Food Labels and What They Mean

One of the advantages of having been a calorie counter was learning how to read food labels.  Reading the nutrition facts for particular foods not only helped me control the amount of food I consumed in a sitting, but the amount of fat, salt, sugar and carbs I was taking in as well.  I don't count calories anymore because I found it too time consuming, however I still read food labels in order to know how many servings of foods I should be taking in at each meal. 


According to Canada's Food Guide, one can use food labels to "compare products more easily; determine the nutritional value of foods; and help you choose a product with more or less of a particular nutrient".  They usually have 13 nutrients listed as these are what "consumers, health professionals and scientists consider important to the health of Canadians".


For the healthy minded individual food labels provide an opportunity to focus ones attention on healthy eating by comparing products more easily and determine the nutritional value of foods to help one manage their weight.


Before you go off and start getting label crazy, it is important to know how much of the various nutrients you should be taking in.  For example, based on the USDA Food Pyramid, when it comes to sodium the daily recommended serving for individuals aged 9-50 is 1500 mg/day; for sugar, the rule of thumb is less than 22 grams/day (6tsp's/day) and for fat the value is approximately 53 grams/day.


For more information on food labels, check out this great article by Laura Bofinger from sparkpeople.com:


http://www.sparkpeople.com/resource/nutrition_articles.asp?id=145

Image from Canada's Food Guide