Comments on: Yeah, Jim, Information Is Power

By: Waffelautomat

Waffelautomat — Sat, 20 Feb 2010 02:40:18 +0000

delicately! ;). Thank you for sharing

By: spacedcowgirl

spacedcowgirl — Mon, 09 Jul 2007 16:50:21 +0000

Hmm… thanks for the tip. Perhaps I should expend those [mumble mumble] calories on something more worth it.

You learn something new every day on BFD! ;-)

By: Dona

Dona — Thu, 05 Jul 2007 22:09:51 +0000

spacedcowgirl, skip the Chocolate Covered Strawberry Waffle bowl. They use their regular strawberry topping (which tastes like jam to me) and the chocolate sauce that they use for dipping cones. The combination isn’t as tasty as it looks or sounds.

By: spacedcowgirl

spacedcowgirl — Tue, 03 Jul 2007 02:39:45 +0000

Regarding how hard it can be to order a small sandwich, the McDonald’s I worked at about 9 years ago had a value meal called the “All-American Meal.” It was a hamburger or cheeseburger, small fries, and small drink. I always thought that was a cool idea (you save a few cents on the meal deal, no pressure to upsize, easy to order). But I’ve never seen it since. We had many customers who were seniors so that may have factored in.

By: spacedcowgirl

spacedcowgirl — Tue, 03 Jul 2007 02:36:51 +0000

You know who has an astonishingly complete set of nutrition information? Dairy Queen. A lot of the info was even posted on the wall when I went in there for the first time in a while the other night. The particular flavor of Blizzard I got wasn’t on the poster, so I got on their web site to check when I got home, and there was basically every menu item they have. It was impressive.

Sure, the stuff isn’t good for you. But if you’re going to have a treat, it’s nice that the information is out there. Props to the DQ!

And someday I’m going to skip dinner… OK, maybe it should be lunch and dinner, but whatever… and have their Chocolate Covered Strawberry Waffle Bowl. It looks awesome.

By: mo pie

mo pie — Mon, 02 Jul 2007 22:03:44 +0000

Ho cho, thanks for your comment. I think you absolutely nailed it: “It sucks that you can look a person and decide you know everything there is to know about them.”

Oh and also, I’ve never really been upsold at Subway, but they do that at movie theaters too. I always get talked into upgrading my popcorn for “just fifty cents more!” It’s evil!

By: MizShrew

MizShrew — Mon, 02 Jul 2007 19:42:06 +0000

I like having the nutritional information and ingredients lists available for a number of reasons. First, I’m a vegetarian, and so I want to know if the soup is made with chicken or veggie stock, or if the refried beads are prepared with lard or vegetable oil. Second, I try to avoid high fructose corn syrup and hydrogenated oils, which are prevalent in everydamnthing, it seems. Third, I find it difficult to “guess” at portion sizes, so if I know that something is 800 calories in advance, then I know to split it with my husband, or save half for later, or whatever. And finally, it can be confusing to figure out what things fit into my own dietary needs (not necessarily just the calorie count, but the amount of protein, for example.)

For these reasons, I tend to seek out info on websites before I go to fast food places, so I have my order for Qdoba, or Panera, or Subway in my head before I even get into the line. That way I’m less likely to be tempted by the stuff that I find out later is a gabillion calories of pure, chemically-enhaced sugar.

But I have another pet peeve: Why the hell is it so hard to harder a small sandwich and a small diet soda at a fast food place? Every time, I hear: “But if you go with the value meal, it’s cheaper.” To which I reply: “But I don’t WANT the value meal, I just want the sandwich, thanks anyway.” So they counter with: “But the small soda costs more than the large, I’ll just ring it up as a value meal.” Me: “OK, whatever, but all I want is a small soda, please.” After which they deliver a large soda and sometimes the regular size sandwich, and act like they’re doing me a favor by giving me more. Arrrgh!

By: ho_cho

ho_cho — Sun, 01 Jul 2007 21:21:07 +0000

i was stimulated by this post, as were some other people, because its so controversial. The fact of the matter, is that we should all be educating ourselves on what we are eating, whatever our shape, whether or not you are trying to lose weight, or whatever. I think the problem is that “fat” is such a loaded term, meaning that if you are a heavier person, you are automatically not only unhealthy, but lazy, etc. So if you can look at a person and see that they are thin, even if they eat a lot or unhealthy and they make up for it with a high metabolism or lots of activity, then there is no reason to criticize them. Thats a bunch of bullshit. It sucks that you can look a person and decide you know everything there is to know about them. That being said, there is a lot of misleading information out there that might be confusing to people. For example, the earlier comment about lean cuisines – they are perfect in caloric intake if you are eating 6-8 meals a day, but not if you are eating three. I feel like everyone should be more critical of things, which is awesome on a site like this, even if it just sparks some discussion.

By: littlem

littlem — Sun, 01 Jul 2007 21:19:38 +0000

Ingredients are important.

Knowing that you have access to information is important (the last time I ordered a Jamba Juice, I was in a hurry so I didn’t think it through to ask whether or not the information was available, but I certainly didn’t see it displayed on the lit-up board where the varieties available to order were described).

Companies can gently lie and mislead. If you’re ordering a ready-made “health-food” drink (Naked, or Odwalla, for example) and you’re counting calories, you want to read the label very carefully and note that all the nutritional information is for one serving, but the bottle that you’re about to suck down because you’re thirsty and in a hurry contains two servings — or even three.

It may not be rocket science, but our hurry-up lifestyle has certainly not been structured to make it simple. I can’t help but think some conglomerates count on that.

“…forget about the calories…just don’t overeat…”

*head explodes from cognitive dissonance*

By: karrie

karrie — Sat, 30 Jun 2007 11:12:08 +0000

False advertising really pisses me off. And I personally think a lot of companies promoting healthier alternatives are doing just that. Sure 400 calories from fruit is better for your body than 400 calories from corn syrup, but it is still 400 calories for a *beverage* when you could eat a good amount of healthy food and stay full longer.