The Truth on Health

By Connie Evers MS, RD, LD – Nutrition for Kids

Connie’s Healthy Eating Blog – Be a Food Fact Finder

Use Label Logic To Find Healthier Food Choices

Instead of just ripping the package open and munching away, first apply some label logic to decipher the Nutrition Facts food label.

Some foods don’t need Nutrition Facts labels because what you see is what you get. For example, fresh fruits and vegetables don’t need an ingredient label since there is only one ingredient. For most other foods, a nutrition label will show you the ingredients and also the nutrition value of the food.

WHAT’S ON A LABEL

Ingredient label:
The ingredients are listed from most to least, by weight. In other words, if the first ingredient is “sugar,” the product is mostly sugar*. If sugar is the 10th ingredient, there may only be a small amount in the product. The ingredient label also gives you clues about how “close to nature” the food is. A product with lots of strange sounding chemicals, dyes and artificial flavors is highly processed and usually not the best for you. If you have food allergies, it’s very important to read the ingredient label to make sure you won’t accidentally eat something that will cause a reaction.

*By the way, there are many ways to say “sugar” on a food label. All of the following ingredients are types of sugars: High fructose corn syrup, sucrose, dextrose, glucose, molasses, honey, brown sugar, corn sweetener, corn syrup, fructose, invert sugar, and fruit juice concentrates.

Serving size:
Pay attention here! You may glance at the label and think you are getting 50 calories and 5 grams of sugar, only to find out later (after you actually read the label), that the container you just finished off was 4 servings (so how many calories and sugar did you really eat?).

Servings per container:
Again, you can’t assume that one container, bottle or package is one serving. Often, there are 2 or 4 or even 3.5 servings in one container.

Nutrient Values:
The package lists several nutrients that are found in one serving of the food. Here’s the rundown:

Percent Daily Values :
These values help you to figure out whether a food has a little or a lot of a nutrient. The 5-10-20 rule is helpful when looking at a serving of food:

(Be careful though, because sometimes highly processed foods have been fortified with nutrients in order to make them seem more nutritious.)

APPLYING LABEL LOGIC

Labels are helpful when you are comparing foods such as cereal, yogurt, fruit juice, breads
and many other products. As you read labels, make sure the serving sizes are about the
same. The next time you go to the store, try making some of the following comparisons:

For more information:

How to Understand and Use the Nutrition Facts Label: http://www.fda.gov/food/labelingnutrition/consumerinformation/ucm078889.htm

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