Be Honest About Nutritional Information

Every morning on my way in to work, I think about all the stupid people on the road and think to myself... I should write a blog about that person. But then I get to work and get settled in and forget. It's time to wake up the Glitchy Rants blog! Viva la rants!

So this morning I am blogging about a different sort of annoyance - nutritional information. Now, I'm not one of those hard-core calorie counters like some of the girls I work with are. I don't eat particularly healthy and I'm terrible at dieting. I do still check the nutritional information from time to time to see just how bad some of the food is that I am eating.

Pet Peeve: Why can't the manufacturers just be honest about the serving size? My son really wanted me to buy Pop Tarts for him for breakfast and as an adult, I still love Pop Tarts so who could deny him that simple pleasure? And of course if they are in the house, I'm likely to sneak a couple so I decided to check the nutritional information to see how bad it really is for me.

Serving Size: 1 pastry.

Really? You mean there are actually people out there who open one of the packets (which if you don't know has two pastries in it), take out a single pastry, put it in the toaster, and then find a zip-lock baggie for the other pastry? Come on! The packets have 2 pastries in them, thus the serving size is 2 pastries, not 1!! Stop lying to consumers to make your products look better than they are. Just be honest with us and let us make our own decision on whether or not we are willing to burn off the extra calories that these little heavenly pastries are packed full of... Let's be real here, if a parent is buying Pop Tarts for their child for breakfast, they are obviously not all that concerned about the healthiness of the meal.

Snack food manufacturers are the worst at this. Cookies and chips always have very low serving size counts. Serving Size: 2 cookies  Serving Size: 13 chips
How many of you open a pack of Oreos and stop eating after 2 cookies? How many open a bag of chips and put it away after 13 chips?

My favorite are the ones (like the Pop Tart) example above that are pre-packed into a serving, but then the serving size is actually half of that. Take for example a can of pop. I haven't checked one in a while, but a 12oz can of soda used to say servings per container: 2. Really? You are going to drink half of a soda and then put it back in the refrigerator to drink the VERY flat other half tomorrow? Come on!! Who does that??

I do like the whole 100 calorie snack packs that are out now, because it does help portion control to package things with "actual portions" that make you mindful of your calorie count, but I'm not even suggesting all manufacturers do that. Package it however you want. Just be honest about how many calories are in the portion that you have rationed out. If a person wants to eat half the portion to watch their calorie count, let that be on the consumer.