Non-food content of food

I’ve become obsessed with the non-food content of my food.

It started when I decided, earlier this week, to keep track of the protein, fat, and carbohydrates in my diet. The very first thing I looked at was my delicious Cliff Bars. See? It says right there that they are Certified Organic and therefore horribly healthy.

OK, so one serving is one bar; 68 grams. (I’m looking at the Crunchy Peanut Butter bar; others are similar). Total protein = 12 grams. Total fat = 6 grams. Total carbs = 40 grams.

That only adds up to 58 grams.

So what is the remaining 10 grams? It’s non-food. Vitamins and minerals? There can’t be ten fucking grams of vitamins and minerals; I don’t care how healthy those Cliff Bars are.

I guess the “sodium” and potassium account for just under another half-gram. Part of it could be water, I guess, although water isn’t listed as an ingredient, and if it accounted for almost 15% of the weight of the bar you’d think it would be listed. So just what is it, anyway?

…do I really want to know?

What’s funny to me is that the supposedly-healthy-and-organic Cliff Bar has waaaaaaay more of the non-food stuff than does, say, a serving of Doritos or a Hershey’s Special Dark bar (only about 1-2 grams unaccounted for on both of those).

Food is scary. I’m going to stop looking so close now.