One of the Quaker Oats Company's classic products is Old-Fashioned Oatmeal, made from rolled oats. This form of oatmeal is made by cleaning the husk from the oat grain, steaming it and then rolling it flat between heavy metal rollers. Oats are a source of whole grains and offer multiple nutritional benefits.
Macronutrients and Calories
In a ½ cup serving of dry oatmeal, there are 150 calories and 3 g of fat. Quaker rolled oats provide 27 g of carbohydrates and 5 g of protein. Quaker rolled oats contain no cholesterol and no sodium. There is just 1 g of naturally occurring sugar in a serving of oats.
Additional Nutritional Benefits
A serving of Quaker rolled oats contains 10 percent of the recommended daily allowance for iron. It is also a good source of the B vitamins thiamin and riboflavin. According to the World's Healthiest Foods, 1 cup of cooked oatmeal provides 68.5 percent of the RDA for manganese, 27 percent of selenium and 25 percent of the amino acid tryptophan.
Fiber
One serving of Quaker rolled oats has 4 g of fiber. Fiber is a way to describe carbohydrates that are indigestible, explains the Harvard School of Public Health. There are two types of fiber found in food: soluble fiber, which partially dissolves in water, and insoluble fiber, which does not dissolve in water. Two grams of the fiber found in Quaker oats is soluble, which can help lower cholesterol, and the other 2 g are insoluble, which helps with digestion. The Institute of Medicine recommends that women aged 19 to 50 get a minimum of 25 g of fiber daily and men 38 g daily.
Cholesterol Claims
In 1997, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration approved a request from Quaker to claim on packaging that consumption of oats can help lower cholesterol. The packaging states that 3 g of soluble fiber daily from oatmeal can reduce the risk of heart disease, when combined with a diet low in saturated fat and cholesterol. A ½-cup of dry oatmeal provides 2 g of this fiber.
Considerations
The process of removing the husk and steaming rolled oats removes some of the protein, bran and B vitamins available in whole or steel cut groats. Rolled oats have a longer shelf-life, so they can be stored in paper packaging rather than in vacuum-packed containers. Old-fashioned oats differ from quick oats in their size alone. Quick oats are cut smaller, so they cook faster.
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