This is for all the folks that are freaking out about all that sugar in candy that the kids are getting this time of year… and for the ones who may or may not be blowing their diet as they write this blog. Before you point a pudgy judgy finger at candy, let’s take a look at the sugar content in some other foods.
The following is a chart showing the approximate amount of sugar in different foods. For those of us who have a hard time imagining what a gram looks like, I made this chart in teaspoons. I was surprised to find that a 12-ounce Coke in a can is about the same amount of sugar as a 32-ounce sweet tea from McDonald’s. Also, a 20-ounce mocha at Starbucks can have 3.5 times the amount of sugar found in a standard pack of Reese’s Peanut Butter Cups. Does this mean you should eat 7 Reese’s cups, if you forego the mocha? Probably not. After the chart, see how much sugar is too much per day.
| Food | Ounces or grams | Tsp of Sugar | This amount of this snack reaches a woman’s daily limit of sugar (6 tsp) | This amount of this snack reaches a man’s daily limit of sugar (9 tsp) |
| Tomatoes 1 cup | 6 oz | 1 | 6 | 9 |
| Banana medium | 4 oz | 3.33 | 1.80 | 2.70 |
| Hershey’s Milk Chocolate bar | 43 g | 4.87 | 1.23 | 1.85 |
| Reese’s Peanut Butter Cups (2 classic cups) |
1.5 oz | 5 | 1.20 | 1.80 |
| Red Bull | 12 oz | 5.35 | 1.12 | 1.68 |
| Butterfinger bar | 60 g | 5.58 | 1.08 | 1.61 |
| Twix bar | 57 g | 5.68 | 1.06 | 1.58 |
| Milk chocolate M&M’s bag | 42 g | 5.68 | 1.06 | 1.58 |
| Snickers bar | 57 g | 5.83 | 1.03 | 1.54 |
| McDonald’s Sweet Tea 32 oz | 32 oz | 9.04 | 0.66 | 1.00 |
| Little Debbie Zebra Cakes 2 cakes | 2.6oz | 7.61 | 0.79 | 1.18 |
| Coca-Cola | 12 oz | 9.28 | 0.65 | 0.97 |
| Starbucks Chai Tea Latte – venti | 20 oz | 12.38 | 0.48 | 0.73 |
| Starbucks White Chocolate Mocha w Whipped Cream – venti |
20 oz | 17.57 | 0.34 | 0.51 |
Note that the amount of snacks represented in the chart are not of equal volume. For example, drinks range from 12 – 32 ounces. If you’re doing the math, one ounce = 28.35 grams.
In order to make these sugar numbers, I had to find out that , 4.2 grams of sugar equals a teaspoon. According to the American Heart Association (AHA), the maximum amount of added sugars you should eat in a day are different for men and women. Men get 37.5 grams or 9 teaspoons and women get 25 grams or 6 teaspoons.
If you’re trying to cut down on sugar, click for some tips from the American Heart Association.