Want to share a rant about food labelling

JenRainbow1
JenRainbow1 Posts: 74 Member
in Food and Nutrition
I was checking the back of the pack of my drumsticks from Iceland. Ok, it gave me a calorie count per 100g. Ok fair enough, I go to weigh my drumstick and then realise: it says EXCLUDING BONE! Call my stupid, but I don't know how much bone weighs and I'm not taking all the meat off the bone and weighing it, it's frozen after all.
This is so annoying. You look at the back of a pack to make sure all the calories on here are right and they say something stupid like that. I can't weigh my drumstick without the bone so I won't know how much it weighs.
I understand they count the calories in the meat obviously as we don't eat bone but there is no way I can calculate the weight of the MEAT on my frozen drumstick.

My boyfriend was making Bachelor's Pasta (and their supernoodles are the same) it says how many calories per 100g portion (which is one pack) then it say's how many calories per 1/2 a pack and calls half of a 100g pack 150g!

I sincerely hope that this is not mean being stupid but surely this doesn't make sense. Please share you rage against pack labelling... Surely I'm not alone in this.
Best Wishes :)

Replies

  • capaul42
    capaul42 Posts: 1,390 Member
    With the meat, just weigh it before, then weigh the bones after you've eaten and subtract the difference.

    Recently had a similar problem with a dry cake mix. When scanned, it gives you the calorie details for prepared. Problem is they prepare with water and I prepared with milk. After searching for 15 minutes for an entry for just the dry mix, I finally logged it prepared and added the milk separate.
  • lemurcat12
    lemurcat12 Posts: 30,886 Member
    There is no good alternative -- they don't know what the bone weighs either, and that's likely consistent with the rules for labeling (I know the USDA information excludes bones). Subtracting out the non-eaten bone is good enough.

    I typically don't buy meat from a package with a calorie count, so use the USDA information which similarly excludes bone (I think all calorie counts will). What that means is that I use the cooked entries for bone-in cuts and weigh the meat when I take it off the bone (or the bone later if the bone goes on the plate).
  • ForeverSunshine09
    ForeverSunshine09 Posts: 966 Member
    Eat the meat and then weigh the bone before you throw it out. It is really easy and not something to get upset about.
  • kiittenforever
    kiittenforever Posts: 479 Member
    Yeah, just weigh the bone after and subtract.. tedious but accurate
  • fr33sia12
    fr33sia12 Posts: 1,258 Member
    JenRainbow1 wrote: »

    My boyfriend was making Bachelor's Pasta (and their supernoodles are the same) it says how many calories per 100g portion (which is one pack) then it say's how many calories per 1/2 a pack and calls half of a 100g pack 150g!

    With the pasta/noodles the 1/2 pack is probably when cooked, it's the same with packs of cous cous.
  • JenRainbow1
    JenRainbow1 Posts: 74 Member
    ForeverSunshine09 wrote: »
    Eat the meat and then weigh the bone before you throw it out. It is really easy and not something to get upset about.
    That's me, getting annoyed over nothing. I didn't think of that I'm sure someone would've corrected me

  • Francl27
    Francl27 Posts: 26,372 Member
    I love 'steam in the bag' veggies that give you calorie info for frozen. So useful.

    For lots of those things I just use USDA entries.
  • mylifeisbeautiful
    mylifeisbeautiful Posts: 292 Member
    You're not alone! It's really frustrating trying to log with so many labels being misleading or incorrect!!
  • Colorscheme
    Colorscheme Posts: 1,179 Member
    mylifeisbeautiful wrote: »
    You're not alone! It's really frustrating trying to log with so many labels being misleading or incorrect!!

    I had this recently. I bought pre-made pizza and the wrapper said it was 255 grams and 520 cals for the whole thing. It was actually 455 grams and 900+ cals :/
  • yourfriendlaurie
    yourfriendlaurie Posts: 32 Member
    edited May 2016
    I buy these high fiber pitas that are really good and are supposedly 60 calories per pita, except that I've started weighing them and the package says they weigh 37g but I've never seen one that weighs less than about 46g. That's an extra 15 calories! Not that big of a deal for one item but I've noticed this problem on a lot of foods I eat and it adds up over the course of the day, especially if you're a short/sedentary woman with a low daily calorie goal.

    And then there was the time when I bought a McFlurry from McDonald's for a treat, but decided to weigh it before eating and found out it was 1.5x the weight the website said it should be - that's 1.5x the calories too!
  • titianwasp
    titianwasp Posts: 139 Member
    Beanitos chips...love them. High protein/fiber snack food if you miss that carby chip crunch. 140 calories for one oz, aka "about 12 chips". Nonsense. It's about 8 chips - I weighed out an ounce. Trust your food scale, not their marketing department. ;)
  • extra_medium
    extra_medium Posts: 1,525 Member
    edited June 2016
    If you're trying to plan ahead though, subtracting the bones after you've already eaten the chicken isn't super helpful.
  • CrabNebula
    CrabNebula Posts: 1,119 Member
    yourfriendlaurie wrote: »
    I buy these high fiber pitas that are really good and are supposedly 60 calories per pita, except that I've started weighing them and the package says they weigh 37g but I've never seen one that weighs less than about 46g. That's an extra 15 calories! Not that big of a deal for one item but I've noticed this problem on a lot of foods I eat and it adds up over the course of the day, especially if you're a short/sedentary woman with a low daily calorie goal.

    And then there was the time when I bought a McFlurry from McDonald's for a treat, but decided to weigh it before eating and found out it was 1.5x the weight the website said it should be - that's 1.5x the calories too!

    You can have the opposite thing happen too. I was weighing some Kirkland tuna out of the can. I should have had 168g drained weight, but in reality, I had 141g.
  • mathandcats
    mathandcats Posts: 786 Member
    extra_medium wrote: »
    If you're trying to plan ahead though, subtracting the bones after you've already eaten the chicken isn't super helpful.

    Agree. It's annoying having bone-in cuts of meat for this reason!
  • lemurcat12
    lemurcat12 Posts: 30,886 Member
    mathandcats wrote: »
    extra_medium wrote: »
    If you're trying to plan ahead though, subtracting the bones after you've already eaten the chicken isn't super helpful.

    Agree. It's annoying having bone-in cuts of meat for this reason!

    When I don't have guests or some kind of fancy dinner, I just pull/cut the amount I want off the bone when serving up the food and use that.
  • mom22dogs
    mom22dogs Posts: 470 Member
    After the meat is cooked, just take it off the bone and weigh it. Or weigh it on the bone, eat the meat, then weigh the bone and subtract. Personally, I just buy meat that doesn't have bones included. It might seem cheaper to buy a whole chicken per pound, but you're paying for the weight of the bones that get thrown away. Not very cost-effective.
  • Francl27
    Francl27 Posts: 26,372 Member
    extra_medium wrote: »
    If you're trying to plan ahead though, subtracting the bones after you've already eaten the chicken isn't super helpful.

    Haha yeah. I always end up having that for dinner too so I have to guess and it often means eating the veggies after the meat to make sure I'm not overeating.
  • Zipp237
    Zipp237 Posts: 255 Member
    mom22dogs wrote: »
    After the meat is cooked, just take it off the bone and weigh it. Or weigh it on the bone, eat the meat, then weigh the bone and subtract. Personally, I just buy meat that doesn't have bones included. It might seem cheaper to buy a whole chicken per pound, but you're paying for the weight of the bones that get thrown away. Not very cost-effective.
    Some meats taste better and are juicier with the bones. You don't need to throw the bones away. You can make stock with them. It will be cheaper than store-bought stock and will taste a million times better.

    For some, those bones end up saving us money.
  • mom22dogs
    mom22dogs Posts: 470 Member
    I don't make anything that needs chicken stock, so for me, bones are a waste of money. YMMV.

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