Those evil food makers!

[Jimmy Higgins]

Trans-fats. They are really really bad. This has been known for a long time, but it's knowledge hasn't been widespread. But now the government is phasing in requirements that trans-fats be listed on nutrional guides on food packages, people are becoming more and more aware.

But the Pasta Roni (http://www.ricearoni.com/RAR_Products/pastaroni.cfm) makers have, in a very evil way, have manipulated the nutrition guide. They proudly denote that the product has 0 grams on Trans Fats on the side of the box in the fat portion of nutrition guide. Having avoided the product since I discontinued using products with trans-fats, I had been occasionally checking Pasta Roni to see if they'd finally got rid of the trans-fats, so now I'm happy seeing that I'll be able to eat that food again, when occasions call for it.

So after looking at the bold trans-fat data, I did what most other people wouldn't. I looked at the ingredients and then felt the elation in my body tumble as I saw partially hydrogenated oil as the THIRD ingredient. Something is amiss. One of the two pieces of information has to be wrong. They wouldn't list trans-fat as ingredient unless it was in the product. So when looking at the panel again, I notice an asterik. The asterik, which had much smaller type than the normal text and that 0 g trans-fat, led to text which admitted that "as prepared" each serving had 2 grams of trans-fat, not the 0 grams the nutrition panel testifies as.

So, this got me mad. How in the world could they legally say in big type that there are no trans-fat in the food, when there are trans-fat when the meal is prepared (with the sauce that's included in the package!). Once again, big business trying to lie in order to appear healthy in order to gain your dollar.

[Darth Executor]

:hrm:

[Teallaura]

Technically, they can do it because the pasta is the food product per se and the sauce optional. Doncha love technical definitions in regulations!

I love the part where you have to do math to figure out the number of calories in a single serving container. Really, how many people eat three Vienna sausages out of a can of seven?

[Jimmy Higgins]

Technically, they can do it because the pasta is the food product per se and the sauce optional. Doncha love technical definitions in regulations!

I love the part where you have to do math to figure out the number of calories in a single serving container. Really, how many people eat three Vienna sausages out of a can of seven?It really is borderline pathetic, the loopholes that the food industry is just handed in these regulations. In Canada, they report fat to the 0.1 of a gram. In the US, it's to the half of a gram. So a food with 0.44 grams of trans-fat, actually gets to report as having no trans-fat.

You mentioned serving size, which is another utterly ridiculous way these companies can shield the lack of nutrition in a container or package. It's only 100 calories... if you just sniff the bar of chocolate.

I have to give props to Pillsbury, who had frozen biscuits in the store, and actually listed something like 2 to 4 grams of trans-fat per serving.

Another thing... I read about Weight Watchers choco candy, which was low in "points" because the candy had fiber in it. Well, the ingredients aren't really fiberous, per se, but rather laxatives which technically qualify as fiber. Not really the same sort of thing.

And finally, in this post, one thing I noticed now are these "TM's" coming after food products and a new ingredient. Word to the wise, if the food has a "TM" after it's name, DON'T buy it! One such thing was an orange juice with fiber all of a sudden in it. At first thought, I pondered the stuff was loaded with pulp. Pick it up, read the ingredients, the fiber is some TM'd ingredient... ie not really natural and probably not the best thing to use as a fiber supplement!

On a brighter side, I did notice that Brownberry has a new double fiber wheat bread which tastes real good. Here's a hint to those who need more fiber on their diet, don't eat more than two slices a day! For those who have a diet with a good fiber intake, don't eat more than two slices a day!

[Meh_Gerbil]

This is maddening and very wrong.

A legitiment role of the federal government is to protect the people from business tom-foolery like this - get some senators on this pronto!