiply the grams of saturated fat times 9. Saturated, trans fat, polyunsaturated and monounsaturated fats are all types of fat, so they all have 9 calories per gram.
The same holds true for Total Carbohydrate, Sugar or Protein. Multiply any of these by 4 and you find out how many of the calories in a serving come from protein and how many from carbohydrate or sugar.
You Should Know – if one serving of a food equals: 40 calories or less – it is a low calorie food; 100 calories – it is a moderate calorie food; 400 or more calories – it is a high calorie food. This shortcut can help you make a quick decision about a food without doing math.
Thousands of new foods are introduced each year. By knowing how to use the nutrition label, you can decide for yourself which to buy and which to leave in the store. Voting with your buying power makes manufacturers produce the foods you want.
Over the next few weeks we’ll be looking at the rest of the nutrition label. Part 2 will feature the ingredient list, allergy labeling, and %DVs. We hope you’ll come back to learn more.
© NRH Nutrition Consultants, Inc.
Jo-Ann Heslin, MA, RD, CDN is a registered dietitian and the author of the nutrition counter series for Pocket Books with 12 current titles and sales in excess of 8 million books. The books are widely available at your local or on-line bookseller.
Current titles include:
The Calorie Counter, 5th Ed., 2010
The Ultimate Carbohydrate Counter, 3rd Ed., 2010
The Complete Food Counter, 3rd ed., 2009
The Fat Counter, 7th ed., 2009
The Healthy Wholefoods Counter, 2008
The Cholesterol Counter, 7th Ed., 2008
The Diabetes Carbohydrate and Calorie Counter, 3rd Ed., 2007
For more information on Jo-Ann and her books, go to The Nutrition Experts
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