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Confused about nutritional information re of which sugars.

O

OldToby

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We (wife and I) have been told to reduce the amount of sugar in our diet, so I started reading and planning.
To find out where we are and how much sugar we actually consume we are going to monitor our intake in both free sugars and carbohydrates.
I have found that 1g of carbohydrate = 4g of sugar so the conversion should be straightforward.

I am making a simple spread sheet to do this with columns for carbohydrates times 4 and free sugars which will then be added together to give the total sugar content.

My problem is the food packaging gives a total carbohydrate content of say 55g per 100g of product of which 5g is sugars.
Using the above example should I enter 35g of carbohydrate, being 55-(5x4), and 5g of sugar, or ignore the sugar content and simply use the 55g of carbohydrate?
Or am I barking up the wrong tree with my simplistic method.
 
You just need to count the carbs. All carbs turn to sugar anyway. I always ignore the “of which sugars bit”!
 
Not sure where you got your conversion factor from. As far as I know carbohydrate is carbohydrate.

To be clear, sugar is a carbohydrate. It is usually absorbed faster than other carbohydrates and so is more likely to cause spikes in BG. However all carbohydrates (more or less) will be converted to glucose by the body so you should just count them all.

You appear to be working on the assumption that the food suppliers multiply the weight of sugar by 4 to give the total weight of carbohydrates. I think this is completely wrong.

For a simple illustration, consider a bag of table sugar, which is (hopefully) pure sugar. With your method 100 grams would contain 100 grams of sugar, but would have to be reported as 400 grams of carbohydrate per 100 grams.

Edit: gah! Completely the wrong way round. You are trying to multiply the weight of non-sugar carbohydrate by 4. No, ignore me for the moment as I haven't finished my first cup of coffee yet.

Edit 2: going back to the sugar example, I think your formula would give 25 grams of carbohydrate of which 100 grams sugar. You seem to be counting 4 grams of sugar as one gram of carbohydrate. I think.
 
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hi there @OldToby
welcome to the forum :)

I think there might be a bit of confusion regarding carbs and sugar.......

1 gram of carbohydrate is equal to 4 calories ( not 4 grams of sugar )
1 gram of protein is equal to 4 calories
1 gram of fat is equal to 9 calories

it indeed is best to use the total carbohydrate per 100 gram and multiply that by your portion for a total carbs consumed
( example boiled potato - 17 carbs per 100 grams so a 150 gram portion is 17 x 1.5 = 25.5 carbs )

Daisy1 provides a great starter pack which I see you have received on your opening post.
A lot of very helpful information is there.

removing the daisy1 tag as you have already had this starter pack !!

all the best !
 
Hi and welcome!

I agree with the others. You are confusing carbs with calories, and making life very difficult for yourself trying to estimate how much sugar you are eating.

Sugar is just one of the many carbohydrate foods, but it is all carbs we need to be aware of. On the nutrition labels on food packaging it states the number of grams of carbs per 100g. of food, then it goes on to say "of which sugar ..." You can totally ignore the of which sugar bit. The number of grams per 100g is easy because it is a percentage. 12g carbs per 100g = 12%, so whatever portion size you eat, 12% of it will be carbohydrate.
 
Thanks for this.
Moral is, beware of private websites that have an axe to grind. I found the 1g of carbs = 4g of sugar on a LCHF website.
But we are not going down that route.
 
OldToby said:
Thanks for this.
Moral is, beware of private websites that have an axe to grind. I found the 1g of carbs = 4g of sugar on a LCHF website.
But we are not going down that route.
Click to expand...
Would you share which one please? It needs to be corrected.
 
OldToby said:
Thanks for this.
Moral is, beware of private websites that have an axe to grind. I found the 1g of carbs = 4g of sugar on a LCHF website.
But we are not going down that route.
Click to expand...

When you say "that route" do you mean LCHF?

If so, why? No pressure, just interested.
 
Ah - not if the total carbs includes the fibre.
In the US the fibre is included, so many foods which are rich in fibre are excluded from the diets of those wishing to control their diabetes through low carb eating.
UK websites give the net carbs, which are the ones I use for monitoring what I eat.
I stick to foods which are 10 gm of net carbs or fewer, for the most part. Anything higher is eaten in extreme moderation.
 
Resurgam said:
Ah - not if the total carbs includes the fibre.
In the US the fibre is included, so many foods which are rich in fibre are excluded from the diets of those wishing to control their diabetes through low carb eating.
UK websites give the net carbs, which are the ones I use for monitoring what I eat.
I stick to foods which are 10 gm of net carbs or fewer, for the most part. Anything higher is eaten in extreme moderation.
Click to expand...

Which is why we have to be very careful when using Google for nutrient amounts. Make sure you know if it is a US entry, and if it is, deduct the "of which fibre" amount.
 
Rachox said:
You just need to count the carbs. All carbs turn to sugar anyway. I always ignore the “of which sugars bit”!
Click to expand...

So can you help me I’m confused when reading food labels what should the carb be to be ok to eat also sugar level I have to get my sugar levels down and my carbs thanks
 
bigbird said:
So can you help me I’m confused when reading food labels what should the carb be to be ok to eat also sugar level I have to get my sugar levels down and my carbs thanks
Click to expand...
Sugar is a carbohydrate. When looking at the label in the UK you can ignore the "of which sugars" bit because the sugars are included in the carbohydrate amount.
 
If you look at the label and find the carbohydrate, anything 10 percent or less is probably fine, certainly to start off with.
I eat Lidl protein rolls, but all other bread is off the menu as it is too high in carbs.
When I started out cooking for a family I used to have two shopping lists which I used alternately - I did do three at one time but it was not very successful. It did mean that I made different meals over about a fortnight. Before that I had a notebook with the carb count of all the usual low carb foods and some which were a little higher and which I used to buy small amounts of.
 
I find that the 'of which sugars' is a good guide to how quickly the carbs taken will affect your blood sugar rise.

I find that something which contains 30g of carbs of which 25g are sugars will have my blood sugar rising a lot quicker than an item that's 30g of carbs of which 5g are sugars. This is why jelly babies/glucose tabs are idea for an hypo situation.
 
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