Harvest Snap Peas- Yah or Nay?

Harvest Snap peas are heavily marketed as a “health” food. The appealing label is covered with comments such as: “100% Less Snacker’s Remorse”, “50% less fat”, and “gluten free.” Who wouldn’t want to eat these? However, if you have been reading my weekly blog, then you know that marketing can be deceiving.

The table below compares one serving of Harvest Snaps with good old, fresh sugar snap peas. One serving of Harvest Snaps is 28 grams. However, this isn’t very much. One bag contains almost 3.5 servings. I would suspect that most people would eat more than the modest serving of 28 grams in a sitting.

Even if you manage to stick to one serving of Harvest Snaps, they are evidently much higher in calories and fat than fresh sugar snap peas. The second ingredient in Harvest Snaps is vegetable oil. Despite being marketed as “baked,” they’re still baked in oil. In addition, they use sunflower and safflower oil, which are high in omega-6 fatty acids and can be pro-inflammatory.

The nutrient quality of sugar snap peas is also clearly superior as shown in the table above.  While sugar snap peas are a great source of vitamin A and vitamin C, the Harvest Snaps have been stripped of these nutrients in their manufacturing.

To drive home my point, 25 grams of Lay’s potato chips, while containing 4 more grams of fat, contains a comparable 140 calories to Harvest Snaps. I don’t know about you, but I would rather eat some potato chips. They’re also a whole lot cheaper.

Don’t fall for marketing traps. Be very wary of any foods that are promoted as “health” foods. Compare food labels and investigate it for yourself. If it sounds too good to be true, then it probably is.

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