FS: Chocolate Pudding

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Snack Pack Chocolate Pudding
Ingredients: Water, Nonfat Milk, Sugar, Modified Corn Starch, Vegetable Oil (Contains One or More of the Following: Palm Oil, Partially Hydrogenated Palm Oil, Sunflower Oil, Partially Hydrogenated Soybean Oil), Cocoa (Processed with Alkali), Less than 2% of: Salt, Calcium Carbonate, Sodium Stearoyl Lactylate, Artificial Flavors, Color Added.
Snack Pack Reduced Calorie Sugar-Free Chocolate Pudding Ingredients: Water, Maltitol, Modified Corn Starch, Nonfat Milk (Adds an Insignificant Amount of Sugar), Cocoa (Processed with Alkali), Vegetable Oil (Contains One or More of the Following: Palm Oil, Partially Hydrogenated Palm Oil, Sunflower Oil, Partially Hydrogenated Soybean Oil), Erythritol, Less than 2% of: Calcium Carbonate, Salt, Milk Protein Isolate, Carrageenan, Sodium Stearoyl Lactylate, Artificial Flavors, Sucralose, Acesulfame Potassium.
Snack Pack Fat Free Chocolate Pudding Ingredients: Water, Nonfat Milk, Sugar, Modified Corn Starch, Cocoa (Processed with Alkali), Less than 2% of: Salt, Calcium Carbonate, Carrageenan, Artificial Flavors, Color Added.

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Let's talk about the ingredients for a minute. Typically, the fat-free products tend to have more ingredients to make them more like the original, but in this case its the opposite! The original pudding has more junk in it that I'd be concerned about. Partially Hydrogenated oils are bad for you altogether so thats a no right there. On the bright side, according to the MSDS sheet for Sodium Stearoyl Lactylate, it has a "low level of toxicity" and presents "very little hazard if swallowed". At least its somewhat edible. It is a food emulsifier (makes things thicker) so I guess its not too bad but I don't trust anything that you refer to by its chemical make up. But I'll let this one slide. The oil is still getting to me though.

I expected the "reduced calorie" one to be bad because it was sugar free. Sucralose is common although I avoid it like the plague. I have heard/read horrible things about Acesulfame Potassium. I avoid that the most out of all artifical sweetenerss so there's a no for me right there! The rest of the ingredients are similar to the original.

The Fat Free (although fat isn't bad for you), seems to be the best! Its got the least amount of crazy ingredients. I've discussed Carrageenan before which is made from seaweed and is considered to be super safe by most people. I've never seen a question about it being bad for you so I will go with safe. Also, I looked up Modified Corn Starch and that also had nothing bad about it anywhere. Calcium Carbonate is simply a calcium supplement. Eating it excessively is bad but isn't everything? I think this is generally safe.

Let's look at the nutrition!

The serving size is according to the little snack pack cups. I don't know if they are the same size or not but who is going to eat .75 of one? Not me! LoL. So oviously, the original has the most calories and the fat free and sugar free are pretty close so unless you are diabetic, I don't see a reason to get the sguar free yet. Also notice that the fat free has the most protein! Wow! I know a lot of people complain about getting enough protein so there ya go. Get it from your pudding. Haha! Also, according to my reference, there are 9 grams of "sugar alcohol" in the sugar-free one. According to wikipedia, they are used in place of sugar along with artifical sweeteners. I don't know what kind of affect this would have on a diabetic. It seems they don't cause extreme sugar spikes. There is also a warning that people who have had gastric bypass should eat it becaue it causes "dumping" when basically the food isn't digested in the stomach. Hm. Anyway!



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I definitely think that the Snack Pack Fat-Free Chocolate Pudding is the clear winner here. For once, that fat free product is actually better than the regular! Woah! Ok, now I want me some pudding...