Sarah Bystrycki: Food Label Assignment

   The research question I came up with was: Which snack will give me the most long lasting energy? Would it be a one hundred calorie bag of smartfood white cheddar popcorn, salt & pepper pork rinds, or a package of six individual toast & peanut butter crackers? My hypothesis is as follows: The toast and peanut butter crackers will give me the most long lasting energy. I hypothesized this because they contain the most carbohydrates per serving at 23 grams, and carbohydrates store energy in the long term. While the popcorn contains only 9 grams per serving and the pork rinds don't even have any carbohydrates. The cracker sandwiches percentage of total calories  from carbohydrates is also the highest at .48%. As for the popcorn the percentage of total calories from carbohydrates is .36% and the pork rinds' 0%.
      For the popcorn and the crackers the serving was realistic because they come in sectioned off packages. However, the pork rinds say the one serving is 1/2 and ounce which is about 4 pork rinds, and thats like saying I'm going to eat one potatoe chip, no one ever does. Therefore, the popcorn and crackers have realistic serving sizes, but the pork rinds do not. As for nutritional value, the serving size does help explain them. The serving size for the popcorn is one bag, which is about the size of our school agenda, which is why it has better nutritional value then the jumbo bag, it has less product, and therefore less calories making it have better nutritional value. The serving size for the crackers is also one package containing six crackers, and is basically the same situation as the popcorn, both products are packaged individually as one serving, so you know exactly how many grams of fat, carbohydrates, protein, fiber, cholesterol, and sodium you've taken in without watching and counting how much you eat of the product like you would have to with the pork rinds. if you finish the whole bag of pork rinds that's 6 servings you ingested in one sitting! Which gives you more calories and more of everything previously mentioned. There are nutrional claims on the popcorn bag, porkrinds, and on the crackers. On the popcorn bag it says that it is made with all natural ingredients, on the pork rinds it says that there are no carbohydrates in this product, and that the cracker sandwiches are made with real peanut butter. I did not find anymore claims then the ones previously stated. On  the contrary the claim made by the popcorn bag is misleading to me because the cheese is powdered, and enhanced with preservatives, making not all of it's ingredients natural. My calculations supported the claim that there were in fact no carbohydrates in the pork rinds. The ingredients in the cracker sandwiches support the claim that it is made with real peanut butter because in the listing of the ingredients it sates that the peanut butter is made from roasted peanuts.
the predominate ingredient by weigh in the cracker sandwiches is enriched flour. The order of the ingredients in the cracker sandwiches affects it negatively becaus ethey contain more unhealthy elements than healthy ones. So in conclusion, my hypothesis was supported, the cracker sandwiches provide the most long lasting energy because they contain the most carbohydrates, and as we all know carbohydrates store energy in the long term.