Tips for reading nutritional
labels:
Check the list of ingredients:
Ingredients are listed on the
label in order of importance.
If the first ingredient is sugar,
don't buy it. Here are a list of
other names you might encounter
for sugar:
Whole wheat breat and whole grain bread is different. If the first ingredient is enriched flour, then the product isn't truly whole grain. Look for ground wheat, oats, rye, etc as the first ingredient.
If the list ingredients includes words you can't pronounce, you probably don't want to eat it.
Check the number of portions in the product
Be sure to check number of portions against the number of calories in the product. For instance, if you look at the label on a bottle of flavored ice tea it may say 90 calories and 18 grams of sugar per serving. However, the 16 oz bottle may contain 2 or more servings bringing the total up to 180 calories and 36 grams of sugar. (A 2000 calorie diet should contain no more than 50 grams of sugar per day or about 10% of those calories).
Calories 170 Calories from Fat 60
%Daily Value
Total Fat 7 g 11%
Saturated Fat 2 g 10%
Trans Fat 0 g
Check for "good" fats vs "bad" fats
Good fats are necessary to healthy living and help you keep your weight down. Unsaturated fats include olive oil, nuts, canola and peanuts oils. Fats to avoid are saturated fats such as palm oil and cottonseed oils, butter, fat from red meat and dairy products, and any "partially hydrogenated oil."
Partially hydrogenated oils or trans fats are also to be avoided and are now listed on labels. However, by law a product may still contain .5 mg and still be labeled trans-fat free or zero trans fats. On the label below, the product says "Trans Fat 0g".
Eggs, Partially hydrogenated soybean and cotton
seed oil with TGHQ to Preserve flavor, oats, Palm
and palm kernel oil, soybean oil, coconut
So how do we know if the product is truly trans fat free? Check the list of ingredients. If you see partially hydrogenated oil in any form, palm or cottonseed oil, then the product contains under .5 g but it isn't trans fat free. Here is a partial list of the ingredients from the same package.
Tricky but entirely legal.
Limit consumption of good fats to 20 percent to 35 percent of your daily calories. Also on the above label notice that the calories from the item are 170 and calories from fat are 60. In a 2000 calorie daily diet, fat should be limited to 20 to 35% of calories, or 400 to 700 calories.
© Copyright 2007 by Path2HealthyLiving
