We may need a couple of posts on food labelling. Lets start with the marketing companies use. How they advertise can mean you don’t always get what you think you are!
High in Protein
Protein is more trendy these days, as more people understand the benefits. What this has led to is a lot of products sticking “High in Protein” on them. The problem is what the definition of high actually is. There is quite a lot room for interpretation so it can be misleading.
The Pop Chips image is a large sharing bag. The 25g they put in a large font isn’t even in the entire bag! Yes they state it’s per 100g, but a lot of people struggle to visualise what that is in terms of actual food. When you break down that in the full 85g bag you’re down to 21.25g. Then they don’t list portion sizes – another flaw. Lets say the average serving is more like 30g, now you’re only at 7.5g.
To get the benefits of protein and stimulate MPS that isn’t close to being enough. Maybe the whole bag just about would be, but that’s a lot of calories for that much protein. A lot of trail mix bars similarly are labelled high in protein but read the label and it’s often less than 5g.
Vitamins & Minerals
Next up with the current pandemic (as well as general health seeking tendencies) labelling specific nutrients in large letters can entice you to buy them. This smoothie was a large bottle, and a serving is 150ml. This is pretty standard for juices. But checking the vitamin content, firstly it’s written in a way that is not easy to quickly scan and understand. The content (per serving) is well under half the MINIMUM you should be getting daily. Then while they list the serving size pretty clearly the calorie amount is listed only per 100ml.
They’re not all bad
I have put some examples of good food labelling too. These are nice and easy to understand. The serving sizes on each are very clear. They have a breakdown of nutrients/calories both per 100g/ml as well as per serving size.
The more you read labels the more you will understand the contents of the food you buy and consume. Also it will help you spot where the marketing companies are over-hyping the contents, and how they fit into a full days recommended nutrient amounts.
(Reposted from Instagram)
