Read the Labels

I am all about generic brands, as long as they are priced less. I almost always buy them when available, but will go for name brands when I can tell a major difference in quality or would like the health benefit of a name brand.

Today at the grocery store was one such instance of buying a name brand for the health benefit. The recipe called for low-sodium chicken broth. So I looked at them all and picked up the Swanson's Chicken Broth, which has 1/3 less sodium. This was written on the package with an asterisk. The note was that there was a 1/3 less sodium than their original product. I thought I might as well compare the sodium content to the generic brand I normally would buy. So I picked up the chicken broth by Great Value (the Wal-Mart generic brand) and compared. I was floored. The Swanson's Chicken Broth with less sodium had 570 mg of sodium per 1 cup serving while the Great Value Chicken Broth had 135 mg sodium per 1 cup serving. That is a MAJOR difference. So not only did I buy the one with a LOT less sodium, I spent less money, almost half the price. Lesson learned... read the labels. I pasted the labels from their websites so you can see for yourself.


Great Value Chicken Broth Nutrition Info
Nutrition Facts
Serving Size: 1 cup

Amount per Serving
Calories 10 Calories from Fat 0
% Daily Value *
Total Fat 0g	0%
Saturated Fat 0g	0%
Monounsaturated Fat 0g
Polyunsaturated Fat 0g
Trans Fat 0g
Cholesterol 0mg	0%
Sodium 135mg	6%
Potassium 110mg	3%
Total Carbohydrate 0g	0%
Dietary Fiber 0g	0%
Sugars 0g
Protein 2g	4%

Vitamin A	0%
Vitamin C	0%
Calcium	0%
Iron	1%

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Est. Percent of Calories from:

Fat 0.0% Carbs 0.0%

Protein 80.0%

Swanson's Chicken Broth Nutrition Info

Amount Per Serving (serving size) = 1 cup
Calories 15
Total Fat 0g
Sat. Fat 0g
Cholesterol 0mg
Sodium 570mg
Total Carbs. 1g
Dietary Fiber 0g
Sugars 1g
Protein 3g

%Daily Values **
Vitamin A 0%
Vitamin C 0%
Calicum 0%
Iron 2%