Quest for Real Food Labels

What is the first thing you look for on food labels? This is the question I posed to my community and their answers surprised me.

Of the 24 people who weighed in, few were looking for the same thing. Most of my friends are very health-conscious and have either lost weight or maintain healthy lifestyle habits. Some of my friends are also nutritionists or health advocates.

But, they still did not agree on what is the most important inforation on food labels.

Here is the breakdown of what they said:

• 6 look for real ingredients (no additives, flavoring agents, etc)
• 5 look for fat or fat calories
• 4 look for sugar
• 4 look for salt
• 3 look for calories
• 2 look for serving size
• 1 look for protein
• 1 look for macronutrients

*Many looked for a combination of the above.

What can be learned from this informal study is that everyone has a different priority when it comes to nutrition. Not to mention, some were not aware of how to interpret the nutrition facts on food labels.

Before we explore how to make some of these nutrition facts work for you, let’s understand what food labels actually tell us about the nutrition in our food.

There are 4 distinct sections on a food label. They are:

Serving information

The serving size reflects the amount that people typically eat or drink. Paying attention to serving size of what you are eating is critical to learning portion control, especially if you tend to overeat. Some serving sizes may be as low as a few pieces, or the entire packet.

Calories

2,000 calories a day is used as a general guide for nutrition advice. However, if you are not a 6′ tall man of approximately 175 pounds, this calorie guideline may not be appropriate for you. If you aren’t certain how many calories you should shoot for, let’s connect on a phone call.

Nutrients

Next are key nutrients that may impact your health. The top half of this section of the label includes the macronutrients of fat, carbs, and protein, and breaks those down farther into different types of fat or carbs that may be less beneficial for health (such as saturated or trans fat, sugar and added sugars). The second half of this section focuses on nutrients that many Americans are insufficient in, such as vitamin D, iron, calcium and potassium. How much of each of these you require depends on personal factors.

The Percent Daily Value (%DV)

The % Daily Value (%DV) is the percentage of the Daily Value for each nutrient in a serving of the food. The %DV helps you determine if a serving of food is high or low in a nutrient.

• 5% DV or less of a nutrient per serving is considered low
• 20% DV or more of a nutrient per serving is considered high

There are also dual-column variations of food labels that may show up on products with multiple serving sizes. For more on food labels, please visit this Federal Drug Administration article.

Below are my comments on how to make some of these work for you.

REAL FOOD

I was shocked at how many people look at ingredients first. This is probably due to the popularity of food documentaries like Fed Up and books like Sugar, Salt, Fat. The whole foods movement is a powerful one that is gaining traction in many communities.

There is no bad side to looking for real food ingredients. However, if real food is an important criteria, perhaps you should check out some healthy recipes to try out.

FAT

I was blind-sided that so many people look for fat. Studies have shown that high-fat diets such as the Mediterranean Diet can be heart-healthy and help you lose weight. I have several friends who eat up to 40% of their daily nutrition in the form of fat, and they are the slimmest people I know. It is also popular amongst people who are actively building their muscle to eat at least 30% fat a day.

However, history is hard to ignore. If you grew up in the 80’s like me, you remember the low-fat diet craze. Our mouths crave the texture from fat, so food manufacturers replaced that texture with sugar. I used to eat boxes of those darn Snackwell’s devil’s food cookies. After all, they were low-fat.

We now know that fat does NOT make you fat. Healthy fats come from oils like coconut, olive, and flaxseed and from foods such as nuts and avocadoes. Most healthy sources of fat would not find their way on a food label.

If you are eating lots of meat and dairy, then it is a good idea to go for leaner varieties. Please note, though, that low-fat or reduced fat cheeses or yogurts might have added sugars.

SUGAR

Most processed foods have some form of added sugar. Added Sugars on the food label include sugars that are added during the processing of foods (such as sucrose or dextrose), foods packaged as sweeteners (such as table sugar), sugars from syrups and honey, and sugars from concentrated fruit or vegetable juices.

Some tips on identifying the many aliases for sugars, both added and naturally-occurring include:

• Any ingredient ending in –ose is most likely another form of sugar. Examples are high fructose corn syrup, sucrose, maltose and dextrose
• Inulin, Maltodextrin, dextrin, ethyl maltol, maple syrup, brown rice syrup, honey, molasses, coconut palm sugar, stevia, agave

Here is a list of up to 46 aliases for the sweet stuff.

Natural sources of sugar are still sugar, and some may even distract your digestive system. It has been my experience that using stevia or agave in baking results in inferior quality as well.

CALORIES

It’s encouraging that so few people pay attention to calories. However, if you are trying to lose weight, you need to at least be aware of how many calories you are eating. This can be through calorie counting, portion control, or serving sizes.

If you eat at restaurants at least several times a week, you are probably eating (and drinking) more than you know!

When I first started losing weight, I focused on calories. That was the only way I knew how to eat less. There is a better way.

FILL YOUR PLATE

Every time you eat, aim to have at least 40% of the plate filled with carbohydrates in the form of vegetables, fruits or whole grains, 30% of the plate filled with protein, and 30% of the plate filled with fat. These are the 3 macronutrients.

This recommendation is slightly different from traditional low-fat or low-carb diets. Instead, filling up your plate in this way focuses less on single nutrients, and looks at a holistic view of nutrition.

It also allows you to select foods you actually enjoy.

♥If you don’t eat salmon, then your protein source can be eggs.

♥If you have a nut allergy, have an olive-oil based dressing on your salad and throw some sunflower seeds for fat.

♥If broccoli makes you gag, just find any other vegetable that tantalizes your taste buds.

This is what helped me maintain my 100-pound weight loss, and helps you avoid all the food label confusion.

It’s your turn to WEIGH IN. What do you look for first on a food label? How has this approach improved your eating habits?