Food/Groceries

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When the Chips are Down in Fat, Are the Calories Too?

Diet-conscious consumers are probably attracted to low-fat products. And in the case of potato chips, they probably feel a bit less guilty indulging in that treat if it contains less fat.

Enter Cape Cod 40% Reduced Fat potato chips:

Cape Cod potato chips

Now don’t assume that the reduced fat chips on the right have 40% less fat than the Cape Cod regular chips on the left.

*MOUSE PRINT:

fat reduction claim

The reduced fat chips contain 40% less fat than the market leader, Lay’s potato chips. Lay’s has 10 grams of fat per ounce, Cape Cod 40% Reduced has six grams – 40% less as advertised, and regular Cape Cod has eight grams. This means that Cape Cod Reduced Fat chips contain 25% less fat than their own regular chips — still a substantial savings.

Dieters, however, are not only concerned about fat but calories as well. Would you care to venture a guess as to how many fewer calories Cape Cod 40% Reduced Fat chips has compared to their regular chips?

*MOUSE PRINT:

Cape Cod chips nutrition label

What? The lower fat chips have exactly the same number of calories — 140 — as their regular full-fat chips? Yep, that’s what the nutrition (alternative?) facts label says.

How can that be? The portion size is exactly the same – 28 grams — as is the number of chips per portion, but there is 25% less fat in one product.

So we posed that very question to the PR folks at Snyder’s-Lance, the makers of Cape Cod chips. And we also wanted to know whether they felt they had an obligation to dispel the likely consumer misimpression that their 40% fat reduced chips were lower in calories than their own regular variety. In reply, after three attempts to obtain answers, all the company (through their PR firm) would say relevant to our questions was this:

With regards to the calories in each item, we adhere to the strict FDA regulations that dictate how companies must calculate and report nutritional information.

Clearly something just doesn’t add up here. The company should be able to explain to customers how it is possible that their substantially reduced in fat product offers no caloric savings if in fact the label is correct.

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The New Math at Mio

Mouse Print* reader Jack K. recently wrote to us complaining about Mio water enhancer. This is a little bottle of concentrated flavor that you squirt into a glass of water to give it some flavor and maybe a few vitamins, all while adding zero calories.

Mio label   Mio side label

Jack says that despite the label promising that the product makes 24 eight-ounce glasses, he was getting much less and felt shortchanged. Since the amount a customer squirts into a glass could vary each time, our intrepid consumer used a measuring spoon, following the instructions on the side of the bottle which called for using about 1/2 teaspoon per glass. Lo and behold when he emptied the bottle he had only been able to make the equivalent of 16 eight ounce glasses of flavored water — one-third less than the package promised.

We did a little math using an online conversion program to find out how many half teaspoons are actually in a bottle whose net contents are 1.62 fluid ounces (48 ml).

*MOUSE PRINT:

Mio conversion

There are about nine and three quarter teaspoons worth of syrup in those Mio containers, which is slightly less than 19-1/2 half teaspoons. So just by pure mathematics, each bottle only holds enough product to make about 19 glasses of beverage rather than the 24 claimed.

We contacted the PR folks at Kraft to ask about this discrepancy. They responded in part as follows, without directly addressing our specific math question and example:

MiO Vitamins and our other MiO products are labeled properly.

Other Mio Vitamins products yield 24 servings and have prep instructions that indicate 1 squeeze of approximately 1/2 teaspoon (~1/2 tsp) per 8 floz. We clearly label that this is 2ml/about 1/2tsp for a 1.62oz 48ml) bottle.

So, if you want 24 glasses of Mio from each bottle, you’ll just have to use your handy 2-ml measuring spoon, which, of course, no one owns.

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How Much Milk Can You Squeeze Out of an Almond?

Almond BreezeElsie the cow would probably turn over in her grave if she could see all the newfangled milks on the dairy shelf, like Milkwise, which we wrote about in 2015. And there are a lot of soy milks and almond milks.

Almond Breeze is one of the big brands. It looks and sounds wholesome and nutritious. But even checking the ingredients listing doesn’t give you a full picture of what you are really buying.

*MOUSE PRINT:

Almond Breeze

It may seem like a bit of circular reasoning, but “almondmilk” is the first ingredient in almond milk. But if you are just casually reviewing the list, it appears that almonds are the second ingredient in the order of predominance after water. But that is a bit of word trickery — almonds are not really second overall. After that is a form of sugar, which might give a clue to what you are really buying. And the nutrition label offers yet another clue by noting it only has one gram of protein.

The trouble is we really don’t know how much of the product is derived from almonds. I don’t know about you, but when I squeeze an almond, I can’t get any milk out of it. 🙂 So leave it to some industrious lawyers who found out the answer.

*MOUSE PRINT:

According to a lawsuit they have filed in 2015, Blue Diamond Almond Milk only contains two-percent almonds.

So the product is really just a bunch of water and sugar with a pinch of almonds. While the flavor may be pleasing to many, the nutritional value of the product seems questionable at best.

Fast forward to late 2016 and early 2017.

A settlement of this class action was announced last month that will cost Blue Diamond $9-million. And of course, the company denies any wrongdoing and stands by its advertising. Consumers who purchased Almond Breeze are entitled to $1 back per container, for up to 10 containers, depending on whether they have proof of purchase or not. The deadline for filing a claim is April 13, 2017.

Last November, 25 members of Congress wrote to the Food and Drug Administration calling on the agency to investigate and take action against any producers of “milk” products that are not derived from cows.

And just last week, Wisconsin Senator Tammy Baldwin introduced a bill in Congress to fight back against nondairy products mislabeled as milk, yogurt or cheese.