Purely Nourished

The Nutri­tion Facts Label, printed on the sides of most pack­aged foods can be daunt­ing. Most peo­ple have dif­fi­culty decid­ing where start or what ingre­di­ents are most impor­tant to pay atten­tion to. In this post Purely Nour­ished will break down labels in  a sim­ple, easy to under­stand manner.

Start at the serv­ing size. With­out this impor­tant infor­ma­tion, the rest of the info is worth­less. Check to see how many serv­ings are included in the pack­age. The serv­ing size influ­ences the num­ber of calo­ries and nutri­ent amounts listed on the label. Make a con­scious deci­sion about the num­ber of serv­ings you will be con­sum­ing and go from there.

Calo­ries and calo­ries from fat are the mea­sures of how much energy you will be receiv­ing from a serv­ing of this food, twice as much if you are con­sum­ing two serv­ing sizes.  To deter­mine the amount of calo­ries you will be con­sum­ing, mul­ti­ply the num­ber of calo­ries by the amount of serv­ing sizes you are plan­ning to have. Calo­ries from fat deter­mines the num­ber of calo­ries you will be tak­ing in from fat. This sec­tion is nec­es­sary if you are try­ing to decrease your fat intake. There is a rec­om­mended per­cent­age of calo­ries from fat, pro­tein, and car­bo­hy­drate that you should con­sume daily. The calo­ries from fat are the most impor­tant to pay atten­tion to.

As calo­ries are con­cerned, a food with 40 or less is low, 100 is mod­er­ate, and 400 and above is con­sid­ered to be high.

Nutri­ents found in the pack­age are listed below the calo­ries. They include fat, cho­les­terol, sodium, car­bo­hy­drates, and pro­tein.  Sub­cat­e­gories of the total fat are sat­u­rated, unsat­u­rated, polyun­sat­u­rated and trans fats, while sugar and fiber are the sub­cat­e­gories of car­bo­hy­drates. Fat, cho­les­terol, and sodium are usu­ally already con­sumed in ade­quate amounts in the diet. Try to limit these nutri­ents, pay­ing extra atten­tion to leav­ing out the sat­u­rated and trans fats. All three of these nutri­ents may increase the risk of chronic dis­ease if con­sumed in high amounts on a reg­u­lar basis. As for car­bo­hy­drates, most peo­ple don’t get enough dietary fiber, but more than enough sugar. Eat­ing a diet high in fiber pro­motes healthy bowel and diges­tive func­tion. A diet rich in fruits, veg­eta­bles and whole grains con­tributes to ade­quate amounts of fiber and a reduc­tion in the risk of heart dis­ease. While increas­ing your intake of fiber, try to keep you intake of sugar low. Pro­tein lev­els should be around 35% of daily your daily caloric intake.  Veg­e­tar­i­ans and veg­ans usu­ally need to be more con­scious of the pro­tein lev­els, as they are more likely to be deficient.

Vit­a­mins and Min­er­als are located in a small rec­tan­gu­lar box below the nutri­ent list. These include Vit­a­min A, Cal­cium, Vit­a­min C, and Iron. Unfor­tu­nately, by eat­ing processed and pack­aged foods we are not obtain­ing ade­quate amounts of these vit­a­mins. Pay atten­tion to the foods that are high in these vit­a­mins and min­er­als and try to incor­po­rate those foods in your diet on a daily basis.

Below vit­a­mins and min­er­als there is a foot­note that tells you the per­cent daily val­ues based on a 2000 and 2500 calo­rie diet. It gives you the total gram amounts for each nutri­ent depend­ing on the spe­cific calo­rie diet. In my opin­ion, this sec­tion is not very use­ful because no two peo­ple are expected to thrive off the same diet. In the past it was deter­mined that most peo­ple fare best on a 2000 calo­rie diet. In this day and age, caloric intake is deter­mined by body size and activ­ity level, there­fore no two peo­ple are the same. Stay tuned for a later post where I break down spe­cific caloric needs and how to deter­mine your % daily val­ues based on your spe­cific caloric needs.

The per­cent daily value (%DV) is based on the rec­om­men­da­tions for a 2000 calo­rie diet. Per­cent daily val­ues are great to under­stand but not nec­es­sary to look at when decid­ing on a meal. The %DV  helps you deter­mine if a food is high or low in a spe­cific nutri­ent. It puts grams of nutri­ents on a 100% scale where you can see how close you are to obtain­ing ade­quate amounts of that nutrient.

Last but not least, read the ingre­di­ent label. This list tells you what exactly is in the pack­age. The ingre­di­ents that are in the great­est con­cen­tra­tions will be listed first, while the ingre­di­ents in lesser amounts will be listed towards the end. Strive for five or less ingre­di­ents and make sure they are all iden­ti­fi­able. Stay away from high fruc­tose corn syrup!

To sum­ma­rize:

• Know your serv­ing size,
• Limit your total fat, espe­cially trans and sat­u­rated versions
• Main­tain low intakes of cho­les­terol and sodium
• Up your fiber consumption
• Decrease your sugar
• Read the ingre­di­ent label and stay away from long lists and unpro­nounce­able names

With all said, the eas­i­est way to get low calo­rie, nutri­ent dense foods is by eat­ing un-packaged whole foods such as fruits, veg­gies, and whole grains. Limit your intake of pack­aged foods when­ever you can.