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On our vacation last week, Pam and I were responsible for planning, purchasing, and cooking the food. OK, Pam planned and did a lot of the cooking, but I did make the mega shopping trip and cook my fair share. My mother in law was responsible for bringing all of the beverages for the trip–including the all important morning cup of joe.
Coffee is very important to me. I’m not picky about what I drink, how it’s made, or even how it tastes. But I love a steaming hot cup of coffee in the morning. So my mother in law did a great job, and she even brought half and half and sugar for us; like I said, I’m not a coffee purist.
One morning, as I was mixing my coffee, I actually read the label on the half and half. It read “Fat Free Half and Half!” How can half and half, which is supposed to be half cream and half milk, be fat free? I did a little reading and here’s what I came up with.
First I wanted to brush up on my knowledge of the various dairy based creamers:
Whipping Cream–Sometimes we have this laying around the kitchen for various cooking purposes. When we do, I love to add it to my coffee. But at 30-36% fat, the calories add up fast and I’m not so sure they’re worth it.
Half and Half–This is the stuff most often used in coffee in the US. It’s very good in coffee, but obviously not as good as full cream. At 10-16% fat, it’s a pretty good compromise between total creamy blissfulness and functional coffee drinking
Whole Milk–We always have this stuff in our house because our son is under 2 and still drinks it. At slightly less than 4% fat, it’s not a very effective creamer, but it’s a lot healthier than any of the above options.
So, what exactly is “fat free” half and half. Here’s the top 5 on the list of ingredients:
- nonfat milk
- milk
- corn syrup solids
- Artificial color
- Sugar
There was recently a question on Ask Metafilter about this stuff and of all the answers, the one that summed it up best was that it looks like fat free half and half is a mixture of nonfat milk, nondairy coffee creamer, and thickening agents.
While the taste of the stuff is similar to regular half and half, I’m not so sure I want to be adding those extra artificial ingredients to my coffee every morning. In fact, Pam recently read an article that suggested if you really want to lose weight, you should avoid coffee creamers all together and stick to milk. Those extra calories really add up over the course of a year. And since we have whole milk laying around, I think I’ll be switching to that for the little bit of creaminess that I need in my coffee.
J.D.
37 responses so far ↓
1 Paul // Aug 27, 2008 at 11:48 am
Being a Brit who lives in the US, I never understood creamer in coffee - I’ve always had milk in mine, and think the taste of creamer is a bit gross.
When I started cutting my weight down, I switched to non fat milk whenever possible - I barely taste the difference in my morning coffee. Even at Dunkin Donuts, I get skimmed milk in my normal and iced coffee now.
2 Gooniette // Aug 27, 2008 at 12:35 pm
Vanilla flavored organic soy milk works for me. They have light versions of it too.
3 Lauren Muney - fitness and wellness coach // Aug 27, 2008 at 1:13 pm
Anything that says “fat free” will have thickening agents which will (for better effect or for worse effect) simulate the texture of the fatted foods it is faking. Normally, it is worse effect.
I tell clients and friends to simply use the “real fatted product”, and go for the most pure product possible (the least ingredients, and the most pure ingredients) and just use a small bit. A slight dollop of real half and half isn’t that many calories and it won’t gum up your body like powdered creamer or ‘fat-free whatever’. I even suggest people use whole milk cottage cheese and yogurts - read the ingredients and you’ll see why.
The problem is not the dash of [whole] half-and-half to cream-up your coffee… it’s that most people who indulge this may also add extra other things to their meals… bigger portions, more treats, etc. Just be aware of using small bits of good-quality things, and watch your portion sizes elsewhere.
4 DR // Aug 27, 2008 at 1:58 pm
Why drink cream in my coffee when I can get even more corn syrup with ‘diet’ half and half?
Be still my overworked pancreas.
5 Greenman2001 // Aug 27, 2008 at 2:04 pm
Mac,
It sounds like you’re of the school of thought that says that fat is bad, so that foods with less “fat” are better for you than foods with more “fat”.
Keep in mind, as you go down this path, that the rise in obesity in the US has been concurrent with the ascendence of the “fat is bad” philosophy and the proliferation of “low fat” foods.
It also sounds like the rule of thumb you’re using is that high fat foods are “bad” because they have more calories per unit. Let’s take a closer look at this.
Half and half has 315 calories per cup, whole milk has 150 (heavy whipping cream has 820). But you don’t put a cup of cream in your coffee. Let’s say you put 2 tablespoons in. A 2 tbs serving of Half and Half has 40 calories, milk has 20 (whipping cream has 160). You’re making a 20 calorie distinction, in the middle of a 2400 calorie day.
I think that this approach to dieting and healthy eating is so fraught with fear and discomfort for people that it simply isn’t worth it. I know that choosing milk over Half and Half in your coffee feels like a victory, feels like one is “making healthy choices,” but I think it undermines long-term, sustainable fitness. In this country, we take pride in choosing milk over Half and Half then help ourselves to a slice of cheesecake in celebration.
You yourself, Mac, know that when you gain weight it’s not because of choices like this, it’s because of the plate of leftovers you eat in one sitting when you’re stressed because of your responsibilities as a stay-at-home Dad, or the week of high calorie processed foods you eat for dinner because you don’t have time to cook.
I notice you tagged this post “Silliness,” so I’m guessing you feel much the same way I do. But I’ll tell you: given the damage that stress does to your fitness program, I think you’d be better off hiring someone to cook dinner for your family once or twice a week so that you can play with your kids instead of pulling your hair out. I wouldn’t give milk vs. Half and Half a moment’s thought.
6 Pam // Aug 27, 2008 at 4:06 pm
Do you really just “love a steaming hot cup of coffee in the morning” or is it more like you are totally addicted to caffeine??! Just wondering.
7 Marshmallow // Aug 27, 2008 at 4:14 pm
I’m with Paul, I have always been puzzled by the ‘cream in your coffee’ phenomenon. I have milk in my coffee, and not just milk, nonfat milk. Because of the taste. For realz.
8 Kym // Aug 27, 2008 at 5:18 pm
I’ve recently switched to drinking whole raw milk, and though I don’t make coffee at home (all the free coffee I want at work!), I would highly recommend it as a coffee add-in. It tastes very much like cream, very smooth, and not to mention it is highly effective at keeping me satiated the better part of the day vs the regular skim milk I used to drink. People say that it is not as thick as whole pasteurized milk, making it easier to drink on its own.
I like knowing that what I’m drinking doesn’t have anything added back in to fix the consistency after having removed the fat (powdered milk is added back into low-fat and non-fat milk to achieve this).
I’m in California and here I can just go to the store to buy it, but unfortunately in Oregon you would have to get it from a farm.
9 Fitness Health Network, Health Ranker, and Sorry | Fat Man Unleashed // Aug 27, 2008 at 7:03 pm
[...] Get Fit Slowly talks about Fat Free and Half & Half. [...]
10 plonkee // Aug 28, 2008 at 1:00 am
Yet another milk person here. I’m in the UK and I think that we have milk because traditionally people drank tea (with milk and sugar) more than coffee. In fact, the default choice is semi-skimmed milk (1.5%-1.8% fat) although some people have skimmed (<1% fat). Whole milk is for small children and old people
.
11 Chris // Aug 28, 2008 at 6:30 am
My favorite is skim milk. It cools the coffee down a little and doesn’t alter the coffee flavor all too much. At work, I sometimes use half and half and it’s all I can taste. As for tea, I prefer no milk, just sugar.
12 minimal.mammal // Aug 28, 2008 at 6:52 am
One thing I picked up from my dad was how to enjoy coffee. He was a Marine, so he never used cream or sugar. I always admired him and drank my coffee the same. Now, I can’t stand anything in it and am grateful for that. Coffee is a beverage I can enjoy without indulgence or worry. Also, it’s a lot cheaper if I ever go into a coffee shop for a quick cup. Cheap with few calories make it one one of my favorite simplicities in life.
13 Sheamus // Aug 28, 2008 at 7:15 am
I drink soy milk nowadays - well, I add it to my cereal, which is the only time I ‘take’ milk - but if you switch to dairy skim milk and stay with it, after a while full-fat milk seems completely gross. It’s one thing to put it in your coffee, but if you ever drink milk skimmed gets a lot colder than full-fat, for obvious reasons (lack of fat), and after a while that’s something you’ll look forward to.
How anyone can bear cream in their coffee is beyond me. Disgusting. I take my coffee black, as it is, but the thought of cream in there turns my stomach. Why not go the whole hog and throw some butter in?
In all seriousness, switching from full fat milk to skimmed can save you a ton of calories a week, depending on how often you have hot beverages and cereal. I have to admit I’m surprised to see it even mentioned as an option on this blog!
14 Brigid // Aug 28, 2008 at 7:19 am
Come on! Be a man - drink it black;-)
15 Sheamus // Aug 28, 2008 at 7:20 am
“Do you really just “love a steaming hot cup of coffee in the morning” or is it more like you are totally addicted to caffeine??! Just wondering.”
All respect, but I hate this sort of attitude. If you give up coffee you might as well give up on life.
1-2 cups of coffee in the morning does nobody any harm. Most studies show that coffee before workouts is of great benefit. Do most people ‘need’ that morning fix? I’m sure they do, but no more so than most people need certain other foods regularly in their diets.
If you drink 1-2 pots of coffee per day, then sure, you may well have a problem. But better that than being the sort of person who feels happy to wake up to herbal tea or a mug of hot water with lemon in it. That’s no kind of life at all.
Coffee rules. I know it, you know it, we *all* know it!
16 Kimberly // Aug 28, 2008 at 8:16 am
Even whipping cream has extra stuff in it to make it whip up better. I love half-and-half. I used it last Thanksgiving in the mashed potatoes because they don’t sell heavy cream of the non-whipping variety in the regular grocery store.
17 LeahB // Aug 28, 2008 at 9:40 am
I drink my hot coffee with milk only - no sweeteners. The fat in the milk works with the acid in coffee to make it oh-so-yummy! I’ve been through this same ordeal - I’m a fan of half-and-half, but I couldn’t have more than one serving a day. Booo. And skim milk and soy milk is atrocious in coffee (my opinion, sorry to those who enjoy it).
My solution was to buy a stove-top milk steamer and foam up a bit of 2% or whole milk. This adds to the “creaminess” factor, while lowering the fat and calories! Plus you can totally make yummy cappuccinos et. al. for guests and look like a freakin’ awesome barista.
18 Denise // Aug 28, 2008 at 1:35 pm
I use fat free half-and-half in my coffee every morning and I’ve lost 7 pounds in the last two weeks. But I only use it when I am actually counting calories.
19 deepali // Aug 28, 2008 at 4:02 pm
You heathens - drink it black!
Unless it’s a latte. Then you need a strong espresso and full fat milk. Yum.
20 Pam // Aug 28, 2008 at 5:07 pm
Sheamus - I am just giving my hubby a hard time. I am not against coffee (or caffeine for that matter) at all. Some days when I get up early to run, a big cup of coffee is all that keeps me awake at work. But I do think coffee is something Mac would be unable to go without. This is itself is not a bad thing, but Mac doesn’t drink it black (nor do I) and after a couple of cups each morning, that’s a lot of extra fat and sugar. Coffee in our house has become more than just an indulgence, it is a source of too many empty calories. By the time we doctor our coffee up we are adding about 60 calories of just fat and sugar per cup. That could be 120 or more calories each day. While the coffee (and caffeine) in one or two cups a day may not do anybody any harm, the fat and sugar just might, which is why I think mac’s caffeine addiction is ultimately hurting him in his fitness goals.
21 My Interweb Reading List « Healthhabits // Aug 29, 2008 at 6:09 am
[...] Mac at Get Fit Slowly gives us the ‘skinny’ on fat free Half and Half [...]
22 Tiffany // Aug 29, 2008 at 7:47 am
I don’t normally have dairy in my house because I can not eat/drink it. But I’m having house guest this weekend and one of them is a BIG coffee drinker. I know she uses half and half so I picked up a pint. Standing in the market, I debated getting her the fat free, but decided against it, based on your post.
23 macdaddy // Aug 29, 2008 at 8:05 am
I don’t usually pay attention to fats. I do try to eat good fats such as oil from fish and olives and stay away from the “bad fats.” You need to remember that I didn’t purchase the fat free half and half and that seeing it in the fridge was what inspired this post. I wouldn’t ever purchase it.
Also, your math above is correct–for a single cup of coffee. But, Sometimes I have 3 cups per morning while getting ready for the day. At 60 calories/morning, that’s 420 calories/week. That turns into about 1 extra pound’s worth of calories every nine weeks, right? Is it still trivial? I’m not saying I want to eliminate half and half, I’m just saying even small amounts of calories add up over the long term.
24 Karen // Aug 29, 2008 at 9:33 am
Well I am a very bad girl!!!! I drink my coffee with Bailey’s Irish Cream. But I don’t like the taste of coffee and only drink it on the weekends for a treat. I drink H2O all day long.
25 Sheamus // Aug 29, 2008 at 11:12 am
@ Pat - I was thinking about my comment today and feared it may have come over as a little rude. Apologies if it did.
Your comment illustrates my point, though - I’m a big believer in having regular treats to keep you sane but if you drink coffee regularly (or any hot beverage) you really need to take it without full-fat dairy or sugar. I have mine black with sweetener. I realise coffee with skimmed milk is not as good as cream, in Mac’s eyes, but those calories add up very quickly. It has nothing to do with Mac’s ‘caffeine addiction’ - coffee is a zero calorie drink. It’s the other stuff I think he’s addicted too, and that’s where your ‘problems’ are.
@ Karen - I’m not surprised you save it for the weekends. Coffee with Baileys in the morning = prison!
26 Sheamus // Aug 29, 2008 at 11:15 am
Darn, darn, darn. That should read, of course, ‘@ Pam’, and also ‘addicted to’, not too.
My kingdom for an edit button!
27 elisabeth // Aug 29, 2008 at 12:37 pm
I only drink tea, and don’t use milk in it, but I do like honey in my tea. Recently, I went from two teaspoons to one — haven’t noticed any weight loss, but my honey jars last longer which, with the price of honey, is a good thing. In the summer, half the time I drink (brewed) ice tea, and find that it doesn’t need any sweetner, but I’m still not seeing any weight loss. I think that my body keeps adapting to fewer calories in….
28 Pam // Aug 29, 2008 at 6:51 pm
Sheamus- you are right on. Treats should not be eliminated entirely - now that’s when you ought to give up on life. But three cups a day is no longer a special treat!
You are also right about the caffeine. I don’t care how much caffeine he gets, or if he is ‘addicted’, because it is not the caffeine that I see as a problem but everything else. And it is not even that I see the cream and sugar as “bad,” but just some unnecessary calories for a guy who is trying to lose weight.
29 Greenman2001 // Aug 30, 2008 at 9:02 am
Mac, yes, I consider even 60 calories a day to be trivial. You — Mac — don’t gain weight because of a series of 20 calorie decisions you make. You’ve been very clear — eloquent, even — in this blog in describing the patterns that lead you to gain weight. There are two factors: stress and boredom. When you encounter these factors, you overeat. You’ve found one tool — writing down what you eat and counting calories using an online tool — that is extremely effective in keeping your calorie intake to within the limits you set for yourself. There’s something about writing it down that enables you to pay attention and “make healthy choices.”
As a stay-at-home Dad, you are marinating in stress and boredom. In this environment, 20 calorie decisions may feel empowering, but they are distractions — perhaps effective, although that doesn’t seem to be the case given your recent 2 lb weight gain — from the contextual factors and forces that drive your eating habits. Just as it was impossible for JD to begin exercising while working at the box factory, you have got to change the context — the stress and boredom you battle every day — if you are to manage your weight, providing you’re not able to use the one tool that’s proven to be most effective.
It may be that you’re not going to be able to really get control of this until your kids are in school.
But I think it’s possible to tackle these issues right where you are by paying attention to those triggers of stress and boredom and making lifestyle changes around those specific triggers.
One of the problems with the subject of coffee and dieting is that it’s an extremely important part of most people’s lives. Caffeine is both addictive and has enormous benefits in terms of attention and performance. Saying to people in effect, “to lose weight you have to make this really important thing less enjoyable,” is a losing proposition and should be avoided at all costs.
30 Sheamus // Aug 30, 2008 at 3:51 pm
That’s the thing, pretty much spot on. None of this stuff is ‘bad’ or certainly ‘evil’. Sugar is just a little white rock that makes other things taste better. In and of itself it’s completely harmless.
I don’t like breaking things down into ‘good’ and ‘bad’ foods, but if you want to lose weight, you have to make some choices about exactly what you need, and be prepared to cut back on a lot of what you want.
31 Labor Day Roundup | Health, Fitness, Exercise, and Weight Loss (66 pounds in 17 weeks) // Aug 31, 2008 at 6:28 am
[...] The skinny on “Fat Free” Half And Half by Get Fit Slowly explores the sketchy areas of what we put in our coffee. [...]
32 joe c // Sep 1, 2008 at 2:22 pm
I’ve never understood why anyone would get skim milk rather than whole in their coffee. The amount of fat you get is practically negligible. Splurge and get some whole, or drink your java black.
33 Fat Girl Shrinking // Sep 2, 2008 at 2:10 pm
I like a lot of cream in my coffee. But, I have switched to half coffee and half fat free milk (back when I could drink milk, now its soy milk.) You get your cup of coffee, you get a cup of milk, and its all good
Granted, even when I did use cream, my coffee was more light brown than dark, and I like a lot of milk in my coffee.
34 Brigid // Sep 2, 2008 at 6:44 pm
We have a cappucino machine at home, so we make our own lattes. Fat-free milk actually works best for these—it makes a more stable foam than whole milk—and it’s still creamy enough for me. You might test that out for yourself next time you get coffee at a coffee shop.
At work, though, we only have a regular coffee maker, and nothing leaner than half-and-half will do.
35 Brigid // Sep 3, 2008 at 7:04 am
@ Brigid
Wow! Another Brigid. We may need to make a distinction between the black-coffee drinking Brigid (me) and the half-n-half drinking one:-)
I agree with you on the fat-free lattes. Good foam - I still think it tastes a bit flat so I go with 1%. Most coffee shops can make up a mix of 2% and fat-free if 1% isn’t on hand. I don’t ask if it’s busy though - nothing more irritaing than people ordering drinks with a paragraph of instructions:-)
Soy lattes aren’t bad either. You just have to ask if they use regular or vanilla flavored since vanilla soy adds more calories. Regular soy milk seems to have a natural sweetness to it anyways. I believe soy milk also has a tad more protein.
Cheers!
36 Getz // Sep 3, 2008 at 9:15 am
This is something I have actually thought a good bit about lately. I used to hate coffee, but then started drinking it in college for the caffine. Then it grew on me so I drank it a little more. Now, I work in an office with the standard office coffee supply in the kitchen and I have really taken to the coffee culture, plus w/o the caffine, which I readily admit addiction(which I have some caffine addiction issues but thats neither her nor there). I started out with some milk, then started mixing in a little milk and a little cappacino at sheetz, now I buy the bottled flavored creamers(dulche de leche…be still my heart). I noticed that these have anywhere from 30 to 50 calories per serving. I am not sure if I use a serving or more, as I just pour a big shot in my 16oz travel cup. I am up to two cups a day, sometimes 3, rarely more. When I was counting calories, and must return to doing, I didn’t count the creamer because I figured it was trivial, but I drink alot of it, so its not so trivial. I love the flavored coffee, but I realize that losing weight does mean depriving yourself of many, many, many, many…many, things. I have ab0ut a 1/3 a cup black decaf(lousy unleaded), and I’m going to try and choke it down without gagging all over my office. Maybe I could get used to it enough to tolerate it. Or, maybe I’ll have to go back to skim the majority of the time.
37 Getz // Sep 3, 2008 at 9:16 am
I meant to say in the above post, w/o the caffine, I would spiral into a bleak nothingness and die.
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