By Dayne Hudson
It's common practice.
When you're watching your weight, some of us are known to reach for everything "sugar-free" or "low carb" in sight.
There's fewer calories and if you're adopting the flexible dieting approach, aka IIFYM that I've told you all about before - it's a wise move.
It's simple - save some "macros" and calories by drinking or eating something that's less calorie dense.
But there's something I've discovered this week by some food companies in their low carbs bars, cookies and other low carb treats - that you could describe as sneaky at best.
This isn't an article on any positives or negatives associated with "fake sugar" - I'll save that for another time, although I have scraped the surface of this here and on air with Ben Fordham on Radio 2GB.
This is about the hidden content that is made up of carbohydrates - but avoids coming directly under the carbohydrate banner as such.
It's eye opening for those who follow a low carb diet or a no carb diet - because they're consuming a lot more carbs than they think.
THE HIDDEN MACROS
Let's take this protein cookie I found in a supermarket this week, clearly marketed towards those counting macros or simply trying to lose weight.
They tell you there's 3 grams of carbs in it - which would make most people (especially those who stupidly still think carbs are bad) buy it and throw it down in 10 seconds flat.
But when you look at the overall calories in the bar - 115 calories - and match it to the macros, something doesn't add up.
Under the above macros there would be:
PROTEIN - 7 grams (4 x 7 grams = 28 calories)
FAT - 6 grams (9 x 6 grams = 54 calories)
CARBS 3 grams (4 x 3 grams = 12)
TOTAL CALORIES: 94.
But there's not - there's 115 on the packet - so where do the missing 21 calories come from?
Down the bottom, you'll see another column (under dietary fibre) called Polydextrose.
Underneath that is Glycerol.
There's 2.6 grams of Polydextrose and 2.7 grams of Glycerol.
These all pack energy that make up the remaining calories.
Now granted - this is only a small number of calories that we're talking about here, but by having 3 grams of carbs on the packet it's a sneaky way to earn your dollar - when really the truthful marketing strategy would be to talk about the 115 calories instead; not the macros on it that are misleading.
Now again, this is not an attack on these companies, it's just something I want to make you aware of.
But this could well be the start of a trend to market macro breakdowns that work favourably - but that ultimately don't allow you to count your daily macronutrients as accurently as you'd like.
POLYDEXTROSE AND GLYCEROL
POLYDEXTROSE
Polydextrose is a "polymer of glucose that provides to foods the bulk and texture of sucrose" (1).
Polymer is a large molecule with repeated subunits, with glucose being one of them!
What I'm saying is, there's glucose in polydextrose - 89 percent of it in fact, with 10 percent from sorbitol and 1 percent citric acid (2).
At the end of the day, it's classified as a soluble fiber (2) but you can see how this is sneaky!
Now for the record, there's only 1 calorie per gram of polydextrose but when you're not looking for it, it can sneak up on you.
But it get's worse.
GLYCEROL (AKA GLYCERINE)
Glycerol is a type of alcohol formed from sugar (3) made up by using a carbohydrate.
But here's the interesting part: it has the same energy density as carbohydrates, with 4 calories per gram. (4)
But of course this isn't on the macro friendly label they have, which causes inaccuracies.
The label technically should really have 6 grams of carbs - which is DOUBLE what they say is in it.
Glycerol is also 60% as sweet as sucrose, but on the positive side for your dentist; doesn't feed the bacteria that creates plaques and cause dental cavities (5).
Glycerol dodges being put into the category of a macronutrient, because it typicall isn't any of them.
However it is one component of the triacylglyceride (fat) molecule (5).
For years in Canada and America, manufacturers never labelled glycerol and only recently did Health Canada make them include it in listings (5).
But years ago the glycerol never made it onto nutrition labels (5).
The joke is, some of these sweets are made by people advocating a low carb diet plan, which you may know that I'm critical of.
ANOTHER POPULAR SWEET
Here's another low-carb treat from a huge company.
They are passing off the macros as 1.4 grams of protein, 7.5 grams of fat and 2.6 grams of carbs - which all adds up to 84 calories.
"Beautiful!" you think - pencilling in all those macros.
How many calories are in this treat though? 109.
So 25 calories are missing.
But then we take a glance down at those sneaky sugar substitutes and this time we come across Maltitol.
Maltitol is another sugar alcohol and it's food energy value is 50% of the carbohydrate sucrose. (6)
This means there's roughly another 4 grams at least of carbohydrates we need to think about in terms of our macros.
Now 4 grams isn't a lot, I know, but think of it this way: it's another whopping 50% on top of the carbohydrate content you're told is in it.
Is it a little dodgy? I think so.
Again, this is not an attack on these companies, I just feel it's something I need to bring to your attention, as I've had to think about it to hit my daily macronutrient intake.
The other point is, I'm sure as the treats get bigger (growing with the market) then so will the amount of polydextrose, glycerol and maltitol, making it all relative.
...AND ANOTHER
194 kilojoules in a serving they tell us, which equates to 46 calories.
If we add up all the macros as we're told above, we get 17 calories.
Now that's a lot of missing calories.
So on this occasion, we're looking at maltitol again, along with isomalt; also a sugar alcohol with the same caloric value (50% of sucrose) as maltitol (7).
Isomalt is 50% glucose - which is obviously a carbohydrate (8).
But because of it's make-up, it's classified as a fibre.
So it means these companies can leave them off as carbohydrates - but the calories are still there.
The potential of going over your calorie allowance is very much alive, as counting macros is made much more difficult.
CONCLUSION
These companie aren't lying about their calorie content - but rather being somewhat sneaky with their macronutrient breakdowns - especially when in the first treat, the macros are highlighted as a marketing ploy.
At the very least, I think these companies need to add on the extra carb numbers, even though technically their ingredients might not come under the heading as one despite being made from carbs.
But this might be hard when "LO CARB" is splashed across the front of the packet of the first treat I showed you.
Counting macros is a great way to lose weight, however, because of how complex our bodies are and how food labels in the first place are an estimate at best - there's really no room for more guessing games.
No one is really counting calories these days - it's no where near as efficient as counting macros to ensure you're hitting your protein fat and carb numbers properly.
We might only be talking about a few grams here - but it's still a large percentage of what these companies are saying is there initially.
It's relative and worthy of your attention.
Think about this too - if there's DOUBLE the carbs (even though they're technicically NOT carbs but the energy is the same) in these treats then what you're told - if the treats get substantialy bigger, will the ratios be the same?
As time goes on, and counting macros becomes more popular, companies will continue to exploit this tricky little marketing tactic.
At least now, you'll be ready.
"Stay Fit, Stay Flexed!"
REFERENCES
(1) Burdock GA, Flamm WG. A review of the studies of the safety of polydextrose in food. Food Chem Toxicol. 1999 Feb-Mar;37(2-3):233-64.
(2) Raninen K, Lappi J, Mykkänen H, Poutanen K (January 2011). "Dietary fiber type reflects physiological functionality: Coparison of grain fiber, inulin, and polydextrose". Nutr. Rev. 69 (1): 9–21.
(3) Hubert Schiweck, Albert Bär, Roland Vogel, Eugen Schwarz, Markwart Kunz, Cécile Dusautois, Alexandre Clement, Caterine Lefranc, Bernd Lüssem, Matthias Moser, Siegfried Peters "Sugar Alcohols" Ullmann's Encyclopedia of Industrial Chemistry, 2012, Wiley-VCH, Weinheim.
(4) Cavaleri F. Gambling with glycerin, carbohydrate or not? Biologic Nutrigenomics. June 2011.
(5) Glycerol. Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia. Section last modified 22 October 2014.
(6) Maltitol. Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia. Section last modified 9 October 2014.
(7) Isomalt. Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia. Section last modified 15 May 2014.
(8) Joint Expert Committee on Food Additives (JECFA). "Isomalt" International Programme on Chemical Safety (IPCS). Retrieved 15 December 2012.
