The serving sizes printed on nutrition labels used to be something Jody Thompson just tore past on her way to a snack. “I never paid attention to a serving size unless I was in an attempt to diet,” says Thompson, 32. “Even when I would diet, I know I overate.”
Now 237 pounds lighter after gastric bypass surgery in 2001, Thompson says she studies every food label carefully. Although she learned a lot from dietitians at the Wish Center in Downers Grove, she still needed about a year to master label reading.
“Sometimes, you have to be a mathematician to see what they mean,” says Thompson, who now weighs 184 pounds.
Consumers aren’t the only ones criticizing hard-to-understand nutrition labels. The Food and Drug Administration’s Obesity Working Group recently introduced a proposal to make labels more consumer-friendly by printing serving-size information more prominently on the package.
Dietitian Dawn Jackson agrees that nutrition labels should be improved. She says labels on packages such as cake mixes, which list dry ingredients instead of prepared servings, aren’t helpful.
“Many times, people are giving themselves more calories than they thought,” says Jackson, who works at Northwestern Memorial Hospital in Chicago. “You’re not eating it dry. Look at the prepared calories.”
Label reading should start with a long look at the serving size, Jackson says. Check the size of the serving and how many servings are in the product. Next, read the calorie and fat information and consider how many servings you’re likely to eat.
Beware of small snack food bags that also are easy to misread, adds Jackson, who says too many snackers assume a small bag has just one serving when it may contain several.
To avoid extra servings, Jackson recommends dividing large snack bags into one-serving sandwich bags. “If it isn’t portion controlled for you, then you portion control it yourself,” she says.
Weight gain is inevitable when there isn’t a sense of serving size, says Sheldon Levine, a doctor with Advocate South Suburban Hospital in Hazel Crest. “[People] are going to be taking in more calories, more fat grams, and they are going to wonder why they aren’t losing weight,” he says.
Fast checking
Make sure the serving on the label matches the one on your plate. Here’s how the calories add up:
PRODUCT: Pillsbury’s Moist Supreme Cake Mix
LABEL: 1/2 of mix is 180 calories; 4g fat.
PROBLEM: The recipe adds butter and eggs.
NEW MATH: Calories: Mix (2,160) + butter (800) + eggs (210)
= 3,170
Fat: Mix (48) + butter (88) + eggs (12) = 148g
OVERDOSE: 1/12 of the cake is actually 264 calories; 12.3g fat
PRODUCT: Post Raisin Bran Cereal
LABEL: One cup is 190 calories; 1g fat.
PROBLEM: Two cups are a more likely serving.
NEW MATH: Calories: 190 x 2 = 380
Fat: 1 x 2 = 2g
OVERDOSE: Typical serving is double the expected calories.
PRODUCT: Planters Trail Mix
LABEL: One serving is 170 calories; 11g fat.
PROBLEM: Most are likely to eat the entire bag, which has five servings.
NEW MATH: Calories: 170 x 5 = 850
Fat: 11 x 5 = 55g
OVERDOSE: One bag is a day’s worth of fat grams.
SOURCES: PACKAGE LABELS AND COMPANY INFORMATION
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Edited by Cara DiPasquale (cdipasquale@tribune.com) and Kris Karnopp (kkarnopp@tribune.com)
