I’ve already talked about how powdered creamers pack more calories and fat than it would seem from reading the misleading food label. So how about liquid creamers, are they any better?

Fat chance! (Emphasis on the fat!)

The powdered Coffee-mate creamers, as mentioned in my previous post , are made with coconut and palm kernel oils, but any kind of liquid Coffee-mate is made with partially hydrogenated soybean and/or cottonseed oil. That means it has trans fats.

Yes, the label says 0 grams of fat, but you know by now that doesn’t really mean much. More misleading food labels! All varieties of Coffee-mate but fat free and sugar free have 0.46 grams of trans and 0.31 grams of saturated fat. Both of these round down to zero on the label.

So if you use two tablespoons of creamer you end up with 1.86 grams of saturated fat and 2.76 grams of trans fat. Experts recommend as little trans as possible, and certainly no more than 2 grams of trans fat per day.

Too bad, you just blew it all for creamer in ONE cup of coffee.

So what can you use if you like creamer in your coffee???

There’s always milk. It contains NO trans fats, and from 0 grams saturated fat in fat-free milk to 0.6 grams in whole milk. Plus there are only 10-20 calories in two tablespoons.

But if you’re looking for a richer taste, try Land O’Lakes (and some store brands) Fat Free Half & Half. There are no trans fats, and only an estimated 0.3 grams of saturated fats. Even better, it’s only 20 calories in two tablespoons, or about the same as whole milk.

Milk or Fat Free Half & Half… now you’re closer to health foods!

Post from: Health Food Made Easy

Powdered Creamers vs. Liquid Creamers

If regular powdered creamers are loaded with fat, then it stands to reason the “fat free” variety should be a big improvement. After all, on the Coffee-mate Fat Free label, it says there are 0 grams of both saturated and trans fats, so you figure you can consume all you want and there will be zero fat.

Unfortunately, you’d be wrong.

It’s like this, if a food has less than 0.5 grams of fat (trans, sat, or total), the numbers can be rounded to ZERO on the label. So all a smart food manufacturer has to do is make the serving size small enough that it contains less than 0.5 grams of fat per serving and slap 0 grams on the label.  Then you think you’re getting NO fat, when in reality you are.

The serving size of a level teaspoon is unrealistically tiny. People are more likely to put two tablespoons of creamer in their coffee, which equals 6 teaspoons.

With Coffee-mate Fat Free, a flat teaspoon has 0.27 grams of fat. Multiply that to a more realistic two tablespoons (6 teaspoons), and you have 1.6 grams of fat.

Drink 3 cups of coffee a day, and there’s 5 grams of saturated fat. That’s better than the regular variety, but it’s not truly fat-free and you need to be aware of that.

Generic or office-supply company brands of powders of any kind are usually even worse. Coffee-mate powders have little or no trans fat, the really evil stuff, because they’re made with partially hydrogenated coconut and palm kernel oils.

The other brands mentioned are usually made with partially hydrogenated soybean or canola oil, which means about a gram or so of trans fat in every tablespoon, though the label says there are 0 grams in a teaspoon.

Bottom line… powdered creamer is definitely not a health food, but if you’ve just got to have it in your coffee, be aware of what you’re using. Although it isn’t totally fat free as the label indicates, Coffee-mate Fat Free is probably the best of the bunch.

Post from: Health Food Made Easy

More on Powdered Creamers

I’ve talked about misleading food labels before, most recently with whole grains, but when it comes to misleading labeling, creamers are in a class by themselves.

Consider powdered creamers, and to use a specific example, how about Nestle Original Coffee-mate powder? With only 10 calories and 0.5 grams of saturated fat per serving, that doesn’t sound bad at all. With such piddling amounts, there’s no need to even worry about the calories or fat in creamer, right?

Unfortunately, there’s a catch. (Isn’t there always?) Companies are allowed to use a little technique called “rounding” on their labels.

So how does that affect the Coffee-mate powder? Well, one teaspoon actually has 14.83 calories, and they round it down to 10. And one teaspoon actually has 0.99 grams of saturated fat, and they round it down to 0.5 grams.

Isn’t that interesting? They obviously didn’t go to the same schools you and I attended, where our math teachers taught us to round anything under 5 down, and anything OVER 5 should be rounded UP. Nope, instead of 14.83 calories being 15 calories, they made it 10. And somehow 0.99 became 0.5.

Don’t you wish you could use that kind of creative math with your checkbook? Oh, I didn’t really spend $14.83, it was only $10. And even better, I didn’t spend $99, why no, it was only $5! Wow, is that a help to the budget, or what!?

Well, what that would do to your checking account is about the same thing their creative rounding does to your diet. Bad news!

To make it worse, consider the serving size. Did you notice I said one TEASPOON? And that doesn’t mean you can dip your spoon in the creamer and come up with a heaping pile on your spoon. That means a leveled off teaspoon and that’s not very much.

As unscientific as my test may be, I went into the kitchen and got a heaping teaspoon of baking powder (didn’t have any creamer in the house) and then measured how many level teaspoons I got from that pile of powder. Would you believe I managed to get FIVE?

Now even if we use a less generous heap of powder and say there are only FOUR teaspoons in that heap on the spoon, it still means instead of adding 10 calories to your coffee, you’re adding almost 60 calories

And instead of adding 0.5 grams of fat, it’s a whopping 3.96 grams, or as close enough to 4 grams as makes no never mind.

The American Heart Association recommends no more than 7% of your daily calorie intake should be saturated fat. For someone who averages about 1,800 calories daily, that would be less than 13 grams of saturated fat.

Drink 3 cups of coffee with powdered creamer and you’ve about used up your entire quota for the day.

Guess those creamers need to be considered when thinking of a healthy diet after all.

Post from: Health Food Made Easy

Mythbuster – Powdered Creamers Add Very Little Fat or Calories to Your Diet