12th
Half a gram
Put less simply, food manufacturers are allowed to set their own serving sizes. No big deal, until the FDA decides to also let those manufacturers make a zero where there isn’t one. Specifically, if a manufacturer-determined serving size contains .5mg of Fat, they can call it 0mg of Fat. Legally. Absurdly. Insanely. Often the “low fat” version of a food is simply the original version of the same food, with a smaller serving size, one that allows the manufacturer to misrepresent the content with bullshit percentages like the one above. The FDA allows that, too.
In the case of the cooking spray above, I assume it’s nothing more than canola oil. Canola oil contains both fat and calories.The manufacturer has simply made a serving size so small that they can legally claim there’s neither per serving. Has anyone ever coated a frying pan with a 1/4-second spray? Hell naw. You probably spray for a good 2 seconds at least. So assuming there’s actually .5mg of Fat in a 1/4-second spray, that means there’s 4mg in a 2-second spray. Magically, this product now contains fat.
Next time you see “ZERO TRANS FAT!” on a label, look underneath it. If it’s followed by a tiny “per serving,” it’s horseshit 100% of the time.
Exactly right, except for one tiny detail: the threshold is 0.5 grams per serving, not milligrams. Half a gram isn’t a lot, but it’s not zero. As you point out, it behaves a lot differently from zero when multiplied by other numbers. The cooking spray example is the most egregious, because it allows a product which CONSISTS ENTIRELY OF FAT to be labeled “fat free.” (I’m pretty sure they don’t even have to say “per serving” when they use words like “free” or “no” but I need to look that up.)
This made me so angry a few years ago that I registered the domain halfagram.org, with the intent of posting photos of half-gram quantities of various things (fat, sugar, salt, arsenic) to help people understand this ridiculous loophole. Then I forgot about it. If anyone’s interested in helping, I’d love to revive the idea.
