When are food labels going to change? Serving sizes?

Old_Cat_Lady
Old_Cat_Lady Posts: 1,193 Member
in Food and Nutrition
I remember something about changing serving sizes. Is this going to happen? And if so, when?
I can't wait for a serving of ice cream to be more than 1/2 cup. Or saltines being more than 5 crackers.

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Replies

  • dutchandkiwi
    dutchandkiwi Posts: 1,389 Member
    rainbowbow wrote: »
    they don't need to do this (IMO) they just need to change everything to per 100g and leave it at that.

    serving sizes only add to confusion, miscalculation, and under-reporting of calories.
    This! Ignore serving sizes weigh everything and it all works out beautifully with a list of 100g

  • kommodevaran
    kommodevaran Posts: 17,890 Member
    I think it was meant as a joke - I got it if it was - how food labels and other regulations are utterly confusing, and by trying to force us to comply, just makes us rebel.
  • stanmann571
    stanmann571 Posts: 5,728 Member
    edited July 2017
    lemurcat12 wrote: »
    TheWJordinWJordin wrote: »
    I remember something about changing serving sizes. Is this going to happen? And if so, when?
    I can't wait for a serving of ice cream to be more than 1/2 cup. Or saltines being more than 5 crackers.

    Dunno: http://www.marketwatch.com/story/under-pressure-from-food-companies-fda-delays-changes-to-simplify-calorie-labels-2017-06-13

    The .5 cup serving size for ice cream is actually one I don't think should change. I think that's a perfectly reasonable serving size and I don't see the benefit of normalizing portion distortion, but whatever, I realize I'm in the minority here, and I can still eat my .5 cup when I have ice cream.

    .5 cup is about 2 "normal scoops" as in the scoops you'll get if you're at Baskin or Coldstone. So yes!! It's a perfectly reasonable portion size

    It's like half a scoop if you jam the scoop halfway in and wedge out half the container.
  • PaulaWallaDingDong
    PaulaWallaDingDong Posts: 4,641 Member
    I like the idea of adding a "per 100g" column, and a lot of international foods I find in the US have it in addition to the suggested serving size. I think it's a good idea to have both, because suggested servings give a visual idea of what you're getting for the calories, whereas the "per 100g" gives you a 1:1 comparison between items.
  • Old_Cat_Lady
    Old_Cat_Lady Posts: 1,193 Member
    edited July 2017
    Thanks for the link. Showed (on a chart) how serving sizes might change.
    I thought the sugar changes and serving size changes were completely different things/target dates. Got delayed from this July 2018 to July 2019. I did not know potassium was going to be required. Nice that a 20oz bottle will now be one serving. Who drinks just 8 or 12 oz?
  • Old_Cat_Lady
    Old_Cat_Lady Posts: 1,193 Member
    edited July 2017
    I love the idea of 100g. Ex: My saltines currently are 14 grams (5 crackers). I could have 35 crackers (100 grams)? That would be about 425 calories. Maybe too much. Oh, I can see this will never become reality.
  • HeidiCooksSupper
    HeidiCooksSupper Posts: 3,831 Member
    "Serving size" is for the most part, turned into an artificial construct created by food manufacturers so they could "round down" and report the numbers they wanted to report. What looked all the world to us like an individual bag of potato chips might have said on the label to contain 2.5 servings simply so the numbers on the nutrition label weren't so high per serving. The new rule is trying to get this in hand. It is trying to get the manufacturers to say an individual candy bar that looks like one would eat it at one go is the single serving everyone considers it to be.

    The manufacturers don't like this, especially when they must change a number from zero, e.g. "zero transfats per serving" to a higher number. Keeping the servings small meant "rounding down" was legal so something with a little bit of something could be said to have zero of that thing.

    One, of course, can choose any size serving and just put in the diary how many "servings" one actually ate. I do this all the time. But having an available serving size is a good suggestion that a universal 100g amount wouldn't provide. With the convention of 56g as a serving of macaroni, I go with 56g per person and we don't feel deprived. If 100g were the lowest size listed on a label, I'd be sorely tempted to do 100g of pasta per person. If the smaller serving size helps me play a mind game that keeps my calories in check, I'm all for it.
  • CyberTone
    CyberTone Posts: 7,337 Member
    For US labeling, the food manufacturers are not the sole determiners of serving size. In fact, the US FDA has a number of criteria on how they have determined the RACC (Reference Amounts Customarily Consumed, or Reference Amounts) requirements for quite an extensive list of food items.

    The FDA requires manufacturers to adhere to the Reference Amounts for certain food products - as detailed in the below link at 21 CFR 101.12(b). If an item does not appear in the list, then manufacturers do have some leeway on what they choose as a serving size.

    I would disagree with a blanket statement that manufacturers have turned the serving size into an artificial construct.

    Even for sugar substitutes, the Reference Amount is required to be "an amount equivalent to one reference amount for sugar in sweetness." That amount per serving is fewer than five Calories and can according to FDA regulations be listed as zero Calories per that serving size.

    That is well and good if someone is using a small amount of sugar substitute in place of one teaspoon of sugar. However, when a consumer is expecting to use dozens of servings of sugar substitute per day and expecting there is no Calorie impact, who is to blame? The consumer, the manufacturer, the government?

    https://www.gpo.gov/fdsys/pkg/CFR-2012-title21-vol2/xml/CFR-2012-title21-vol2-sec101-12.xml
  • _pi3_
    _pi3_ Posts: 2,311 Member
    Lays chips have started .. only one I've seen
  • lemurcat12
    lemurcat12 Posts: 30,886 Member
    TheWJordinWJordin wrote: »
    Thanks for the link. Showed (on a chart) how serving sizes might change.
    I thought the sugar changes and serving size changes were completely different things/target dates. Got delayed from this July 2018 to July 2019. I did not know potassium was going to be required. Nice that a 20oz bottle will now be one serving. Who drinks just 8 or 12 oz?

    A can is 12 oz, so many people.

    When I was a kid, 12 oz was 2 servings, and I did think of a can of soda as a lot and servings of other beverages tended to be smaller too. (Granted, that was a million years ago, back when soda was a special treat.)
  • lemurcat12
    lemurcat12 Posts: 30,886 Member
    TheWJordinWJordin wrote: »
    I love the idea of 100g. Ex: My saltines currently are 14 grams (5 crackers). I could have 35 crackers (100 grams)? That would be about 425 calories. Maybe too much. Oh, I can see this will never become reality.

    The concept is that it would be:

    1 serving (14 g or 5 crackers)=X calories; 100 g (about 35 crackers)=425 calories (assuming your numbers are right).

    You'd presumably choose to eat however many crackers makes sense to you given calorie needs, how much you like crackers, etc.
  • lemurcat12
    lemurcat12 Posts: 30,886 Member
    HeidiCooksSupper wrote: »
    "Serving size" is for the most part, turned into an artificial construct created by food manufacturers so they could "round down" and report the numbers they wanted to report. What looked all the world to us like an individual bag of potato chips might have said on the label to contain 2.5 servings simply so the numbers on the nutrition label weren't so high per serving. The new rule is trying to get this in hand. It is trying to get the manufacturers to say an individual candy bar that looks like one would eat it at one go is the single serving everyone considers it to be.

    The manufacturers don't like this, especially when they must change a number from zero, e.g. "zero transfats per serving" to a higher number. Keeping the servings small meant "rounding down" was legal so something with a little bit of something could be said to have zero of that thing.

    One, of course, can choose any size serving and just put in the diary how many "servings" one actually ate. I do this all the time. But having an available serving size is a good suggestion that a universal 100g amount wouldn't provide. With the convention of 56g as a serving of macaroni, I go with 56g per person and we don't feel deprived. If 100g were the lowest size listed on a label, I'd be sorely tempted to do 100g of pasta per person. If the smaller serving size helps me play a mind game that keeps my calories in check, I'm all for it.

    I don't think it would just be 100 g, but 100 g as an addition to a serving size (two columns).

    I mean, it's not happening, but that's the usual proposal and what I've seen from other countries.
  • HeidiCooksSupper
    HeidiCooksSupper Posts: 3,831 Member
    edited July 2017
    CyberTone wrote: »
    For US labeling, the food manufacturers are not the sole determiners of serving size. In fact, the US FDA has a number of criteria on how they have determined the RACC (Reference Amounts Customarily Consumed, or Reference Amounts) requirements for quite an extensive list of food items.

    The FDA requires manufacturers to adhere to the Reference Amounts for certain food products - as detailed in the below link at 21 CFR 101.12(b). If an item does not appear in the list, then manufacturers do have some leeway on what they choose as a serving size.

    I would disagree with a blanket statement that manufacturers have turned the serving size into an artificial construct.

    Your critique of my blanket statement is quite apt. Both statements are true within limits. Thank you.
  • Rebecca0224
    Rebecca0224 Posts: 810 Member
    lemurcat12 wrote: »
    TheWJordinWJordin wrote: »
    Thanks for the link. Showed (on a chart) how serving sizes might change.
    I thought the sugar changes and serving size changes were completely different things/target dates. Got delayed from this July 2018 to July 2019. I did not know potassium was going to be required. Nice that a 20oz bottle will now be one serving. Who drinks just 8 or 12 oz?

    A can is 12 oz, so many people.

    When I was a kid, 12 oz was 2 servings, and I did think of a can of soda as a lot and servings of other beverages tended to be smaller too. (Granted, that was a million years ago, back when soda was a special treat.)

    I agree with you. I rarely drink a 20oz bottle and a 12oz can takes hours to finish and seems like a lot to me.
  • fuzzylop72
    fuzzylop72 Posts: 651 Member
    Serving sizes don't bother me hugely (although, I was disappointed @ lenny and larry's complete cookie serving size of half a cookie). I would like essential-9 breakdowns for protein containing foods, though.

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