How to Read a Nutrition Label
Ever grab a food item off the shelf, flip it over, and have no clue what you’re even looking for on the label?
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I used to do it too. Trying to pick healthy foods, ya know?
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But wasn’t sure what the numbers on the label even equate to, what ingredients I should care about, or how to decide between one brand or another.
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“Low fat” and “sugar free” must be better, right? Not so much.👎🏼
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& What about when you’re trying to lose weight, should you be buying completely different foods?
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Can knowing how to read a nutrition label support your weight loss goals?
Stick with me and I’ll walk you through exactly how to scan a nutrition label with confidence.
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You’ll learn:
3 Important parts of a nutrition label
What ingredients to look out for
How to know if the food you’re holding will support your goals
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Let’s dive in, shall we?👇🏼
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Calories don’t matter if you don’t know where those calories are even coming from, amIright?!
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The first thing I look for on a nutrition label is always the INGREDIENTS.
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Why? Because that’s what the food is made of.🤷🏼♀️
I care about what I’m actually putting in my body before I think about what the calories or macro breakdown looks like.
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Unfortunately when it comes to “food” in packages, I take the guilty-until-proved-innocent approach, because our government and “Big Food” does NOT have our health or best interest in mind.
You can’t trust the food on the shelves to not be harmful and you can’t even assume that foods marketed as “healthy” really are.
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Here’s an example: Simple Mills Almond Flour Crackers
Few ingredients, all readable, no artificial flavors, no added sugar, macro-friendly, grain and gluten-free for those who are allergic (all awesome!), BUT made with sunflower oil. That’s a no from me dawg.
Seed oils are essentially farming waste by-products turned multi-million dollar industry as “Big Food” transitioned to using these almost exclusively in packaged foods when the detrimental effects of trans-fats were illuminated and trans fats eventually got banned.
A multi-million dollar industry in getting us sick so “Big Pharma” can come to the rescue.🙄
More on that another time.
But the point is - look at the ingredients first.
I look for the following:
How long is this list? The shorter, the better.
Can I pronounce half of these ingredients? Do I know what they are/they’re purpose? E.g. thickeners that are safe, yet hard to pronounce (gellan gum, guar gum) vs. thickeners that are best to avoid (carageenan) or minimize (xantham gum). Know your ingredients.
Are there grain, seed, or partially hydrogenated oils? (Corn, soy, sunflower, safflower, canola, palm, grapeseed, rapeseeed, vegetable, etc.) Just because these industrialized vegetable oils are in everything, does not mean we should accept them. They are highly inflammatory - think aging, disease, and obesity. Check your breads, dressings/condiments, milk/creamers, nuts, granola/cereals, etc. We can improve the food quality on the shelves by changing where we spend our money.
Are there added sugar or artificial sweeteners? (Aspartame, Sucralose, high fructose corn syrup, neotame, acesulfame k, agave, etc.) Look for this especially in foods you don’t expect to be sweetened (bread, condiments, salty foods, nut butters, protein powders). Added sugar is not just from candy and ice cream, it’s sneaky.
Are there preservatives? (BHT, propylparaben, methylparaben, propylene glycol, propyl gallate, sodium phosphate, sodium nitrate, TBHQ, mono and di-glycerides, etc.) The side effects of these range from central nervous system depression and hormone disruption, to liver damage or even cancer.
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Those are the 5 questions I ask myself when approaching the ingredient list. It may look like a lot now, but with practice you get faster and start to learn which brands are better than others.
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2. The second thing I look at is the serving size.
Is one serving equal to the whole container? If not, how many servings are in the container?
The calories and nutrition facts mean nothing if you don’t know what they equate to. If your serving size is 2 tbsp, or 3/4C, there will be parentheses listed next to that with the equivalent serving in grams.
E.g. On your peanut butter it’ll say one serving = 2 tbsp (32g)
This is really helpful. It tells you the most accurate way to consume 2 tbsp is to weigh out 32g using a food scale.
Santa Cruz Organic Peanut Butter is my fave!
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3. The 3rd thing I look at is the total calories per serving and where those calories come from = the macronutrient breakdown.
Let’s look back at the peanut butter.
✅ 1st - Check the ingredients - it’s peanut butter, so I expect peanuts and nothing else (except maybe, salt).
✅ 2nd - We know one serving is 2 tbsp or 32g weighed out.
✅ 3rd - I wanna know how many calories that will be and what types of calories.
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2 tbsp of Santa Cruz peanut butter contains 190 calories. Calories may come from carbs, protein, and fat, so those are the what I look for last on a nutrition label to find out the macronutrient breakdown of a food.
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Some foods contain only one macronutrient, some contain two, and some contain all three!
Peanut butter contains all three (that’s probably why it tastes so good 😉). Here’s the breakdown:⠀⠀⠀⠀
Fat 16g
Carb 5g
Protein 8g
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This tells me peanut butter is a good source of FAT, while also providing some protein and carbs.
You can learn a lot about food by looking at these 3 parts of a nutrition label. Practice scanning a label on something in your pantry and see what you notice!
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So how do you know if a specific food will support your goals?
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Well, tracking macros (macronutrients) is the strategy I use (& that I teach my clients) to achieve weight loss, weight maintenance, or weight gain.
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It’s the most efficient (& science-backed) way to change your body in a variety of ways without restricting entire food groups (keto), doing excessive exercise, or anything drastic. However, it does require a great deal of commitment to take the time to learn how to track your food and serving sizes closely.
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I think it’s worth it, to learn so much about your habits, the nutritional value of different foods, how to eat, and be more aware of portion sizes for the rest of your life.
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Once you understand the macronutrients your body needs to achieve your goal, you can choose to eat whatever foods you like. The key is changing up the portion sizes so you get the right amount of each macro.
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So for example, if you have already eaten enough carbs and fats for the day, but have not eaten enough protein yet, you’re going to want to choose a food that’s high in just protein, like chicken, egg whites, or tuna.
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If you have eaten enough carbs, but still need to eat more protein AND fat, you might choose a food that contains both protein and fat, but no carbs. So something like ground beef, salmon, or chicken thighs.
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So the right food for you depends on your goals AND what you have already eaten that day. It will vary all the time, and we’re human so it should!
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Although you don’t need to cut out all junk food or any one food group to be healthy or successful at achieving your goal, filling your day with mostly whole foods, foods made of one macronutrient, is going to be best for your overall health no matter WHAT your goal is.
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Foods with just 1-2 macronutrients:
Protein (or protein with some fat): chicken, beef, fish, eggs, cottage cheese, yogurt, turkey, etc.
Carbs: all fruits and vegetables, grains, potatoes, etc.
Fats: avocado, extra virgin olive oil, pasture-raised butter, etc.
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Notice most of these won’t have a nutrition label to review because they are the food.
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Fill each meal of your day with mostly these foods in a balanced way - carbs, fat, AND protein at every meal.⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀
Then add in foods to fill in the gaps to meet your goals. Some of these foods may come in a package, but just keep them in moderation and scan the nutrition label for the 3 important parts so you know what you’re getting!
When a food with a label contains a low number of calories per serving, few and quality ingredients (none of those red-flag ingredients we talked about previously), and you can read all of them - you, my friend, have found a “macro-friendly” food that you’ll have to share with the world!
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You are now equipped to tackle the grocery store knowing what types of foods to fill your cart with and how to scan a nutrition label with confidence. You know how to check the 3 important parts of a label and exactly what sneaky *red flag* ingredients to avoid.
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If this was helpful, please share with a friend!
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In the meantime, to learn more about macro nutrition and flexible eating, join my free Live the Fit Life Facebook group where you can participate in my free 3-Day Flexible Eating Workshop. This workshop is pinned to the “announcements” at the top of the group and starts with “Unit 1”. This is a great place to start. I look forward to seeing you inside!
