It is so nice of you to come back for a visit. I can’t wait to share with you some information on label reading to help keep your family healthy. All of the research I have done says that people who read labels are leaner and healthier overall than folks who do not read labels. That is not to say that reading labels makes you skinny. However, if you have no idea what you are putting in your body…….how healthy do you think you are? Are you willing to just leave that to chance? I thought it would be a good idea to have a frank discussion about food nutrition labels. My experience is in the US for those of you outside of the United States……..leave me some comments below to let me know what you are seeing in your country.
If you are like most, you likely look at the calories on any package first. That’s a great start. It is important to evaluate your overall daily calories. What I have found to be even more important information to me is the serving size. I have been floored over and over about how unrealistic serving sizes seem to be. Sure it seems like there are not many calories in the food item so I go ahead and eat it………till I’ve had enough. Then, I find out that I’ve eaten 6 servings. Oh, no! It is also VERY common to see a number like 2.5 servings per container. How the heck am I going to eat or drink 2.5? I’m probably going to have all of it or half of it. Certainly, not 2.5 of it.
I’ve also come to realize in my family that we need to be careful about feeding our children adult serving sizes. They are growing and need a lot of nutrition, but they do not need adult serving sizes.
The next section of the label covers items that we likely want to reduce or limit in our diets. There you will find the amount of fat, cholesterol, and sodium. I am blown away at the amount of sodium I find in processed foods. I take in far less sodium when I cook using whole food ingredients. The only salt is the salt I put into my recipes. Even with all of the nutrition changes that we have made, my husband still has high blood pressure. I try to watch his salt intake by limiting the amount I use.
The section after that covers certain nutrients like Vitamin A, Vitamin C, Calcium, and Iron. I’ll be honest……….these are certainly important to include in your diet, but I don’t worry too much about this on my packaged foods. I feel like I eat a nice variety of fresh fruits, vegetables, dairy, and organic meat. I am mindful to eat this variety so that my vitamins, minerals and other nutrients fall into place without me worrying about them individually.
Now for the real eye opener!
Are you reading the ingredient list? This is now the first place I look when I am buying a new product. My husband and I have spent hours and hours reading ingredient labels. The kids get annoyed with us a bit. When we started our real food switchover, we actually had a few “date nights” at the grocery store so we could read labels to our heart’s content. We are so romantic, huh?! We try to stick to 5 ingredients or less when we buy anything in a box, bag, or can. It’s not easy……….let me tell you. I look at packages with nice farm scenes on the front and find all ingredients created by scientists. Nothing raised or grown on a farm! No thank you. They go back on the shelf right away.
The ingredients are listed in order of most to least. As I look at the label above……it shows me that there is more whole wheat than there is salt. I want to see ingredients that I recognize and can pronounce. I am really frustrated by the number of ingredients in so many foods.
How about you? Are you frustrated by unknown ingredients on food labels? Have you ever thought about what those ingredients are? Have you ever thought about limiting the number of ingredients you eat when you choose processed food products? Let me know your thoughts on food labels………….do you find them helpful, confusing, or do you just skip over them?
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Great post. Totally agree. Them the serving size is 4 crackers. Who eats 4 crackers?
You got it April! I eat way more than 4 crackers. At least now I know and can start to do the math.
I'm big on reading labels and for the most part understand what I should and maybe shouldn't look at. I tend to overload myself with healthy eating and maybe one too many weight loss books. Then I have information overload and have no idea what I really should pay attention too except for all those weird ingredients I can't pronounce! ~yumeating.com
Reading labels are SO important even if you are already familiar with the product. It's always shocking to see all the added ingredients to seemingly basic food. I heard their is a proposal being reviewed to update food labels. It'll be interesting to see what they come up with. Visiting you from Let's Get Real!
5 ingredients or less is such a great rule of thumb! I honestly and just starting to move towards a more of a raw food diet. I've been so inspired by a more natural lifestyle I've been embracing and it's exciting. I will be buying things less and less that have a nutritional label at all, but it is nice to go by the 5 ingredient rule. 🙂
Excellent! I admire all the helpful data you've shared in your articles.Keep posting about good ingredients!
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I completely agree with the idea of paying close attention to food nutrition labels and being mindful of serving sizes, especially when feeding children. It’s easy to consume more than we realize when servings are small and containers have fractional servings. Tracking sodium intake and opting for whole foods to control it is a smart choice as well. While it’s important to consider essential nutrients, a varied diet rich in fruit, vegetables, dairy, and meat typically provides sufficient nutrients without closely monitoring individual vitamins and minerals.
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