Do You Know How to Read Nutrition Labels?

I spoke to a group of parents and children on how to read nutrition labels this weekend and decided it will be good to blog about this for a larger audience. From my experience, even among the educated, ‘Nutrition Literacy’ is far from where it should be and learning to read nutrition labels can be a good starting point.Most of us walk into a grocery store and add items to our basket, blissfully unaware of what nutrition it actually delivers. In fact, many of us hardly ever stop to read the label and even if we do get around to looking at it, we may not be sure what the numbers imply. So here are some pointers which will help you decide if the product falls in the “healthy or not so healthy category” and how often you or your child should consume it.”No Label Don’t Buy ” -check for nutrition label on the food pack you buy. Today, all food manufacturers in the country have to declare the following on a label -nutritional facts per 100 g or 100 ml or per serving of the product:energy value in kcal,
total carbohydrate and sugar,
the amount of protein,
fat in gram (g) or ml, and
vitamins and minerals for which a health claim is made”Match Nutrition information to the quantity you eat”- next check if the nutrition information is given per 100 g or per serving.Net weight grams = grams declared on the nutrition label – the package is a one serve pack, say net weight is 30g and the nutrition label gives information for a serving size, then the numbers you see on the label is the nutrition you get from the pack.Net weight (g or ml) > grams/ml declared on the nutrition label – a good example for this is the fruit drinks/juices segment – nutrition facts are often shown per 100 ml even when a typical serve size is 200 ml. So if you are not alert to this fact, you might assume that your child is consuming only half the calories /sugar!Net weight (g) < grams on nutrition label- The single serve snack packs which we buy frequently for children weigh approximately 30 g while nutrition information is given for 100 g, so we need to do some simple division here else you might be left wondering how a small packet can deliver so many calories!”Stay away from large snack packs” – they weigh more than 100 g, but present nutrition information for 100 g. Unfortunately, current labeling norms do not mandate serving size, and even if they did when was the last time you were able to convince your child to close the packet after eating 15 chips? So, it is wiser to stick to the single serve /smaller packs!”Deciphering the calories further”: What is declared on the pack is the total calories you get from the product. To arrive at the number of calories from fat multiply the amount of fat, given in grams by 9, for carbohydrates and proteins, multiply by 4.”Sugar watch”: The number declared against carbohydrates indicates ‘total carbohydrates’ which includes complex carbohydrates (like what is found in cereals), simple sugars as found in fruit, milk and cane sugar and fibre. Check if the product contains added sugar. Some responsible fruit beverage companies do differentiate between the added sugar and the sugar coming from the fruit but many do not. So, if you are not able to figure out, take a look at the ingredient list on the pack – if the ingredient list includes ‘sugar’ in addition to water and juice concentrate, you can be certain that sugar has been added to make the product.”Fat Facts”: There are good fats and bad fats. But in our country, companies are not required to provide a break-up of the fat in foods unless they make health claims like ‘low fat,’ ‘low cholesterol’. As a result, one can never be sure of the type of fat used in the packaged food. One way to find out is to look at the ingredient list for words like ‘partially hydrogenated fat’ ‘shortening,’ as these products have a higher proportion of bad fats (trans fat). In the absence of any of the above information it might be best to avoid products which are high in fat content.Trust you find these pointers useful. Next time when you go to the grocery store, do look for the nutrition label and ingredient list on pack. If you are not happy with the information given, or after doing the math realise this should not be in your basket, put it right back on the shelf and do yourself and your kids a favour!

http://parentedge.in/blog/

What Are The Greatest Changes In Shopping In Your Lifetime

What are the greatest changes in shopping in your lifetime? So asked my 9 year old grandson.

As I thought of the question the local Green Grocer came to mind. Because that is what the greatest change in shopping in my lifetime is.

That was the first place to start with the question of what are the greatest changes in shopping in your lifetime.

Our local green grocer was the most important change in shopping in my lifetime. Beside him was our butcher, a hairdresser and a chemist.

Looking back, we were well catered for as we had quite a few in our suburb. And yes, the greatest changes in shopping in my lifetime were with the small family owned businesses.

Entertainment While Shopping Has Changed
Buying butter was an entertainment in itself.
My sister and I often had to go to a favourite family grocer close by. We were always polite as we asked for a pound or two of butter and other small items.

Out came a big block of wet butter wrapped in grease-proof paper. Brought from the back of the shop, placed on a huge counter top and included two grooved pates.

That was a big change in our shopping in my lifetime… you don’t come across butter bashing nowadays.

Our old friendly Mr. Mahon with the moustache, would cut a square of butter. Lift it to another piece of greaseproof paper with his pates. On it went to the weighing scales, a bit sliced off or added here and there.

Our old grocer would then bash it with gusto, turning it over and over. Upside down and sideways it went, so that it had grooves from the pates, splashes going everywhere, including our faces.

My sister and I thought this was great fun and it always cracked us up. We loved it, as we loved Mahon’s, on the corner, our very favourite grocery shop.

Grocery Shopping
Further afield, we often had to go to another of my mother’s favourite, not so local, green grocer’s. Mr. McKessie, ( spelt phonetically) would take our list, gather the groceries and put them all in a big cardboard box.

And because we were good customers he always delivered them to our house free of charge. But he wasn’t nearly as much fun as old Mr. Mahon. Even so, he was a nice man.

All Things Fresh
So there were very many common services such as home deliveries like:

• Farm eggs

• Fresh vegetables

• Cow’s milk

• Freshly baked bread

• Coal for our open fires

Delivery Services
A man used to come to our house a couple of times a week with farm fresh eggs.

Another used to come every day with fresh vegetables, although my father loved growing his own.

Our milk, topped with beautiful cream, was delivered to our doorstep every single morning.

Unbelievably, come think of it now, our bread came to us in a huge van driven by our “bread-man” named Jerry who became a family friend.

My parents always invited Jerry and his wife to their parties, and there were many during the summer months. Kids and adults all thoroughly enjoyed these times. Alcohol was never included, my parents were teetotallers. Lemonade was a treat, with home made sandwiches and cakes.

The coal-man was another who delivered bags of coal for our open fires. I can still see his sooty face under his tweed cap but I can’t remember his name. We knew them all by name but most of them escape me now.

Mr. Higgins, a service man from the Hoover Company always came to our house to replace our old vacuum cleaner with an updated model.

Our insurance company even sent a man to collect the weekly premium.

People then only paid for their shopping with cash. This in itself has been a huge change in shopping in my lifetime.

In some department stores there was a system whereby the money from the cash registers was transported in a small cylinder on a moving wire track to the central office.

Some Of The Bigger Changes
Some of the bigger changes in shopping were the opening of supermarkets.

• Supermarkets replaced many individual smaller grocery shops. Cash and bank cheques have given way to credit and key cards.

• Internet shopping… the latest trend, but in many minds, doing more harm, to book shops.

• Not many written shopping lists, because mobile phones have taken over.

On a more optimistic note, I hear that book shops are popular again after a decline.

Personal Service Has Most Definitely Changed
So, no one really has to leave home, to purchase almost anything, technology makes it so easy to do online.
And we have a much bigger range of products now, to choose from, and credit cards have given us the greatest ease of payment.

We have longer shopping hours, and weekend shopping. But we have lost the personal service that we oldies had taken for granted and also appreciated.

Because of their frenetic lifestyles, I have heard people say they find shopping very stressful, that is grocery shopping. I’m sure it is when you have to dash home and cook dinner after a days work. I often think there has to be a better, less stressful way.

My mother had the best of both worlds, in the services she had at her disposal. With a full time job looking after 9 people, 7 children plus her and my dad, she was very lucky. Lucky too that she did not have 2 jobs.

What We Have Here Is A Failure To Communicate

The results of this past election proved once again that the Democrats had a golden opportunity to capitalize on the failings of the Trump Presidency but, fell short of a nation wide mandate. A mandate to seize the gauntlet of the progressive movement that Senator Sanders through down a little over four years ago. The opportunities were there from the very beginning even before this pandemic struck. In their failing to educate the public of the consequences of continued Congressional gridlock, conservatism, and what National Economic Reform’s Ten Articles of Confederation would do led to the results that are playing out today.. More Congressional gridlock, more conservatism and more suffering of millions of Americans are the direct consequences of the Democrats failure to communicate and educate the public. Educate the public that a progressive agenda is necessary to pull the United States out of this Pandemic, and restore this nations health and vitality.

It was the DNC’s intent in this election to only focus on the Trump Administration. They failed to grasp the urgency of the times. They also failed to communicate with the public about the dire conditions millions have been and still are facing even before the Pandemic. The billions of dollars funneled into campaign coffers should have been used to educate the voting public that creating a unified coalition would bring sweeping reforms that are so desperately needed. The reality of what transpired in a year and a half of political campaigning those billions of dollars only created more animosity and division polarizing one extreme over another.

One can remember back in 1992 Ross Perot used his own funds to go on national TV to educate the public on the dire ramifications of not addressing our national debt. That same approach should have been used during this election cycle. By using the medium of television to communicate and educate the public is the most effective way in communicating and educating the public. Had the Biden campaign and the DNC used their resources in this way the results we ae seeing today would have not created the potential for more gridlock in our government. The opportunity was there to educate the public of safety protocols during the siege of this pandemic and how National Economic Reform’s Ten Articles of Confederation provides the necessary progressive reforms that will propel the United States out of the abyss of debt and restore our economy. Restoring our economy so that every American will have the means and the availability of financial and economic security.

The failure of the Democratic party since 2016 has been recruiting a Presidential Candidate who many felt was questionable and more conservative signals that the results of today has not met with the desired results the Democratic party wanted. Then again? By not fully communicating and not educating the public on the merits of a unified progressive platform has left the United States transfixed in our greatest divides since the Civil War. This writers support of Senator Bernie Sanders is well documented. Since 2015 he has laid the groundwork for progressive reforms. He also has the foundations on which these reforms can deliver the goods as they say. But, what did the DNC do, they purposely went out of their way to engineer a candidate who was more in tune with the status-quo of the DNC. They failed to communicate to the public in educating all of us on the ways our lives would be better served with a progressive agenda that was the benchmark of Senators Sanders Presidential campaign and his Our Revolution movement. And this is way there is still really no progress in creating a less toxic environment in Washington and around the country.