This may sound rather silly, but I felt I had to post this.

First, I am a big Pop-Tart fan. Yes, I know they're packed pastries with tons of preservatives and whatnot but I don't care. I love them. And since I do Weight Watchers, I fit Pop-Tarts in as a treat whenever I can.

Well, today I was reading something about the new Pop-Tarts with fiber, and I was reading the comments left by others about how the nutrition information and packaging was so deceiving.

Well, lo and behold...I've been imagining that the nutrition information covers both pastries in the package...and it only covers one!

It may not sound like a big deal, but Pop Tarts are my treat of choice, and I eat them. A lot. And every time I've consumed them, I'm been consuming double my points. And that adds up.

To make matters worse, I approached my husband about this, and he just looks at me and says, "Well, yeah...you didn't know that?"

So now I feel really dumb. But at least I know what's been contributing to my difficulty losing weight

Ahhh, yeah I LOVE pop tarts as well and I used to eat them every morning...back in high school when I lost weight the wrong way (that pop tart was my breakfast >.<)

As much as I love them, I just stay away from them, I don't even go down that isle in the store. lol

But at least you know now one package is two servings! I hope your weight loss starts getting a bit easier too.

I totally did that too. And I got them from the "nutritious fiber bars" section in the supermarket, so I didn't even realize they were PopTarts (which somehow we never ate in my family growing up, so these were probably only the second or third I'd had in my life.) I thought they were just some more interesting form of fiber bar, which I keep in my office desk for food emergencies. And then after the emergency came and I had to enter the pack it into my LoseIt app, I was, like, *%$Y!

I still have the rest of the box sitting in the kitchen cabinet. Only now they're classified as "dessert".

Yeah, I don't like that either. Esp on drink bottles. :P

A.

A head of broccoli would never lie to you about serving size

This is all a learning process. Now you know and you can carry on with that knowledge of always checking the servings on the labels as well as the other info.

Yea, reading labels is pretty darn important. The "serving size" can really blow my mind sometimes. Like nuts, I NEVER knew the serving size was so few. Raw almonds 1/4 cup = 180 calories. Cold cereal!! varies from 1/4 to 1 cup... I used to eat 4 serving... and then crackers & chips... ahhhh!!

Mmmm...I love poptarts. Before, when I ate whatever I want, I'd eat a pack of poptarts for breakfast every morning. I like the brown sugar and cinnamon ones. And the frosted blueberry ones. Mmmm....

I scrutinize nutrition labels pretty closely, so I haven't made a mistake like this yet. However, there are a lot of packaged foods with really counterintuitive serving sizes. They just make the labels smaller so that when people glance at the calorie count, they don't feel as bad. The food companies know well that most consumers are planning on eating both poptarts in one serving.

A few that I've noticed are bottles of soda, they're usually 2.5 servings or something ridiculous like that. Candy bars...who gets a snickers bar and plans on saving the second serving for later? Even those Select Harvest Light soups that conveniently come in microwavable bowls. If they assume that I will microwave the bowl that I bought it in and then conveniently eat out of the bowl, why would they think that it was more than one serving?

So, it's an honest mistake. At least now you know

Hee I have done the same thing.

It could be worse though! There was a poster here years ago (and I don't remember who it was, so apologies if it was any reader of this thread!) who thought that since the ICBITB spray listed 0 calories on the back, that meant she could open the sprayer and pour liquid ICBITB over everything she wanted to taste buttery for 0 calories. Apparently, she was using it a LOT!

Here's the scoop: 12.5 sprays is 10 calories and 1 gram of fat, 25 sprays (1 teaspoon) is 20 calories and 2 grams of fat, and 37.5 sprays is 30 calories and 3 grams of fat. The entire bottle contains 900 calories and 90 grams of fat!

(and of course, a 1 second spray has 0 calories, because of manufacturers are allowed to call anything less than .5g 0, that's how so many are able to say 0 transfat PER SERVING, when it's like .03 per serving or whatever).

Or oreo cookies, lol....the serving size is 2 cookies. Anybody who has a bag of of oreo cookies near them would have to be a MUCH stronger person than I to stop at TWO oreos, haha.

Oh yes, you must be very AWARE of serving sizes. Muffins? Many times the nutritional information is for 1/2 the muffin, so that a WHOLE muffin is really two portions. How crazy (& deceptive) is that?

About those pop tarts that you love so much. Well, you may start off being able to fit them into your plan, but you may find down the road that though they TASTE good, that they're not satiating enough. That you will be hungry and crave-y and you may decide they are no longer worth it. You may decide you need to get more filling power from your calories (points) and you just may want to give them up.

I know there were lots of foods that I LOVED and thought that there was no way on earth I could live without them, but upon deciding to lose the weight and get healthy I realized that I loved ME and good health and wanting the best life possible even more. So I had to discover other foods that I loved. Ones that tasted great and were great for me. Ones that weren't only good while I was eating them, but they were good for me long after I was done chewing.

Like you've discovered, this IS a learning process and you will definitely keep on learning. It's quite the adventure!

Here's another thing to watch out for. Applebee's does not list nutritional information on their website, but if you look up their foods on places like TheDailyPlate, LiveStrong, etc., you'll find that their Quesadilla Burger is listed as just over 500 calories for 1 burger. This is simply untrue! The serving size is ONE HALF the burger, not 1 burger! So the burger actually has over 1,000 calories. (I found this out on one of those "worst foods you can eat" web articles.)

But if you think about it, you can see what's happened. The "Lowfat Chicken Quesadilla" has 742 calories per serving (the whole shebang), so it's impossible for 1 Quesadilla Burger to have less than that! But each calorie counting website just picks up the information from the same bad source, so it gets duplicated and spread everywhere.

I guess the point is, be cautious! Be skeptical! If it sounds too good to be true, it probably isn't true!

Jay

My favorite thing is to MAKE it, especially with the few baked goods that I still eat. That way I can control the portion size. A cup of white flour = 455 cal, a cup of whole wheat - 405. Then I can decide how many portions to divide it in. And made fresh they taste much better too, so it's not some crummy thing that's not worth the calories in it. (Today I made a batch of 164-cal bagels, yum.)

It's natural to think the serving size is 2 snce that's how they are packaged. I wish they would change this, but they have done it ever since I can remember.

I was shocked to hear on another thread at how many calories some of the Panera bagels have, and that's before putting cream cheese on it. I haven't fallen into that particular trap, but I know I could have.

Don't feel stupid. It's happened to all of us at one point or another. Now that you know the deal with them just remember when you're eating them that you can either eat one for x points or two for xx points. I used to love pop-tarts too but after eating healthy for a while, I went and had one and noticed a different in the way I felt. I have problems rememberring that the "crappy" food I used to live on really does affect the way you feel. So, once in a while, I indulge in something that's not good. Whether that's a pop-tart, ice cream, the dreaded Mc Donald's, etc. It all comes back in end to make me feel gross. I now eat a primarily whole foods diet that consists mostly of raw fruits and veggies. While it was hard to start this (I cheated ALOT!) I've come to realize that I really do feel better when I eat this way.