Food Label Analysis!

Trying to practice figuring out food labels...lol.  I have never been able to Master the easy science behind them but I'm trying. 

Today I picked up some Greek Yogurt and some No Sugar Added Blueberry Jam....I was thinking of eating greek yogurt with a bit of Jam post surgery but the figuring out the Carb thing is stressing me out a little.....

So what's your take on these labels.....

Yogurt



Jam

HI PJB,
Just had my one month follow up at HRRH and the nutritionist said we should be consuming up to 100-120g of carbs per day.  However I know most people need to consume less than 50g per day to maintain ketosis. I know this doesn't answer your question but I thought I would just add my two cents. 
Have a good one.
TT

I wouldn't fret about the carbs in the greek yogurt. I've compared and the lowest carb is the unsweetned Liberte brand. Plus you won't start out eating 3/4 cup, probably 1/4 or 1/3. You can get NSA jams with as few as 2 carbs per teaspoon, or syrups that have no net carbs.

I personally eat around 100gr of carbs a day; I just make sure that they aren't bad white carbs. I eat almost zero bread, although I do have a couple of tablespoons of potato or rice once in awhile. I also eat a 2-4 crackers once or twice a week and the odd Fibre One bar. Carbs are necessary for brain function you just want to make sure you are getting them mostly from fruit and veggies.

I would eat both of these products; greek yogurt is easy protein.

Your brain runs on glucose, but that doesn't mean it needs to come from your diet. Your liver can convert stored fat into a glucose substitute that your brain can use for energy. Studies indicate that it is as good, or even better than glucose, after a brief adjustment by the body. This is the process of ketosis. Giving your body carbs to burn only keeps it from burning fat stores instead.

 I remember asking the dietician at TWH how many carbs/sugars we should be looking at on a label  and she responded with 5g or less is ideal.

Tammy

I'm a little confused, as well. I know that Greek yogurt is a "good" food post-op but it does have quite a few carbs per serving. I'm wondering if there's a difference in carbs from lactose and carbs from sucrose and other starches. If I remember my biochemistry correctly:

sucrose (table sugar) is made up of one molecule glucose + one molecule fructose
lactose (milk sugar) is made up of one molecule glucose + one molecule galactose

glucose + fructose in a 1:1 ratio is easiest to be metabolized by the body.

This leads me to believe that lactose is metabolized more slowly thereby reducing the insulin demands on the pancreas.

Sorry for the technicalities of it all. I will definitely be posing this question to my NUT.

You need to look for natural (unsweetened) greek yogurt, it is quite low carb. The 'serving' is 3/4 of a cup but you're only going to eat a 1/4 or 1/3 of a cup. In a 1/4 cup there are only 2 carbs. Then you can add whatever carb free sweetners or syrups you want.

The label itself only tells you part of the story. The next thing you need to do is scan the ingredient list for the types of sugars used. You can find out whether they are naturally occurring sugars like milk sugars, or fruit sugars fructose or sugar alcohols like malitol etc . Some people do not do well with sa's. You can't avoid sugars in yogurt because like all dairy products it is made with some form of milk- in this case skim milk. The jam has fruit and juice. Generally these types of sugars are tolerated well.

If you go to my first year webpage there's s list of types we tend to do well with and those we don't.

Keep reading those labels!!

Dawn

Thanks everyone!  This is the ONLY part of this I am finding daunting - I am a terribly picky eater so I need to be figuring this out before I get turned into a franken-mama!