Reading Labels on the Belly Fat Cure by Amber Allen-Sauer

Reading Food Labels on the Belly Fat Cure

The key to the Belly Fat Cure plan is in your products’ labels. Jorge Cruise’s new book has lots of products and recipes to help you reach your weight loss goals, but by reading your labels very carefully you can follow the plan faithfully with endless products!

Before you eat anything that is packaged, turn it around and find the Nutrition Facts. In the U.S. the FDA mandates that all products classified as food must carry this label and list certain very specific information. I’m pretty sure the staff at my local grocery store moan when they see me walk in the door, because mess up all their products. I pull them out, turn them all around, read them and put 95% of the things back up. Most contain too much sugar or have an artificial sweetener like Aspartame or Sucralose.

The Nutritional Facts is typically white with black text. First locate the Serving Size, which is at the top of the label. I always find this surprising, and sometimes find that the actual serving size is less then half what I expected. Breakout a food scale or a calculator, best guessing is a plan to over eat usually. The “Servings Per Container” number listed below the Serving Size will help you better determine how much you can have too.

Why is the Serving Size So Important on the Belly Fat Cure?

All the nutritional information on the labels is relevant for that specific amount of food. For this example I will use Wasa Crispbread, which are great on the Belly Fat Cure. The Serving Size = 1, Sugar = 0, Carbohydrates = 8 grams. So what if you want to have two of the crackers, or even three? Simply multiple the Sugar and Carbohydate grams by the number of servings you are having to get your total.

3 Wasa Crispbreads:
Sugar 0 grams * 3 servings = 0
Carbs 8 grams * 3 servings = 24 grams

Apply the Belly Fat Cure Carb Servings rules and that is an S/C Value of 0/2

Or make a Wasa Crispbread into a BFC snack:

Wasa Crispbread = 0grams Sugar/8 grams Carbs

Nature’s Hallow = 0 grams Sugar/7 grams Carbs

Cream Cheese = 2 grams Sugar/2 grams Carbs

The total is 2 grams Sugar/17 grams Carbs for a total S/C Value of 2/1

Some food products are considered Dietary Suppliments by the FDA and have different labels requirements. However they may still contain high doses of sugar and artificial sweeteners and must be tracked the same as all food on the Belly Fat Cure. Things to look out for are cough syrup (sugar), fiber supplements (carbohydrates), chewable antacids (sugar) and liquid probitoics (sugar) for example. They may take additional research online and with the manufacturer’s website to find their S/C Values.

© 2010 by Amber Allen-Sauer. Used by kind permission of the author. What do you think? Please send Amber your comments or questions to Amber.