What are you Really Eating?
How to read a label!
Reading the label on prepared foods is very important. The front of the package will use phrases such as “all natural,” “100% of Vitamin E and Folic Acid,” and “100% Daily Value of Vitamins and Minerals.” You probably don’t look at the back, where the real truth lies. Even if you do, you must be careful. One patient was looking for a cereal that was low in sugar. What she didn’t realize is that all carbohydrates are sugar. When the word sugar is on the label it refers to added sugar, so don’t let it fool you. Let’s look at a typical label:
There is one more fallacy on the label. The typical serving size is 3 times the serving size on the label. Most people who eat cereal eat 3 cups, not the 3/4 to 1 cup listed. To get an accurate amount of sugar, subtract the dietary fiber amount from the total carbohydrate count to get the grams of insulin-producing carbohydrate. Then multiply the insulin-producing carbohydrate grams by 3. In the above example this would equal 108 grams. To balance this meal you would need to add about 84 grams of protein. The key to reading a label is to remember the balanced food formula: 7 grams of protein, 9 grams of carbohydrate and 1.5 grams of fat. All labels are measured in grams. The above label is for a popular breakfast cereal, said to be healthy and fortified with vitamins and minerals. Let’s analyze how healthy it really is.
If a meal contains 108 grams of carbohydrate, divide the number of grams by 5, which is the carbohydrate count of a lump of sugar. Each lump of sugar contains two sugar cubes so you then multiply by 2 to get the number of sugar cubes in your meal. Therefore the above breakfast cereal contains the equivalent of 43 sugar cubes. How healthy is this?
TO DETERMINE THE AMOUNT OF INSULIN–PRODUCING CARBOHYDRATE |
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| Total Carbohydrate | ............................................ |
41 grams |
| Dietary Fiber | ............................................ | - 5 grams |
| Insulin–producing | ............................................ | 36 grams/1 cup |
| Typical Serving 3 cups | ............................................ | 3 x 36 =108 grams |
108/2.3 = 47 sugar cube equivalent in the above cereal |
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