FDA to Change Serving Sizes

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  • stealthq
    stealthq Posts: 4,298 Member
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    I don't really have anything to add. I think updating serving sizes is a good thing, because as they are now, they're ridiculous. For example, one serving of Oreos is three cookies, and one package has forty five cookies (Google tells me), so if you eat one serving a day, it takes 15 days to finish a package. The cookies will probably be stale by then. Which is why I link to you the video below. If you've never been fortunate enough to watch Brian Regan's stand-up, I think you'll be in for a treat (and it's totally on topic):

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yS0nhz1RHEw

    As for the new serving sizes possibly leading to people overeating, come on. We have to take some responsibility for ourselves.

    Actually, Oreos don't go stale in that time. They have a nifty new-ish packaging that reseals, and I can tell you from experience with multiple bags (and flavors, ahem), eating an avg of 2 Oreos a day, the last Oreo was still just as nice as the first.

    Even when they didn't have the resealing bag, a Ziplock kept them fresh.

    Anywho, I would like to see total calories for the package, and then calories per 100g. I think having a suggested serving size is silly. Agree that made shopping in Europe much simpler, except that half the time I was having to convert kJ.
  • KingofWisdom
    KingofWisdom Posts: 229 Member
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    On a side-note, I wish the food labels would use decimals up to the nearest tenth. Tracking macros would be a lot more accurate.
  • JPW1990
    JPW1990 Posts: 2,424 Member
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    dbmata wrote: »
    apparently in the meat and beans group, one ounce of meat can be considered equivalent to one ounce of meat.

    Someone got paid to write that. Paid a LOT to write that...

    And at least 3-5 more people had to read it before it was fully formatted and approved to go on their website.

    I wonder what a West Wing type show going behind the scenes of the USDA and FDA would look like?
  • shyn52
    shyn52 Posts: 19 Member
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    It isn't pretty. The food people fight with the health people - the fresh, canned and frozen people fight with each other - the nutritionists disagree with the medical community. When the school lunch program is worth $6 Billion, there is a lot to fight over - e.g. is fruit leather really fruit? Should we downgrade cranberry juice because it adds sugar -- while orange juice brings its own?
  • PeachyCarol
    PeachyCarol Posts: 8,029 Member
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    dbmata wrote: »
    I do like that though, a sedentary 2-3 year old needs 1000 calories, a 4-8 year old 1,200. Any activity and it's up by 400 calories more.

    MPF should like... look at that, and get right. More proof that lol'ing at 1200 calorie diets is appropriate.

    You are obviously not a short woman of a certain age to lol at such things.

  • SciranBG
    SciranBG Posts: 97 Member
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    All I wish for is for single-serv foods to be labeled as a single serving, so no more 1/2 can of soda as a serving. Also the total number of servings in a package should be a full number, so no more 2.5 servings per container.
  • spingirl605
    spingirl605 Posts: 181 Member
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    I loved that video!!! OMG, I was peeing myself. I have to bookmark that one...Thanks for sharing!!
  • ldrosophila
    ldrosophila Posts: 7,512 Member
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    maybe im not seeing the big deal all i can think is well that's when knowing fractions comes in handy.
  • Francl27
    Francl27 Posts: 26,372 Member
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    I don't really have anything to add. I think updating serving sizes is a good thing, because as they are now, they're ridiculous. For example, one serving of Oreos is three cookies, and one package has forty five cookies (Google tells me), so if you eat one serving a day, it takes 15 days to finish a package. The cookies will probably be stale by then. Which is why I link to you the video below. If you've never been fortunate enough to watch Brian Regan's stand-up, I think you'll be in for a treat (and it's totally on topic):

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yS0nhz1RHEw

    As for the new serving sizes possibly leading to people overeating, come on. We have to take some responsibility for ourselves.

    This was funny!

    But yeah, oreos keep well in their new packages, honestly. But still, I wouldn't buy them if I was the only one who eats them.
  • zyxst
    zyxst Posts: 9,134 Member
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    zyxst wrote: »
    CoachJen71 wrote: »
    I don't like this. We should be striving to eat proper portions, not rewrite portion sizes to reflect our tendency to overeat.

    What's a "proper" size? Half a cup? 28 grams?
    Still waiting for @CoachJen71 to tell us what a "proper" size is.
  • dbmata
    dbmata Posts: 12,951 Member
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    zyxst wrote: »
    zyxst wrote: »
    CoachJen71 wrote: »
    I don't like this. We should be striving to eat proper portions, not rewrite portion sizes to reflect our tendency to overeat.

    What's a "proper" size? Half a cup? 28 grams?
    Still waiting for @CoachJen71 to tell us what a "proper" size is.

    that which pleases, sates, or makes sense.

    ergo: proper serving size of a steak is one pound, more or less.
  • callsitlikeiseeit
    callsitlikeiseeit Posts: 8,627 Member
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    JPW1990 wrote: »
    All the more reason to enter by weight in the first place. I really do wish they'd just nuke all the user entered ones and start from scratch with basic requirements.

    wouldnt that be nice?????????
  • jddnw
    jddnw Posts: 319 Member
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    I don't really have anything to add. I think updating serving sizes is a good thing, because as they are now, they're ridiculous. For example, one serving of Oreos is three cookies, and one package has forty five cookies (Google tells me), so if you eat one serving a day, it takes 15 days to finish a package. The cookies will probably be stale by then. Which is why I link to you the video below. If you've never been fortunate enough to watch Brian Regan's stand-up, I think you'll be in for a treat (and it's totally on topic):

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yS0nhz1RHEw

    As for the new serving sizes possibly leading to people overeating, come on. We have to take some responsibility for ourselves.

    Great video @KingofWisdom ! Thanks.
  • NaturallyOlivia
    NaturallyOlivia Posts: 496 Member
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    I weigh by grams anyway. I had an english muffin this morning that was over in grams according to the package serving size, so I adjusted the calories accordingly.....

    I think this is so very important! It's so easy to look at the package and say "okay 1 muffin = 100 cal" but if one muffin is supposed to be 80 g and your muffin is actually 90 g then you have a slight differential that should be accounted for.

  • Dnarules
    Dnarules Posts: 2,081 Member
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    kuranda10 wrote: »
    They need to change the label to the way they do it in Europe and Australia.

    It gives the servings size, but then also give the 100g or 100ml information. that way you can truly compare products since each company will have different serving sizes.

    http://www.awash.org.au/wp-content/uploads/2012/10/understanding-food-label.gif

    I would love this, but the US doesn't do the gram/ml thing. I just don't see that happening here.

  • kristydi
    kristydi Posts: 781 Member
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    I thought of this thread today.
    I went to eat lunch with my daughter at school for her birthday today. One of her little friends asked me to open a pouch of drink mix for her water bottle. Out of curosity, I looked at the nutrition label. The pouch was supposed to be mixed with a standard sized water bottle, but had 2.5 servings in the pouch. How stupid. It only makes sense for things that are obviously supposed to be consumed in one sitting to be labeled as one serving.

    I would love if everything also had a per 100 grams calorie count listed.
  • amf0324
    amf0324 Posts: 46 Member
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    Good. Maybe that means they'll come up with some decent tasting ice cream that has fewer calories. :)
  • chouflour
    chouflour Posts: 193 Member
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    marm1962 wrote: »
    It sounds like it would be more realistic as far as people who don't look at the size of a serving size very closely. If the serving size is increased, the calories will also increase on the label.

    I weigh by grams anyway. I had an english muffin this morning that was over in grams according to the package serving size, so I adjusted the calories accordingly.....

    I also weigh in grams -- or ounces if grams are not available for reference (like with milk). I have noticed that a so called 1/2 cup or cup serving size does not match the gram serving size.

    Nit picking here...

    I believe the oz shown on the milk container is for fluid ounces, a measure of volume, not weight. To measure out 8 fluid ounces of milk, you would use a cup measure, not a scale.

    Since we're nit picking (and these are some mighty small nits)... once you consider margin of error, it doesn't really matter.

    1 have an assortment of measuring cups in my kitchen. Measuring water (so fluid and weighed ounces are equivalent) tells me that my measuring cups have an average absolute error of 4%, with a max of 6%.

    So a measured fluid ounce of milk might -really- be as little as .94 ounces or as much as 1.06oz. The specific gravity of milk is about 1.03, so a weighed ounce of milk is really .97 fluid ounces - in the same range as my measuring cups, and a difference of less than a quarter teaspoon.


  • kuranda10
    kuranda10 Posts: 593 Member
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    Dnarules wrote: »
    kuranda10 wrote: »
    They need to change the label to the way they do it in Europe and Australia.

    It gives the servings size, but then also give the 100g or 100ml information. that way you can truly compare products since each company will have different serving sizes.

    http://www.awash.org.au/wp-content/uploads/2012/10/understanding-food-label.gif

    I would love this, but the US doesn't do the gram/ml thing. I just don't see that happening here.

    So do 8 oz and 1 cup.
  • CoachJen71
    CoachJen71 Posts: 1,200 Member
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    zyxst wrote: »
    zyxst wrote: »
    CoachJen71 wrote: »
    I don't like this. We should be striving to eat proper portions, not rewrite portion sizes to reflect our tendency to overeat.

    What's a "proper" size? Half a cup? 28 grams?
    Still waiting for @CoachJen71 to tell us what a "proper" size is.

    Sorry I disappeared for so long. I was just thinking of ice cream when I wrote that. LOL I just don't think that a pint of Ben and Jerry's should become a serving size, for example, even though I have gladly treated it as such in the past. ;) Obviously thinking it over, there could be some value to changing some sizes, as other have mentioned.