Do you find nutrition labels confusing? It's sometimes hard to tell how nutritional what you're eating is. This is low in fat, but high in sugar, and this is low in calories but high in carbs... there's a lot to worry about. So now there's a system that simply rates food on a scale of 1-100, 1 being the least nutritional, 100 being the most.
A company called Nuval has developed this ranking system, and soon grocery stores will display the food score right on the shelf. Until then, you can check out the website and see what the foods you are eating rank. Here's how the scoring works:
"NuVal Scores summarize comprehensive nutritional information in one simple number between 1 and 100. Each NuVal Score takes into account more than just the nutrition fact panel. It considers 30-plus nutrients and nutrition factors – the good (protein, calcium, vitamins) and the not-so-good (sugar, sodium, cholesterol). And then it boils it down into a simple, easy-to-use number; a number you can trust to make better decisions about nutrition in just a few seconds. There’s a lot more to the science behind the NuVal System than what we’ve explained here. To learn more about it – and the independent panel of nutrition and medical experts who developed it – visit The Science Behind NuVal."
So what foods are best for you? Brocolli and blueberries both scored 100. And the worst? Well Cheetos scored a 5, and Chips Ahoy chocolate chip cookies scored a 2.
The site also features a trading up section, where it suggests you trade up from one product to one with a higher score. For example, Special K cereal with protein ranked at 60, while the original scored only a 20. Regular eggs score a 33, while Egg Beaters scored a 58.
Oh and if you're interested, here is the link to my latest blog update at the Pitt News. The post is on ways to visualize the progress you're making through healthy eating and fitness (other than using the scale). The post also contains access to my before and after picture (s0 far). I know you're curious :-p.
