Hi all, I'm very new to this site. And I need some help figuring out the carbs in this chicken product. I'm sure it's quite simple really!

Anyway, it's a packet of chicken breast portions and on the back it says:

carbs nil
of which sugars 1.0g

in the ingrediants it has glucose syrup.

So which one do I ALWAYS count? The 'of which sugars' or the Carbohydrate above it - sorry - really confused!

Ta muchly!

Anyone?

Thanks

I would count one carb and assume the 'nil' is a mistake, as if the carbohydrates include 1 gram of sugar they cannot be nil.

Is it a branded product? I might contact the manufacturer to ask them to correct the nutition info if there was an address on it.

It must be injected with gucose syrup to make it taste 'yummier'

I would not buy it again.

Oh really? That's an interesting point to make. I haven't got the packaging but I will pop into Asda and look again.

It also had dextrose as an ingredient.

So they use that stuff to make it yummier do they?!

X

Ooh - with dextrose as well that means it has 2 types of sugar, so definitely not one I would buy.

Legally they are allowed to inject meats with quite a high percentage of water to keep it moist and most often they use sugared water for this.

I found an article about one chicken brand where they inject the meat with 50% fluid!!
http://www.digitaljournal.com/article/267204

It makes the chicken weigh heavier at the point of sale so it seems a better buy than a non-injected one which would be more expensive but all meat.

I had no idea that they injected it with sugared water! urgh! I always wondered why it tasted nicer than the chicken i cook up at home ! now i know!
hmmm yes i think i will be checking labelling more carefully in future!

In the olden days that's why they soaked chicken in buttermilk first. The milk sugars were like our modern dextrose injection.

ahh, southern fried chicken....

hehe i know what you mean!

Think il be avoiding the sugar soaked chicken in future and just stick to my plain old chick boobies in future.......

Remember, it's not just chicken, ALL meat can have sugar added: -bacon, pork, gammon, ham, turkey, duck - you name it. In the case of something like a piggy product, the words you're looking for are 'sweetcure', 'honey roast', 'maple syrup' etc' and chicken is very often marinaded in brown sugar (the pre-cooked, pre-packaged stuff from Sainsbury's states this on the front of the packaging 'with a brown sugar marinade' or words to that effect.

The best advice I can give you is ALWAYS buy ham from the deli counter (and ask for 'ham on the bone' which should be free from any additives (may have a little salt added, but that should be it). Buy chicken breasts marked free-range, and which have a guarantee that they're not from chickens fed with antibiotics or growth-enhancers (Sainsbury's are a supporter of the RSPCA's Freedom Foods scheme, so when I do my online shop there, those are the ones I buy).

Eggs: - Again, free-range is good, free-range organic even better. Barn eggs are no better than battery (there can be anything up to 500 birds stuffed into a barn) and make sure the packaging states the hens have been inoculated against salmonella, and not fed GM feed, or feed containing artificial colour enhancers (to make the yolks yellower).

Look for as few ingredients on the packaging as possible; if you need a dictionary of food science to translate the ingredients, stick it back on the shelf.

I would try, depending on your budget, to buy bacon without added water, as the amount of water determines how small the rashers are going to be once cooked (as it all evaporates!) Avoid breaded ham, as that bumps up the carb count as much as 1g per slice for some brands (and if it's honey or maple-syrup roasted, too, then you can probably triple that!).

Remember, sugar can take many forms: -

Anything ending in '-ose is a sugar (sucrose, glucose, dextrose, fructose, lactose, etc). The only exception is 'sucralose' which has the 'ose' suffix because it's derived from sucrose.

Any ingredient containing the word 'syrup' (corn syrup, and the really evil glucose-fructose syrup are the main two).

Just to reiterate: - if you pick up a product, and you don't immediately recognise every single ingredient listed, then put it back on the shelf.

Hope this doesn't come across as too 'preachy', sorry if it has, I'm not too good at gauging this sort of thing...