Almost every snack, drink and food item you can buy at your local grocery store has one thing in common with all the others: nutrition fact labels. But what does it all mean, and more importantly, how can you possibly get at least a little benefit from their existence?
The first thing to look at in the interpretation of a nutrition fact label is the serving size. The serving size information serves two purposes: telling you how much food is in the product you are buying, and creating some type of standard to compare the information contained in one product to other products.
Next in the nutrition facts would be the grams of the major ingredients, but people in general don’t have any clue what the average grams of sugar, fiber or Vitamin E they are supposed to have in a day.
You do not need to understand complex terms in order to understand these labels because the percentages to the right of the ingredients are easy to understand. Based on a 2,000-calorie diet, the percentages tell you how much of the daily percentage of that particular ingredient you are eating.
Ingredient percentages greatly help because you can base any diet around them, whether it is for weight loss or just a healthy diet.
For example, if you have a food that contains 30 percent of your normal daily fat intake, then you need 70 percent more to meet your daily requirement. Because this is the percentage of the daily requirement, it stays consistent throughout your day applying to all the foods you eat.
Nutrition facts can be a powerful tool to help you limit and control the amount of different substances you put into your body. It is a good idea to use the notepad in your phone to keep track of things like your fat and sodium intake per day.
Most Americans eat an excessive amount of Trans-fats and saturated fats per day. Experts recommend you eat as few saturated and Trans fats as possible. More than likely you will make up for it later without knowing it.
You can also use the nutrition labels to increase the vitamins and minerals you get in a day. Vitamin water and vitamin enforced Gatorade (G2) can help you get the vitamins you need. But if that fails, you can always get the daily vitamin or fiber pills from a local drug store.
