The Life Ledger

Fitness is a way of life.

In March of last year, I wrote an article about Subway’s white and wheat breads, and whether the wheat bread actually is the healthy alternative. It turned out white was healthier. I noticed Subway modified their ingredients listing this month (and, I’m sure, several times between), so I wonder - since Subway still claims to be the healthy fast-food alternative, and people have a perception that anything “wheat” is the healthy alternative, has Subway stopped lying to its customers? Let’s find out.

First, here’s the old and new ingredients list:

Old list, quoted from my post dated 3/20/07:

WHEAT BREAD
Enriched flour (flour, malted barley flour, niacin, iron, thiamin mononitrate, riboflavin, folic acid), water, whole wheat flour, high fructose corn syrup, wheat gluten, contains less than 2% of the following: wheat bran, yeast, salt, soybean oil, dough conditioner (acetylated tartaric acid esters of mono-and diglycerides, ammonium sulfate, calcium sulfate, ascorbic acid, azodicarbonamide, potassium iodate, amylase (enzymes)], cracked wheat, sodium stearoyl-2-lactylate, caramel color (contains sulfites), dried honey preparation (honey powder, invert sugar, wheat starch, soy bran flour, silicon dioxide [anti-caking]), mineral oil. Contains soy and wheat.

New list, dated 01/2008:

WHEAT BREAD
Enriched flour (wheat flour, malted barley flour, niacin, iron, thiamin mononitrate, riboflavin, folic acid), water, whole wheat flour, high fructose corn syrup. Contains less than 2% of the following: yeast, wheat bran, bleached oat hull fiber, vital wheat gluten, salt, soybean oil, dough conditioner, acetylated tartaric acid esters of mono- and diglycerides, calcium sulfate, ammonium sulfate, ascorbic acid, azodicarbonamide, potassium iodate, enzymes [amylase]), cracked wheat, sodium stearoyl-2-lactylate, caramel color (contains sulfites), refiners syrup, dried honey, mineral oil. Contains wheat.

And the caloric information for the two breads, first dated 3/20/07:

And the new chart, taken from Subway’s nutrition information page on 1/4/08:

The only difference I see is wheat bread’s listed dietary fiber - up from 3g to 4g. The wheat bread still has more calories and fat than white bread, and contains high fructose corn syrup and lists a refined wheat as the first ingredient. Sure, there’s not a drastic nutritional difference between Subway’s white and wheat breads, but that’s just the point - not only is there not much difference, the white bread seems slightly nutritionally healthier. Just another reminder - “wheat” doesn’t always equate “healthy.”

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I have accepted an invitation to run as part of a team in a 5k race with my coworkers in June. It’s a little frightening - although I used to run cross-country competitively in high school, as Dave can attest (he ran for a different school’s team) I wasn’t that good then, and 17 years later I haven’t aged like wine or fine cheese. Dave assures me two months is enough time to get used to the 5k distance - we’ll see. I’ll measure out 5k somewhere in my neighborhood and give it a go tomorrow morning. I haven’t committed yet, but I likely will.

I have finally had time to start messing with the look of The Life Ledger. I have probably one more day’s worth of tinkering to do, then we’ll be creating some original tools for our readers - charts, nutrition info, calculators and more. I’m looking forward to rolling it out over the next few weeks.

Oh, and I keep forgetting to mention - Dave and I got interviewed by the crew at Weight Loss Tips - you can read my interview here, and I expect Dave’s will get posted soon. Here’s an excerpt:

-Do you think it will be easy to fall back into your old lifestyle pattern? How do you prevent this from happening?

It took years to develop the habits that led to my weight-gain; I expect it will take a while to replace them with healthy habits. Some are easy, like no longer eating fast food (I pack my meals or find healthier alternatives); some are harder, like not snacking during meal preparation or grazing at gatherings. To prevent slipping back into old unhealthy habits, I practice awareness in two different ways:

1) I weigh daily. I don’t freak when my weight fluctuates from day to day, but I do watch for trends. I set an alarm weight of 5 lbs over my current weight; when I reach my alarm weight, I know I’m slipping back.

2) I count every calorie every day. Over time, I learn how to judge a meal’s caloric content without looking it up. Also, if I have to write down every bite I take while grazing at a party, I’m much less likely to eat it in the first place.

Read the full interview at wltips.com.

Oh, and one more thing - the wraps at Jersey Mike’s taste a whole lot better than Subway’s. I’ll have to look into the nutrition info.

Wheat bread is better than white. Right? Apparently not, especially at Subway.

I did a little bit of research before, but I’ve since gotten a lot more curious. My wife and I have always gotten sandwiches on wheat bread, operating under the assumption that it’s healthier. I decided to take a look and see if that’s actually true.

Here’s Subway’s nutrition information for bread, with white and wheat highlighted:

And Subway’s ingredients list for white and wheat breads:

ITALIAN (WHITE) BREAD
Enriched flour (wheat flour, barley malt, niacin, iron, thiamin mononitrate, riboflavin, folic acid), water, sugar, contains less than 2% of the following: soybean oil, yeast, salt, wheat protein isolate, wheat gluten, dough conditioners (acetylated tartaric acid esters of mono- and diglycerides, ammonium sulfate, calcium sulfate, ascorbic acid, azodicarbonamide, potassium iodate, amylase [enzymes]), sodium stearoyl-2-lactylate, mineral oil. Contains soy and wheat.

WHEAT BREAD
Enriched flour (flour, malted barley flour, niacin, iron, thiamin mononitrate, riboflavin, folic acid), water, whole wheat flour, high fructose corn syrup, wheat gluten, contains less than 2% of the following: wheat bran, yeast, salt, soybean oil, dough conditioner (acetylated tartaric acid esters of mono-and diglycerides, ammonium sulfate, calcium sulfate, ascorbic acid, azodicarbonamide, potassium iodate, amylase (enzymes)], cracked wheat, sodium stearoyl-2-lactylate, caramel color (contains sulfites), dried honey preparation (honey powder, invert sugar, wheat starch, soy bran flour, silicon dioxide [anti-caking]), mineral oil. Contains soy and wheat.

Immediately, three things jump out at me:

1. The wheat bread has high-fructose corn syrup. As the medical community studies HFCS more, we are coming to understand it’s connection with obesity, due largely to how it interacts with insulin, ghrelin and leptin.
2. The wheat bread has the same calories, more fat and more carbs.
3. The first ingredient listed is refined flour.

Suddenly, Subway wheat bread is looking less like a healthier alternative to Subway white bread. What about the wrap? Ten less calories, twice the fat, five less carbs, the same refined flour and a bunch of ingredients I can’t pronounce. I’m sticking to the salads. (I wonder what those ingredients are? I’ll have to look into it.)

Eating at Subway is a good example of why it’s important to exercise awareness of what you eat - Subway markets itself on being the “healthy alternative” to fast food, with healthier menu items than other restaurants and the misleading name of the franchise owner, Doctor’s Associates Inc. However, if you simply buy into the marketing and assume Subway is the “healthy alternative”, you can easily make some mindless, habitual choices and build a sandwich with more calories than a Big Mac. For instance, their nutrition information lists sandwiches with “6 grams of fat or less”. My wife likes the veggie sandwiches, so we’ll take that as an example:

She likes her sandwich with provolone cheese (+50 calories), mayonnaise (+110 calories/tblsp, we’ll assume one tblsp although I’m sure in reality it’s more), and vinegar/oil (+45/tsp, we’ll assume 2 tsp for +90 calories). Let’s compare caloric values:

• Plain 6″ veggie sandwich: 230 calories
• My wife’s 6″ veggie sandwich: 480 calories, more than double a plain sandwich
• Who eats a footlong at once? You’re consuming 960 calories
• And a Big Mac? 540 calories.
• Other 6″ plain Subway sandwich choices for comparison:
  • Cold Cut Combo: 410 calories
  • Meatball Marinara: 560 calories
  • Chipotle Steak & Cheese: 530 calories
  • Tuna: 530 calories (I thought the Tuna sandwich was supposed to be one of the healthy ones!

I don’t want to sound like I’m ragging on Subway - to borrow a phrase from Bill Mahrer, “I kid the Doctor’s Associates!” I realize that it’s your choice to not add mayonnaise and cheese to an otherwise healthy-ish meal. I realize that no matter the caloric value, a Subway veggie sandwich is probably at least a little healthier than a Big Mac, if only for the fact there’s a few raw veggies between the bread slices. I do, however, think it’s important to investigate the truth behind marketing when Subway claims to be the healthy alternative. You can’t maintain a healthy lifestyle and make healthy food choices when you don’t educate yourself about the food you eat.

I’m still curious about those bread ingredients. I think I’ll look into those next…

I ate at Subway for dinner last night. I already had a salad, and hate the taste of their wraps, so I got a 6″ turkey & ham on wheat. I wanted to see how many calories the sandwich was, and discovered something - Subway’s nutrition site *sucks* could be a lot better. You would think a restaurant that prides itself on being the healthy alternative would offer complete nutrition information - give me a flash-based sandwich builder or something. Here’s what calorie-count.com says about my sandwich:

Of course, it appears most of that comes from the bread:

Speaking of bread, compare the ingredients list between the Italian and wheat breads:

ITALIAN BREAD
Enriched flour (wheat flour, barley malt, niacin, iron, thiamin mononitrate, riboflavin, folic acid), water, sugar, contains less than 2% of the following: soybean oil, yeast, salt, wheat protein isolate, wheat gluten, dough conditioners (acetylated tartaric acid esters of mono- and diglycerides, ammonium sulfate, calcium sulfate, ascorbic acid, azodicarbonamide, potassium iodate, amylase [enzymes]), sodium stearoyl-2-lactylate, mineral oil.

WHEAT BREAD
Enriched flour (flour, malted barley flour, niacin, iron, thiamin mononitrate, riboflavin, folic acid), water, whole wheat flour, high fructose corn syrup, wheat gluten, contains less than 2% of the following: wheat bran, yeast, salt, soybean oil, dough conditioner (acetylated tartaric acid esters of mono-and diglycerides, ammonium sulfate, calcium sulfate, ascorbic acid, azodicarbonamide, potassium iodate, amylase (enzymes)], cracked wheat, sodium stearoyl-2-lactylate, caramel color (contains sulfites), dried honey preparation (honey powder, invert sugar, wheat starch, soy bran flour, silicon dioxide [anti-caking]), mineral oil.

See anything interesting? Yeah, me too - not only is there high fructose corn syrup in my wheat bread, the first ingredient of both breads is the same enriched flour. Perhaps it’s time to switch back to Italian bread in the few instances I eat a sandwich there?

Anyway, my sandwich had pepper-jack cheese (+50 calories), lettuce, tomato, banana peppers and a little dijon mustard - then I took the top layer of bread off (-100 calories), leaving me with an approximately 250-calorie sandwich. Not bad I guess, but with the HFCS, I’m much better off sticking to the salads.