Trader Joe’s Green Dragon hot sauce has plenty of ingredients yet zero calories per serving. How is this possible? Is it because the serving size is so small at 1 tsp?
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I believe it is because the companies can legally round down the calories if its below a certain number, and since one serving is so small you’ll never get that
Same reason tictac can (or used to? Idk) claim there was no sugar in their product even though it was like 90% sugar or something.
The regulations make it so that whatever is on the label isn’t necessarily *the truth*, just adhering to the regulations
You are precisely correct. Because of the small serving size – they are able to round the calories down to zero instead of up to one.
It isn’t that there are no calories in this food – that isn’t what is going on. Your instincts on this one are spot on and you already came up with the correct answer.
Yes, I believe the law is if a serving has fewer than 5 calories it can say it has 0 calories per serving. Tic Tacs get away with saying they are 0 calorie because a serving is one tic tac. They are pure sugar and if you eat the whole thing it is quite a few calories.
On top of the serving size, there’s also the fact(?) that some foods take more energy (calories) to consume than they contain. Something like lettuce. It obviously has calories, but by the time you chew, swallow, and digest it, the **net** calories are basically zero. Not exactly a scientific source, but https://thesavvykitchen.com/zero-calorie-foods/
Because some ingredients have no caloric value, i.e., there’s nothing in there our bodies can metabolize for energy. It doesn’t mean they have NO value, because there are minerals and electrolytes you need (like salt) that just aren’t something you can burn for fuel.
Yellow mustard is basically the same. Vinegar, water, salt, ground mustard seed and turmeric. Not much fuel there.
Now it’s not *completely* true that stuff has zero caloric value. Spices are mostly made from seeds, and the oils in the seeds technically have *some* caloric value, but it’s usually so low it’s not counted at normal serving sizes. If a serving of yellow mustard technically gives you 0.4 calories, they can just round down to zero on the label.
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