FACT OR FICTION?

It should be no surprise that I think the food industry is evil.  I’ve talked about it here, here, here, here, and here.

96% FAT FREE:  FACT OR FICTION?

Here’s my latest example of how the entire food industry is a scam.  Look at the picture below and you'll see that they market this deli meat as 96% Fat Free.  But is it really?

OSCAR MAYER DELI FRESH MEATS HAM COOKED 96% FAT FREE

Serving Size:  28g

Total Fat:  1g

% Fat by Weight:  1g / 28g = 0.036 (rounded to 4.0%)

Technically they aren’t lying.  That product is in fact 4% fat by weight, or in other words it is 96% Fat Free.

Now here’s the twist.  There are a number of ways to fudge that number.  If you look at the ingredients list you’ll notice that water is the second ingredient.  Why the hell would you need to add water to meat?  Well as I’m sure you know water has 0 calories, so it obviously doesn’t contribute to the caloric load of the deli meat.  However it does have mass, which means it does contribute to the total mass (or serving size).  This effectively dilutes the Fat Free figures in favor of the food company and can mislead the consumer.

So let’s look at it differently.  We’ll use the same label and information that is provided right there in plain sight, it just hasn’t been emphasized in bold letters or anything like that to catch the consumer’s eye.

Calories per Serving:  30

Calories per Serving from Fat:  10

% Fat by Calorie:  10 / 30 = 0.333 (rounded to 33.3%)

That’s quite a dramatic difference!  How many packages of that deli meat do you think Oscar Mayer would sell if they labeled the package as “66.7% Fat Free”??

Now imagine if you apply this same technique to a creamier product or even a liquid (e.g. yogurt or milk) where even more water could be added without significantly affecting the texture of the product. 

If you want an even more dramatic example of this, check out this video from Jeff Novick.  This guy is a smart dude.  He has Masters’ degrees in both exercise and nutrition and more abbreviations after his name than I care to list.  Anyway, if you have a few minutes, watch this video.