Fridays I work in our local food pantry to aid in dispensing food assistance and nutritional information to folks who could use a little help. We have a number of staple items we purchase from monetary donations, and we dispense eggs, milk, canned fruits and vegetables, pasta and rice and other grain products. We get all sorts of food donations, too, and you never know what a group, a church, or a store will send over. Sometimes we’re lucky enough to get loads of noodle soups, boxes of cereal, or cans of sweet potatoes just when we’ve run out. Yesterday we received a delivery of a dozen cases of monster honey buns with 36 packages in each case. Not the ones pictured here: No, the ones we got were similar–except they were absolutely HUGE! The jumbo ones in the picture are only 4.75 ounces each and probably come in under 600 calories. The ones we got were 6 ounces each. I ventured a guess at the calorie and fat content–580 calories and 30 grams of fat? I was pretty far off. These babies provide 760 calories a piece and 43 grams of fat.
This opened up a topic of conversation among the volunteers at work. “What else could you eat for 760 calories?” (My entire dinner usually). ”Isn’t 43 grams of fat all you need in an entire day?” (Why, yes, for most people it is). “What if you just ate two of these in a day–you’d get 1520 calories and wouldn’t need to eat anything else at all!” (Except for the fact that the two honey buns would give a grand total of 4 grams of fiber for the day and absolutely no vitamin A, vitamin C or a number of other vitamins and minerals).
My biggest question is, “How many people who eat these take a look at the label?” Do you always look at the food label before you decide “yes” or “no”? What are you picking up for a snack during the day, oblivious to the number of calories, fat grams, and perhaps total lack of any nutritional value it provides? And if people knew the number of calories in one of these, what percentage of them would keep on choosing them despite the outrageous number of calories contained?
I urge you to take a look at the food labels on the choices you are putting into your body. Not that you are going to instantly change what you are eating, or give something up because it’s not “good for you”. But a little knowledge can go a long way. Do you have a cut-off point in mind? A number of calories at which you will put that down and walk away, realizing how far those calories would go towards an entire meal? Thinking about how many hours of exercise you’d have to work through to burn that food off?
In the case of the food product in question, one would have to jog about seven miles–would it be worth that to you in exchange for enjoying a Monster Iced Honey Bun?
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2 comments:
Look at the 7-11 iced honey bun over 1000 calories and 58g of fat. Do I eat them yes probaly 3 times a year. How often do I want to eat one probaly once a week. I'm a bodybuilder so I look at nutrition info on everything I eat. I was amazed seeing what tat jumbo iced hoey bun packs
I know someone who is a bodybuilder who weighs in at 230 and 6% body fat that takes one of those monster iced honey buns and puts it in his after workout protien shake simply for the extra calories it provides, although this bmr is about 6k calories a day so he needs to injest 6k calories a day to maintain it. The normal person who eats this is in no way able to sustain eating these and maintain a normal body figure.
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