Reading Food Labels

Our clients are sometimes confused with food labels.  Here is an example of a test question on our Sports Nutrition Exam.

If Jane ate the entire bag of 94% fat free popcorn, how many total calories would she eat?  How many of those calories come from fat?  How many from carbohydrates?  How many from protein?

One bag of microwave popcorn has about 2 servings.
Each serving has:
2g fat, 27g carbohydrates, 4g protein.

There are 9 calories in each gram of fat; there are 4 calories in each gram of carbohydrate and each gram of protein.

Fat calories = 2g x 9 calories x 2 servings = 36

Carb calories = 27 x 4 x 2 = 216

Protein calories = 4 x 4 x 2 = 32

Total calories = 36 + 216 + 32 = 284 calories.

In summary, make sure you look at the number of servings in each bag/box/can/container.  Multiply the number of servings with the amount of grams on the food label and the number of calories per gram of each macronutrient. 

Also, don't forget, this was 94% fat free popcorn.  Most popcorn has more fat grams thus more calories.  Time for a movie and some popcorn :)