I am getting so sick and tired of food companies deciding what an acceptable portion size is for so many different foods. A well-known chip maker has decided that 2 ounces of chip dip is a suitable amount for dipping chips (they're going with the portability of it, ya know). And for this supposed on-the-go convenience, you get to pay $3.49 for a package of 6 of these little portions. I'm sorry, if I want portability in my chip dips, I'll buy a large container of the flavor of my choice and divide it up into smaller portions of my choosing (I have all kinds of those 1/4 and 1/2 cup plastic containers floating around). I'll pay a lot less for that larger container, and I get to decide what a suitable portion is.
Why does this piss me off so much? Mainly because these companies are jumping on the obesity epidemic bandwagon with their portion-control/calorie limitations and charging the consumer more for it. Just like all the foods that are reduced fat/reduced sugar/reduced whatever-is-bad-for-you-today foods, they are taking out natural ingredients and substituting others that may or may not be good for you and charging you more for the privilege. The really sad thing about all of this? People are buying into the idea that portion control (90 - 100 calories for a snack) is going to help them lose weight/keep it off. These food companies don't always come right out and say "If you buy our insert whatever portion-controlled item here you'll lose weight and keep it off forever", but they sure as hell imply it. And people who still believe in The Fantasy of Being Thin will buy it, and then wonder why it didn't help them. Will they blame the marketing? Probably not, they'll blame themselves, just like they do when their Weight Watcher's, Jenny Craig, NutraSystem ad nauseum diets fail to make them permanently thin. Cynic that I am, I can see the day coming when you won't be able to buy anything unless it's in those damned portion-controlled packs. Like I don't already have a hard enough time budgeting money for food so DH and I can eat a wide variety of foods while controlling his blood sugar (and make sure he gets a good lunch and snacks for work without sending his blood sugar bouncing all over the place). I finally found a cereal that he can eat (and actually likes) that isn't so high in sugar and carbs/low in fiber, but it costs about 50% more than a similar regular cereal (because it's for diabetics, natch).
I think all the hype about food and health is not about health at all, it's about making us think it's about health so they make more money off our fears. Sorry, I'm not buying it (pun fully intended).
Thursday, February 28, 2008
25 comments:
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Hi. You sure do sound off a lot against thinner people. I guess we can't help it as much as you can't help being fat???!!!
ReplyDeleteThanks for your comment on my latest entry. It's a great idea to point my friend toward Shapely Prose as a great site I've found, which helped me to stop dieting and be happy with myself. She'll be happy to hear it; she's often told me I don't need to diet. She was always right. :)
ReplyDeleteanonymous - where am I sounding off against thinner people? I don't have a problem with thin people just because they are thin (if they troll, however, and think that being thin gives them the right to judge everyone who isn't thin, then I have a problem with them). My daughter-in-law is thin, my grandkids are thin, some of my best friends are thin and I don't have a problem with any of them (because they don't have a problem with me being fat). I have a problem with a society who thinks everyone should be thin in order to be accepted as a worthwhile person. Fuck that.
ReplyDeletejuliafaye- SP has a lot of good information and commentary. I think anyone who has body issues would benefit from reading it. It's made me laugh and cry many a time, and has helped me quite a bit with some of my body issues.
ReplyDeleteOh I HATE those tiny freaking packages. People at work bring them in and feel like they are lording over it all that "Hey look, I only ate 100 calories but it was OREOS!". Big whoop. I'd rather just eat the 3 regular sized oreos if 100 calories of them was all I wanted. Trust me, putting stuff in smaller packages ISN'T going to magically change how much our bodies need to feel satisfied.
ReplyDeleteIt is all just another strive to package more daily guilt into the lives of us fatties. "Oh, you mean three crumbs of this didn't satisfy you? Well that's the RECOMMENDED portion so you're obviously an over-eating fatty".
Gah. The horror. Let ME decide what my body needs, thank YOU very much.
Short version: Great post. I agree. :D
I guess maybe you're talking about all those 100 calorie packs? So far I haven't seen anything I want to eat packaged that way. What drives me nuts are the cans that contain 3 1/2 servings of veggies or whatever, I just want to know how many carbs are in the whole can without having to use algebra because I'm probably going to eat half of it. Am I supposed to eat one serving at a time and throw out the extra half?
ReplyDeletenonegiven - those drive me nuts, and the thing with the different portion sizes on regular foods is a whole 'nother rant. Some say 1/2 cup is a serving, some say 3/4 cup is a serving, and they give nutrition information according to serving size. I would rather they say this is X cups, with total of X # calories for the whole thing and I'll figure it out myself. If one whole can of green beans is 150 calories (I don't know what it is, I eat frozen green beans), for example, then if I eat half the can, it's 75 calories, simple math. But no, they have to say it's 14 oz, a serving is 1/2 cup, 3 1/2 servings per can, 43 calories per serving blah blah blah.
ReplyDeleteI wish they had to use one universal measurement for serving size (1/2 cup works for me) and then package in even increments of that 1/2 cup (2 servings, 4 servings, 6 servings, etc). Makes the math a hell of a lot easier and my shopping would go a lot quicker and be a lot less frustrating.
Anonymous- I'm thin too, and I have no idea what you're seeing. Of course: This doesn't align with your belief system. That's why ITZ T3H EVIL TOWARD T3h THIN PEOPLEZZZZ, right?
ReplyDeleteWhere did vesta sound off against thin people? I musta missed a memo somewhere.
ReplyDeleteannie - shhhh.....I missed that memo too.......lol
ReplyDeleteI never buy them. Then, I buy most of my food in the produce section. I have little interest in anything in a 100-calorie package.
ReplyDeleteI saw nuts at Trader Joes packed that way. I believe it to be a marketing scheme to make money on people too lazy to decide portions themselves. I don't need my nuts portioned. I can pour as many as I want in a dish without having to tear open three or four tiny packages.
Anonymous, I don't see anything in the blog that is offensive to thin people. Do you think thin people can portion food on their own and need to pay a higher price for someone to do it for them? Such baloney!
What I hate is that the 100-cal. packs are not even the REAL ACTUAL FOOD. They're some "thin (hmmm--coincidence?) and crispy" shit. Some manufacturers are actually giving info for the whole box or can of something - I know I've seen that on drinks, anyway.
ReplyDeleteEven though you're not into weight loss - www.calorieking.com does have carb info, and for a lot of eating-out places too. A friend at work had a son with Type I diabetes, and she used it all the time to figure out what she could feed him.
goingloopy - thanks for that link, I'll check it out. It sounds like it would help a lot when we go out to dinner (not that we can afford to do it very often, but still).
ReplyDeleteI buy the 100 calorie packs of goldfish crackers because they're easy to carry to work and they're good for mid-morning snacks at the office. I don't count calories, and if I did, I'd be a nervous wreck.
ReplyDeleteI don't care if you're a size 2 or a 32, we need to eat. I know people who eat high-calorie foods, don't do a lot of exercise and they're not fat. My good friend doesn't eat a lot of junk, has a job that requires her to be on her feet and do a lot of walking every night, and she's a size 22/24. But yet she's the one that will be persecuted because her size isn't a single digit.
No wonder fat haters always claim to be so thin. They burn their calories running their mouths about how much they hate us fatties! That's a pathetic form of exercise if you ask me.
--Bree
Bree, you seriously crack me up :D Running their mouths sounds just about right to me!
ReplyDeleteVesta -
ReplyDeleteCalorie King also has a small (pocket sized) book that lists a lot of "counts" for a lot of food, both generic and name brand (because sometimes the name brand will add or take-away some elements to make it "healthier" or "better"). The book also lists the counts for many "eating out" type places, both fast food and seated dining.
My mom (former diabetic) used hers religiously for several years. It's accurate enough to help her regulate her blood sugar, so I think it's pretty good.
beck - thanks, I will look for that, it will come in handy, for sure :)
ReplyDeleteThis is alot like how the chip company Flat Earth, will advertise they have a full serving of vegatables in their chip. Then you go to their site and find out it's 130 calories for 12 crisps about this big.[ ]
ReplyDeleteAbout the 100 calorie packs, I disagree that they don't help you loose weight, or at least control it. I really like the 100 Calorie Pack Oreo Candy Bites. They taste like chocolate cake, really! 100 Calories for chocolate cake flavor, vs 1,000 something calories for an actual peice of chocolate cake. That's a good deal.
violet_yoshi - I guess the 100-calorie packs are fine if someone wants to use them to control their weight, but I would just as soon buy a regular size bag and divide it (or just take 100 calories worth at a time). I don't see much sense in extra packaging (more garbage to go to the landfill), and paying more money for less product. You're paying for convenience, and when I worked, I took small containers of snacks with me, then took the empty containers home and washed them to be used again. Less trash for the garbage, and the big bag of snacks cost me less money. I'm a cheap bitch when it comes to groceries (my son used to say that I could pinch pennies till they screamed....LOL).
ReplyDeleteI was rather tempted, I admit, when I first saw the 100 calorie pack shit come out. It's great to be lazy and buy a six-pack of 100 calorie portions of Oreos, and damn - maybe if I could combine that with diet and exercise (eat less, move more) I might get thin again! Yay! Simultaneously, I thought - 100 calories of Oreos? What's that, like one or two cookies? Hardly satisfying. I'd end up eating a six pack IF Oreos were what I wanted (and occasionally - yes very occasionally, I do.) I might end up eating even more than I originally wanted if I just sat there with a real bag of Oreos and ate what I wanted.
ReplyDeleteAnd dammit, I'm not on a mission to lose weight anymore. Fuck it.
I don't know if I mentioned this much, BUT as the New Year approached I was on the verge - SERIOUSLY on the verge - of deciding to embark on yet another useless and probably harmful diet. I thought maybe it would be best if I got back down to my pre-sickness weight. No idea why I thought that, except that the doctors are all SO unfamiliar with my bizarre condition that they don't know shit about it anyway.
I then came upon Red No. 3, then THIS blog, then BFB and then one of the others (can't remember which now - maybe SP.) And said - fuck it. Ain't nobody - even my doctor - getting on me to lose weight - SURE my husband was still telling me "Well, hon, it might help your joints to have less weight on them" blah blah but he's very educable and he is perfectly happy to learn from me about these subjects. And he loves me as I am.
Why the HELL go down another diet path? Ain't. doing. it. Thanks to you fine folks. Society's fucked up, not us. Let them freaking adapt because dammit, we're not all dropping dead (much as they'd like us to) and HERE WE ARE. DEAL with it :)
Annie - every once in a while, I consider starting a diet too. But then I think about how every time I've done that, I've ended up heavier than when I started out, and have to say to hell with it (not that I would ever be able to lose enough to get thin, but just being a bit lighter would be so nice, sometimes). Since it's not going to happen, I'm learning to be happy with me as I am, and you're right, all the people that blog about FA are a huge help with that.
ReplyDeleteI think the reason I'm more satisfied with a 100 Pack of candy, is because I'm lactose intolerant. If ate much more than what was in that bag, I'd be sick.
ReplyDeleteviolet yoshi - by my calculations (and the nutrition info) a piece of homemade Duncan Heinz devil's food cake is only 180 calories. Add buttercream frosting and you might add another 100. So yes it's more calories but not a thousand. Now if you're talking about some restaurant dessert, I can't say, but there's just nothing like homemade cake. IMO.
ReplyDeleteGreat post. This is my first comment and I enjoy your blog.
ReplyDeleteI think it's the unspoken intent about these prepackaged food that is the issue. Yet alone the fact that they profit from inflated prices for this 'convenience'. Once again fear of fat works in favour of marketing.
1000 calories for a piece of cake? Once again an overstatement of calories against a supposed 'better' option to vilify one type of food against another.
Diet mentality and morality in action.
sassy - I think maybe that better than sex cake might come close to 1,000 calories a slice (depending on how big a slice you take), but it's too rich for me to have very often (maybe once a year), and I usually have a piece about 2" X 2" and then I'm done. The only time I ever made it was for potlucks at work or family gatherings so I wouldn't have any to take home (if there was any left-over, I either sent it home with a co-worker/family member or threw it away because it went stale sitting at home). But even so, I never even considered how many calories were in it or how it was going to make me OMG FATTER (if I ate the whole thing, I might think about that, but not just one piece).
ReplyDelete