Oh man, it’s been almost a month since my last post. Life kind of happened haha. I’ve had to cope with the sudden unexpected passing of one of my dogs, Handsome. I’ve also been dealing with 2 new puppies, school, tons of demos with LetlerFit apparel, and the release of my new online workout program Get LetlerFit in 30 days! Link to view/purchase my program click here. (Can be downloaded internationally)
Anyways, today’s post is dedicated to reading nutrition labels (the basics). By law every food item we purchase at a convenient store, supermarket etc. that comes packaged must contain Nutrition Facts that include ingredients, macronutrient and micronutrient break downs, serving size, and calories per serving.
If you start at the top of the label you will see Serving size and Servings per container. The macronutrient breakdown of each serving size follows below. Now, how do they get the calories to declare up top where it says calories per serving? In my previous post about macronutrients I mentioned that Carbohydrates contain 4 calories per gram, protein contains 4 calories per gram, and fat contains 9 calories per gram. If you look at the attached Nutrition Label that also has explanations on how to read it you will see that this particular item has
12 g of fat, 31g of carbs, and 5g of protein. So per serving 12g of fat times 9 gives 108 calories from fat, 31g of carbs times 4 gives 125 calories from carbs, and 5g of protein times 4 gives 20 calories from protein per serving. In total that is 253 (rounds down to 250) calories per 1 cup of this food item.
Underneath the macronutrients, the micronutrients are listed. Next to both macro and micronutrients you can find the % Daily value column. The downfall to this column is that the daily values are based on a 2,000 calorie diet (average male diet) so women have to estimate based off of the listed daily values. So for example, if you are eating this food item and consume roughly 2,000 calories a day you are getting 20% of your Calcium needs, which means in your other foods you need to consume the other 80% of your Calcium needs.
In the attached photo ingredients are not listed, but on all labels you can find them. So looking at a label you see from very few ingredients to labels that contain tons of weird ingredients. The less ingredients, generally the better the food item is for you. The more ingredients on a label, the more fillers, useless junk, chemicals, and preservatives are what can be found. The order in which the ingredients are listed are NOT random by the way. The ingredients that comes first on the list are the ones that are most found in the food item while the ingredients towards the end of the list are the ones that the item least contains.
In the above example, the item most contains enriched flour and has the least of the food dyes.
That just about sums about nutrition labels. Any questions? Don’t be afraid to comment! Don’t forget to check out my online at home 30 day workout program! Click here (Can be downloaded internationally)
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