A Snickers candy bar is a common snack food for American children and adults. This confection can be found in grocery stores, convenience stores and vending machines. Available in a variety of sizes, the standard, 2.07 oz.candy bar has been used for the purpose of assembling this nutritional information.
History
The Snickers candy bar was created in 1930 and the manufacturer now claims that it is the biggest selling candy bar in the world. In addition to various sizes, the candy bar comes in versions featuring almonds, fudge and dark chocolate. There is also a Snickers ice cream bar. The regular version contains roasted peanuts, caramel, nougat and milk chocolate.
Healthy Ingredients
Healthy ingredients in a Snickers bar include chocolate and approximately 16 peanuts. Small amounts of skim milk and egg white are present. The healthy ingredients in this product are over-burdened by the unhealthy components, making this item a poor dietary choice.
Unhealthy Ingredients
A Snickers Bar contains sugar, cocoa butter, milkfat, milk sugar and butter. It contains small amounts of partially hydrogenated soybean oil, salt and artificial flavor.
Nutritional Breakdown
According to the manufacturer, this product contains 280 calories, which is 14 percent of the daily calories that a person on a 2,000 calorie diet should consume. This candy bar contains 14 g of fat, which is 22 percent of the fat needed for a typical diet, 5 g of which is saturated fat. This gives the consumer 25 percent of his saturated fat limit for the day. It provides 35 g of carbohydrates, which is 12 percent of a typical person's daily requirement. It is considered to be fairly low in sodium, meeting 6 percent of the daily sodium healthy limit. This food has 4 g of protein, which is 8 percent of the daily requirement. A Snickers candy bar has insignificant amounts of cholesterol, Vitamin A, Vitamin C and iron. It contains 4 percent of the U.S. recommended daily allowance of calcium and meets 4 percent of typical fiber needs.
The negative effects of this snack are additive for a child: if she needs to consume 1,200 calories per day, eating this 280 calorie snack either gives her too many calories or causes her to eliminate a healthier food that would better help her meet her nutrition needs.
How to Fit it Into Your Diet
If you like to consume a Snickers candy bar occasionally, you can offset its negative effects by having it with a glass of water and consuming no other snack foods that day. Better snack ideas include a handful of peanuts, walnuts or almonds, a cup of fat-free yogurt, 3 cups of air-popped popcorn, a cup of berries or a slice of whole-grain bread with banana slices and cinnamon.
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