On today’s edition of “Misleading Marketing” I present to you: protein crackers.
I’ve never actually had these protein crackers, and I have no personal issues with them. I’m sure they’re delicious. But with the giant “protein” on the front of the package, I thought these were going to actually be high protein when I saw them.
One serving of these crackers has 5g of protein. Maybe that’s high protein to you, but it’s not very high in my eyes. Curious, I started going through my favorite crackers and chips to see how they stacked up.
Wheat thins are my all-time favorite cracker, but they didn’t compare perfectly here, and we’re all about soothing visuals. Pita chips are right up there on my snack list, and while not technically an exact comparison to crackers, they’re close enough. Looking at a 1oz serving of each, they’re nearly identical in their nutrition to the protein crackers.
The product marketed with “protein” has 2 extra grams of protein. That’s it. Everything else is essentially the same.
If you have dietary restrictions (like being gluten-free) then that is going to take precedent in your choice. But otherwise, you probably just want a snack that’s delicious. And I don’t know about you, but after seeing the nutritional breakdown, I’m choosing pita chips every time.
Learning to read nutrition labels to base your decisions off of will be one of the greatest things you can do for yourself. In a lot of cases, you’ll find that a food you previously would have dismissed as “unhealthy” is way better than you thought.
When you can rely on your own knowledge of nutrition, you never need to rely on what SOUNDS like a better choice- you can make that decision for yourself.