Reduced-fat peanut butter seems an obvious choice when dieting or trying to maintain weight loss, but if you have a low-carb lifestyle, don’t even think of buying it. While it is lower in fat, by about 25%, reduced-fat peanut butter has more than twice the carbohydrates of regular creamy.
Let’s look at the labels for the two leading brands, Jif and Skippy. Click to enlarge the images. For both brands and all four varieties a serving is 2 tablespoons and all are 190 calories per serving.
Jif regular creamy has 16 fat grams per serving and 7 grams of carbs. The reduced-fat version has 12 grams of fat and 15 grams of carbs:
The labels show those figures are identical to Skippy:
As always, it pays to read labels — and to avoid assumptions.
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{ 8 comments… read them below or add one }
It kills me that the “healthier” product is higher in sugar, lower in fiber, and full of additives. Give me Smucker’s Natural any day – just peanuts and salt. The best peanut butter I’ve ever had is Cream-Nut Peanut Butter from Grand Rapids MI
Caroline´s last blog ..Readers’ Photos: Polaroid Gallery – Lens Blog – NYTimes.com
Hi, Caroline! It is amazing, isn’t it? It reminds me of the pasta sauce labels I compared: the one not marked heart healthy was healthier and had more fiber. I liked Smucker’s Natural too, but since my strawberry jam comparison I’m not buying their stuff anymore. The jam they sell in Canada is far healthier than ours, less sugar and no HFCS.
Good to see you!
Nut butters, by their very nature, are high in fat; when they take away the fat they have to replace it with SOMETHING.
As always, the key is moderation and portion control. If peanut butter has too much fat, don’t eat it every day!
Kathy G´s last blog ..The Preschool Fitness Plan
Hi, Kathy. I get your point but I’m not sure it’s always that easy, at least not in practice. If it were, nobody would be overweight.
These last two years, since I’ve been on the South Beach program, one of my staples is peanut butter. But, only Trader Joe’s peanut butter, which has two ingredients; peanuts and salt. And the unsalted version has one ingredient….peanuts! You do have to stir it up, as the oil comes to the top when you first open it, but once it’s stirred, you don’t have to ever stir it again. It tastes exactly like fresh peanuts because…that’s what it is! I love it.
Sunny dear, hello! I thought of you when I wrote this and felt sure you know what’s what. I’ll have to try TJ’s pb. Nut butters are so easy to make with a processor, maybe even a blender. I do it sometimes when I have a taste for cashew butter, which is fabulous with apples in the fall. I make a small amount, no muss, fuss or leftovers!
Support for your point from a different perspective…
At one point in her furry little life, Dixie Rose was getting plump. She was up to 12 pounds, and, as I explained to her vet, I knew things were getting out of control, and had tried to do something about it.
One move I’d made was from Science Diet regular to Science Diet Light for kitties.
As it turns out, the “light” kitty food has far more carbohydrates than the regular. His advice? Portion control of the regular. He said anyone who puts their pets on the light foods is only going to encourage weight gain and poorer health.
I took his advice, and last time around we were at 11-1/2 pounds. At least it’s the right direction!
shoreacres´s last blog ..What? Who, Me? Dogged?
Good luck, shore! You’ll both make it. I once adopted an adult cat that weighed 18 pounds. He looked like a meatball on feet. It took about a year but I got him down to 12 or 13, mostly by letting him only eat food made for kitties. His previous owners let him eat his food and theirs. Every day, many times a day.
Animals don’t have to deal with will power, and that’s what makes it difficult for us humans. Portion control’s all well and good, if one can stick to it. Big if, sometimes!