New Nutrition Labels For Alcohol
The US Alcohol and Tobacco Tax and Trade Bureau (TTB) is looking at a new standard for labeling alcohol. This is currently under discussion after pressure from lobby group CSPI. The TTB is looking at the following changes:
including the serving size in fluid ounces; servings per container; calories; grams of fat; grams of carbohydrates; grams of protein; ounces of alcohol (ethyl-alcohol) to the nearest tenth of an ounce;
Nutrition details are always helpful, however the CSPI has one criticism:
including nutritional information like fat and protein content could lead to the false impression that alcohol is food and allow the industry to make spurious claims about "fat-free" beverages.
I believe this criticism is justified. While the calorie content of some liquor is an issue (for example the carbohydrate quantity of beer) - the reality is that alcohol simply does not help fat loss. Burning fat and burning alcohol are two processes that cannot co-exist.
However, seeing how many grams of maltose are in that third beer you're about to drink may make you think twice...
Written By J. Foster
Nutritional labeling on beer, wine and spirits bottles and cans? Well, it's about time. I just went to www.knowyourdrink.com and got the info. It would be nice -- and appropriate -- to go in to a liquor or convenience store and look at the label to find out what I'm getting...especially the number of drinks per container. I found that many people believe that some forms of beverage alcohol are "harder" than others...no way... if you have the information at hand when you make the purchase, you would see quite plainly that alcohol is alcohol.
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