The Great 'shrinking food and other items' Hunt

General_Grant

Rosa_Damascena said:

General_Grant said:

I don't know whether Mr Kipling Bakewell Tart has been mentioned already.
I bought one today and did think it was smaller than when I last bought one (probably a couple of years ago!).

I like to keep track of my calorie intake and so was making a note of what constitutes a portion.

The whole tart weighs 280g so they give the standard 100g figures and then what I take to be a single portion which they describe as "1/8th of tart (38g)".
My primary school arithmetic tells me one-eighth of 280g is 35g.
They do translate the 100g values to those for 38g not 35g.

So I assume the tart used to weigh 304g (perhaps 300g) and they have to mark the box with the correct total weight but have forgotten to adjust the portion values to match the reduction in total weight of a tart.

Any way, that's about an 8% reduction in size.

Looking on the bright size, I can have a portion of tart but consume fewer calories, sugar, etc than before.  (And of course that would be their justification for the size change.)

Can you stop at 1/8? I'd easily demolish 1/4 in a sitting, no questions asked.

You can still have 1/4 and nevertheless have less than you would have had before.

(Yes, I can have 1/8 with a coffee - and I must say it's like having a biscuit rather than a cake.)

briskbeats

Many of these products that say "serves X" - if you serve an Xth to someone, they wouldn't be pleased! Do food companies think we have portion sizes that my 93 year old grandmother has? 

One product which I have to say the serves X is a nice sized portion are Lidl's Deluxe roulades (frozen desert). - NVs say a 1/6th. Had a sixth of their toffee roulade today and was a perfect sized portion

briskbeats

The shrinkflation may have contributed to the obesity problems. People used to eat one biscuit. As now shrunk (which doesn't satisfy them), they eat 2 biscuits - that means probably eating 40% more calories, fats and sugar. It not just one product, people are eating more of. It is other things. So over weeks, months and years, the weight has piled on.

briskbeats

Noticed this at work today - Go Cat dried cat food has reduced from 825g to 750g. 

Barny1979

briskbeats said:

Noticed this at work today - Go Cat dried cat food has reduced from 825g to 750g. 

There's the massive Public Health ticking timebomb of Chubby Cats in Britain!!!

Barny1979

Another very obvious one is Warburtons bread rolls, were in 12 packs, now 8 packs, I presume because of the sugar tax?

pumpkin89

Barny1979 said:

Another very obvious one is Warburtons bread rolls, were in 12 packs, now 8 packs, I presume because of the sugar tax?

The sugar tax only applies to soft drinks - this one is likely to be due to the cost of ingredients going up.

Barny1979

It applies to chocolate and other sweets I thought?

pumpkin89

Barny1979 said:

It applies to chocolate and other sweets I thought?

No - that has been proposed as an amendment but not at the moment.

It is true, though, that chocolate and sweets have 20% VAT whereas most food has 0%
Sugary soft drinks have the sugar levy and then the 20% VAT on top.

Rosa_Damascena

pumpkin89 said:

Barny1979 said:

It applies to chocolate and other sweets I thought?

No - that has been proposed as an amendment but not at the moment.

It is true, though, that chocolate and sweets have 20% VAT whereas most food has 0%
Sugary soft drinks have the sugar levy and then the 20% VAT on top.

Good. Our collective dental health is going to hell in a handcart and this might well help.