Snacking on veggie chips can be an easy way to incorporate more vegetables into your diet, and your kids’ diets - but how much nutritional benefit are you really getting? Some of the most popular veggie chips aren’t much better than plain old potato chips.
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Whole Foods Veggie Chips
- Real vegetables: shiitake mushrooms, green beans, okra, carrots, and pumpkin
- Sliced and ‘vacuum-fried’ so that less oil is absorbed and less nutrients are lost
- Per ounce: 140 calories, 4 grams fat, 2 grams fiber, 130 mg sodium, 1 gram protein
Rhythm Superfoods Sweet Potato Chips
- Sweet potatoes are loaded with beta carotene and fiber
- These sweet potato chips are dehydrated at low temperature with just a little sea salt
- Per ounce: 140 calories, 0 grams fat, 5 grams fiber, 135 mg sodium, 3 grams protein
Rhythm Superfoods Kale Chips
- These kale chips are really just kale, plus sunflower seeds and seasonings
- Air-crisped at a low temperature, not fried, so they retain nutrients and enzymes
- Per ounce: 210 calories, 9 grams fat, 5 grams fiber, 180 mg sodium, 8 grams protein
- Also provides 115% DV for vitamin A, 60% DV for vitamin C, 10% DV for calcium and 15% DV for iron
- Higher calorie than most chips, but loaded with vitamins, minerals, beta carotene, lutein
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World Table Exotic Potato Chip Blend
- Similar to Terra Exotic Vegetable Chips
- Made with real vegetables: sweet potatoes, Yukon gold potatoes, blue potatoes
- Provide 10% of DV for vitamin A
- Per ounce: 150 calories, 9 grams fat, 2 grams of fiber, 115 mg sodium, 1 gram protein
- The main drawback: they’re fried, with 9 grams of fat per serving, and not such as nutrient powerhouse as kale chips, so they’re just in our ‘like it’ category.
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Sensible Portions Veggie Chips & Veggie Straws
- Similar to Pirate’s Booty Veggie Chips (which use mostly corn meal and rice flour)
- Not much better than a potato chip; first ingredients are potato flour and potato starch
- The ‘veggies’ are mostly just spinach powder and beetroot for color.
- Per ounce: 130 calories, 7 grams fat, 250 mg sodium, 1 gram fiber, 1 gram protein
