Complete Guide to Understand Nutrition Facts Label
Learning to read the nutrition facts label can be a skill that nobody interested in learning. I mean, when was the last time you ever found someone bragging about being an expert in reading nutrition facts? But having the ability to read nutrition label can improve and save your life. If you think about it, you can know what actual things you swallow down your throat, and create a better lifestyle and diet. Knowing what’s good and not for your body will at least psychologically help you to limit and avoid consuming bad stuff.
For a while, I have immersed myself in living a more healthy and balanced diet. I stop consuming process sugar and do routine exercises. I also keep track of my protein intake. Little did I know, I started to get interested to get deeper into understanding the label. Not long ago, my family member got a medical treatment that makes me learn more about the nutrition facts label.
When learning, I found all answer to my question on the internet. But I have to go to several websites and go back and forth to solve the puzzle. My intention here is to try to help you understand how to read the label without having to go berzerk on your internet browser.
Disclaimer: I have no medical degree and background, not a nutritionist nor doctor. I’ve been learning this for quite sometimes through accountable references and studies. I also try to write this as human-friendly-language as possible so everyone can understand.
So basically, the nutrition facts label, divided into 3 parts; The Serving size and total calories, the macronutrients, and the micronutrients. Before that, I want to tell you the loopholes that manufacturers can exploit.
The Loopholes
Have you ever read a label with 0gr of sugar or 0gr of trans fat? That might not completely true. The fact that they can have 0–0.49 grams of those things and writing it a full zero without violating the rule.[1]
The other loophole is the manufacturers don’t really have to write everything in the label itself. Food and health organisations like the FDA have their own guidelines on making the label, so a requirement in the US might not be the same as the law in Asia or Europe. But one thing for sure for most of the lawmakers itself, the usual bad thing in food have to be written in the label.
The Serving Size and Total Calories
As the words imply, serving size is the portion of the food you are recommended to consume in one time. We’ll have an example of sweet cookies, for this explanation. In the label, you found the information about serving size of 5pcs in 4 amount of serving. Means, in one container of the cookies, there will be about 20 pieces of cookies. Grams, millilitres, or another amount variable, can be interchangeable according to the products. In the example below, the total amount in the container will be 28.5gr x 4 = 114gr.
Serving size x Amount of serving = Total amount of the product
Now you know serving size, the label will give you the information about the macronutrient and micronutrient, for that specific amount of serving size.
This is where most of us get it wrong. We are aware that the label told us that it contains 10 grams of sugar, so we ate a bag of it, while the amount of serving said for 4 amount of serving. That means we swallowed 40gr of sugar innocently.
As I said above, the number of total calories will also be for one serving. So please be mindful of what the amount of serving told you, as it’s one of the most important things to calculate the nutrition facts.
This part also tells you about the daily value reference. Most of the products will use 2000–2200cal as a daily value reference.
Daily Value
Usually, the total reference number will be at the bottom of the label. But, if you are going to be a perfectionist, counting your total intake, you are going to need to make sure that you translate all your products into the same daily value.
This total daily value will then translate into the percentage of the recommended intake for particular nutrition i.e. fats, protein, vitamin, etc. You can see this number on the right side of the label following the amount numbers.
The Macros (Fat, Protein, Carbs)
1. Fat
Not all fat we’re made the same. One of the most common misconceptions about our diet and lifestyle is “don’t consume fat, it will make you fat”. The thing is fat is actually important for our diet as it provides the most calories, therefore the most energy, it helps your body to absorbs and process other nutrients, and many other benefits[2]. As many recommend to consume 25–35% fat for your daily intake. But, there’s a bad fat indeed, and we should avoid it.
Fat would be divided into three main types. The Unsaturated, the Saturated, and the Trans. We’ll make it easy here with:
“Take the Unsaturated, limit the Saturated, avoid the Trans.”
A common confusion about reading the label is,
“why do the printed numbers of fat doesn’t equal to the total fat.”
Well, as it turns out, it’s because of the loopholes. Manufacturers often don’t require to write their unsaturated fat contained in the products. If you look at the example beside, it contained approximately 3gr of unsaturated fat. And it’s a good thing, or is it?
Unsaturated fat is good, but be aware that there are types of unsaturated fat, and some can change form to trans fat by the temperatures. You would find many vegetable oils that have zero trans fat on the label, but when you use it to fry, it might change the unsaturated fats to trans. The best is to consume unsaturated fat raw with the minimum process.
Cholesterols, sometimes printed as parts of fat. Though it’s a type of lipid, it’s different from fat. We’ll discuss this later.
2. Protein
For most of the people living in this world, protein is a good guy.
As it is good enough to consume at a reasonable value, the label will almost always only write the total amount of protein.
That being said, it’s a bad idea to consume everything excessively. Protein is no different. Too much of it leads to several problems such as liver and kidney diseases according to some studies. But unless you’re obsessed with protein, it is really hard to consume protein excessively.
3. Carbohydrate
Unlike his brother, protein, carbs have probably been the most controversial of the macros. Being correlated with sugar, sometimes carbs even consider worse than fat.
The common mistake of reading nutrition facts on carbs is quite similar to fat contain readings.
We might ask;
“Why the total carbs doesn’t equal to the sub-written numbers?”
All the sugars are carbs. But, not all carbs created equal. In fact, one of the most important thing for good intestine is fibre, and it’s carbs! Fibre goes through your body undigested and helps regulates blood sugar level.[3] There’s a lot of good sugar-bonds that your body actually love.
Not all carbs are created equal.
I’ll try to explain it as simple as I can please bare with me.
Sugar can be divided into three groups,
1. Monosaccharide
This type of sugar also called a simple sugar, is one molecule of sugar. This type of sugar is what your body will absorb, and use it as energy. To much of unused sugar will then stored as fat. This type of sugar will further be divided into:
a. Glucose: you’ll find this most likely on every carbs
b. Fructose: you’ll find this most likely on fruits
c. Galactose: you’ll find this most likely on dairies.
2. Disaccharide
This type of sugar is created by two bonding simple sugar. This bond will be processed in your body to be separated and become mono-saccharides. These bonds include:
a. Maltose: Glucose & Glucose
b. Sucrose: Glucose & Fructose
c. Lactose: Glucose & Galactose
3. Polysaccharide
This type of sugar consist of multiple sugar molecules bonding together. Usually this kind of bonds are not called by the word ‘sugar’. This create products such as starch and fibre that are great for your guts. As the bonds were created strong, this type of sugar most likely not to be absorbed by our body.
Feel free to read it back and forth as this is the simplest explanation I can give you.
Back to the label, if you look to the example below, this is an oat product’s label, and as you can see, the total carbs are 27gr, while in the sub-content written sugars of 0gr and fibre of 4.3gr. Where have the other 22 grams gone?
From the explanation above, it’s saved to predicts that the other approximately 22gr consist of starch or other polysaccharides. Or it’s also saved to say that the other unwritten carbs are actually good carbs.
My personal recommendation is always to avoid processed sugar. I believe natural sugar from fruits, honey, maple, etc., won’t be bad for the majority of people if consumed moderately. — please discuss with your doctor if you have diabetes or sugar-related problem —
The Micros
Micronutrients are the third part of the label. This consist of minerals and vitamins your body needs.[4] If we want to talk about micronutrients, it would take a lot — and I mean, a LOT — of times.
The Important thing is, we want to get as many as a good amount of micronutrients. We want to avoid micronutrients deficiency, as this nutrition gives your body additional function from the macros counterparts. Also, eating too much of something we’ll always be a not so good idea. Excessive minerals or vitamins might lead to problems for the body. Just like protein, the micros are harder to get excessive. Supplements might helps if you notice your body needs more of one of these.
If you really want to count your micronutrients, you can use the daily value as your metering tools.
You can read a lot about micronutrients on the internet. Contact your doctor if you need any further explanation.
Cholesterol and Sodium
Cholesterol
Cholesterol usually is written on the macros part under the fat content of the label. Though cholesterol was a type of lipid — just like fats are — , cholesterol actually can’t be change form to energy.[5]
The food doesn’t actually found on foods, and only found on your blood. The way your body process the fats you consume will determine your cholesterol level.
That being said, cholesterol was also the victim of a common misconception. Cholesterol has a bad guy and the good guy.
Low-density lipoproteins (LDL) is the bad guy. You want to keep this number low. On the other side, High-density lipoproteins (HDL) is good cholesterol as it helps the body to process and excrete the cholesterol and lower the heart disease risk.[6]
Sodium
Sodium is one of two minerals that create our table salt. Sodium is a mineral that actually micronutrients. But Sodium is one of the micros that usually put on the macro part. The tendency of people consuming too much of it might be the background.
Sodium is good if consumed at the right level. It helps muscle and nerves stability, and also body fluid. But, too much of it we can increase the risk of heart disease and kidney problem.[7]
Endnote
Most of the time, things that are not written in the label are safe to beneficial stuff. It’s not always. Home-production or new manufacturer sometimes haven’t gone to the lab and write labels according to their limitation. This can lead to untested and unreliable label that sometimes not even complete. Nutrition label also can’t be 100% precise. Even big manufacturers may drift from the label slightly.
In having nutrition, we want to get the best out of something. It’s really important to keep a healthy lifestyle and food balance. Sure, eating bad foods will lead to bad things. But eating too much — even — good food and excessive in, can be bad for us.
I wish this could help you to better understand food label reading to build your intended diet. I hope that this can give you a complete explanation about how to read the nutrition facts label and help us to choose our food more wisely. Keep it healthy!
Reference:
[1]https://www.sparkpeople.com/resource/nutrition_articles.asp?id=153
[2]https://www.foodnetwork.com/healthy/articles/importance-of-healthy-fats
[3]https://www.hsph.harvard.edu/nutritionsource/carbohydrates/fiber/
