- Are serving sizes a scam?
- Let's talk about that.
(upbeat music)
Good Mythical Morning.
- Have you ever looked at food's nutritional labels
and wondered, what's up with the serving sizes?
For example, we got some Campbell's Chicken Noodle soup.
How many serving sizes in this thing?
Two and a half.
- Mm.
- Who comes up with this stuff?
I mean it, yes, it is condensed,
so you're supposed to add a can of water,
but who gets only half the serving?
- The youngest.
(crew laughs)
- Two and a half servings in this thing?
Would you just eat the whole can?
- Yes. - Probably?
- I would.
Okay, the Mythical crew wondered this, exactly,
and then because they're very good at their jobs,
as I've been asked to say,
they immediately stopped and thought,
we know exactly how to turn this into a fun
and informative game to play on a daily internet show.
- Man, they sure are good at their jobs,
which they asked me to say.
- Ah.
- It's time for "This Snack is Serving! Sizes...
Salty Snacks Edition."
(upbeat music)
- Are you saying serving in the Gen Z sense?
- I think I was.
- Oh, that's cool of you.
- Yeah, I'm so cool.
Boopity boop boop boop boop boop!
Research!
Even though the serving sizes
on the nutrition facts labels seem random,
they're actually dictated by the FDA,
and the amount of a serving size
is supposed to reflect what the average person eats
in one sitting.
- Okay.
- It's different from portion sizes,
which is the amount nutritionists recommend that you eat
in one sitting.
- And because serving sizes are meant to be reflections
of what people actually eat,
some serving sizes have recently been updated
to better reflect people's habits because-
- No, they haven't. - ... in 1993,
when the FDA first made the nutrition facts label.
Can you believe that it was 1993?
- That seems late to me. Yeah.
- I mean we were just in the Wild West before that as kids,
and they were using survey data from the '70s and the '80s,
and now, they use a lot more recent data
from like 2003 to 2008,
which is why serving sizes like soda
recently went from eight ounces to 12 ounces,
'cause who drinks eight ounces of soda?
Am I right?
So now that we got all that straight, Stevie,
how do we play this game?
- [Stevie] In each round, you'll be presented
with a different snack and your goal is to guess
what you think the official serving size is,
and whoever is closer without going over will win a point.
You'll also use a second bowl
to show us what your personal serving size
for each snack would be,
and we'll discover how close you are
to the FDA serving size.
And let's go ahead and dole out your first snack, shall we?
It's one near and dear to your hearts,
sour cream and cheddar Ruffles.
- [Link] So good.
- [Stevie] And we're looking for a serving size
based on individual chips.
- But if you give me a bowl-
- Fill it up. - ... of these-
- You fill it up, right? - ... I will finish the bowl.
That's the problem.
- If I give you the bag-
- If you gave me the bowl in a bag,
and just so you remember, just so you remember,
this is the closest to going the answer without going over.
This is "Price Is Right" rules.
- I'm turning my thing sideways so you can see it, but-
- That's my serving size right there.
- Okay. - That's how many I would get.
- So that's more than me.
But then what I would do is I'd eat all these,
and then I would go back, and I would,
what I do is I'll open a bag of something that I really love
and I won't even use a bowl.
I'll just put it on the counter.
I'll be like, this is how much I'm allowing myself to eat,
and then I'll put the bag away before I start eating.
But then sometimes, I will get the bag back out.
But if the bag stays out, you just eat out of the bag.
You see what I'm saying?
- Now, I'm trying to put together
what a normal person would do.
- 'Cause if you've a got a sandwich,
or you've got a burger- - A sandwich?
- ... or something there, it's a side serving.
- [Stevie] Now, you have to replenish-
- Are you just eating?
- [Stevie] ... the serving that you've made for yourself.
(crew laughs)
- I've eaten three.
- Okay. So should we...
Do we need to count these chips or how are we gonna know?
- [Stevie] Yeah, count the ones that are your official guess
because my answer is in number of chips.
- Oh, okay.
Well, there's some smaller ones.
I'm gonna count that as two.
Three, four.
- I'll count it as I put 'em in there.
- Five, six, seven, eight, nine, 10, 11, 12.
Let's call that 15.
- Okay. - I have at least 25 in mind.
- [Stevie] Rhett, how many chips is your official guess?
- Seven.
- [Stevie] Okay.
- I think they would be barely eaten, barely eaten.
That's what I believe.
- I hope it's not that low. 15.
- [Stevie] You're both dancing around
in in the right general area
because the answer is 28 grams, or 11 chips.
- Ooh!
- 11 chips is less...
11 chips is like-
- Is less than the number that you guessed,
which means I've win-
- That's like that much!
- ... even if I'd have said one chip.
- I'm gonna have to eat these
in order to get this bowl right.
- Nine, 10, 11, 12.
- 11 chips!
- [Stevie] Yeah, so you can kind of see
if you weren't actively eating your own chips
just how much your serving size is compared to-
- Mine's about 20 chips.
It looks like my serving size is about 20 chips,
so I'm not that crazy.
I'm just twice as big as the a regular boy.
- Yeah, you've got more to fuel.
- And how many chips did you put in, you think, in your...
You would've got pretty close to the real answer.
- I think I doubled the size.
Hmm.
11 chips.
- 11 chips. - She wasn't lying.
- And you're supposed to be done?
(crew laughs)
- I'm ignoring that.
(upbeat music)
- [Stevie] Okay, we're moving on to Chex Mix here,
and this time, you're measuring your serving size
in increments of a cup,
hence why you have increments of a cup available to you.
- I got a quarter cup, I got a quarter cup,
I got a, I guess that's a half a cup,
and then I got a full cup.
- Did we establish that the Mythical Beasts
didn't like the bagel bites?
- They didn't like 'em as much as we did.
- Man, y'all crazy. They're so good.
- They're so good.
- I just had two.
- They're the best.
They're the best part.
- This is how I measure my snacks, by the way.
I've always got one of these on my key chain.
(crew laughs)
A lot of people don't know that.
You hear me coming down the hall.
- Like a janitor.
- It's my snack spoon.
So what does it feel like to get a cup of this?
- So one cup feels pretty good.
- This me here?
- Hmm. Cup.
- [Link] But maybe that's too much.
- I think I'd eat more than that.
- If I'm going fishing- - Yeah, be honest.
- It's a good fishing food.
When's the last time you went fishing?
- Why is it a good fishing food?
- I don't know.
I've been watching lots of fishing videos on TikTok.
I keep getting people catching bass.
I got a guy caught the biggest bass.
It said "Biggest Bass Ever Caught on Camera."
(Link laughs)
That was the name of his...
That was his caption.
- How big was it?
- I mean, he said, "That's every bit of 18 pounds!"
(crew laughs) - Okay.
Biggest bass ever caught on camera.
And caught it with a camera?
- That would've been awesome.
- Quarter.
Oh, look at how janky that is.
- What did I just do?
I think I would do a cup and a half.
- This is one cup, this is a quarter.
The way that I normally do this,
I'll just grab a Ziploc bag,
and then I'll fill it up with Chex Mix, you know?
So it's like, what is a Ziploc bag?
I think it's a cup.
- I think I could eat a quarter cup of Chex Mix
in just like a spoon.
- Yeah, that's one bite for you.
- I mean that's literally what I made a serving,
'cause I can't go over.
All right, so I'm locked in. FDA at a quarter.
I'm at a full cup.
- FDA at a half for me,
and I'll give myself a cup and a half.
- [Stevie] One serving size of Chex Mix is half a cup.
- Yes!
- Well, shoot. You nailed it.
You freaking nailed it.
- I'm gonna go fishing!
- Says it right there, half a cup.
She's not lying.
I like the fact that we can tell if she's lying.
A lot of times, we can't, you know?
- Yeah, Stevie makes up a lot of stuff.
- We just gotta take your word for it.
- We found that out because of a fact checker.
We got contacted by a fact checker one time.
- Bagel chip is back.
- Says Stevie's lying all the time.
(upbeat music)
- [Stevie] Okay, we're moving on to pretzels.
- That's pretty.
- It's a big bowl of pretzels.
- [Stevie] Yeah. And no cups this time.
You're just individual pretzelizing it.
- Do you think we're gonna get to a point
with them updating their standards
that this will become the average amount
that we humans are eating?
- I think we're actually- - This is it?
- I think we peaked,
and I think we're coming back, actually.
- You think we're coming back?
- The drinks can't get any bigger
If the drinks at 7-Eleven,
if the largest size of drink at 7-Eleven got any bigger,
people couldn't carry it.
So that's the limiting factor
is that you have to be able to tote it around, you know?
- I'm gonna tell you how many of these that I eat.
I'm gonna put it in my Link serving bowl.
I'm gonna eat one of these.
- That's about right. - And I'm gonna be like,
hmm, why don't I eat more pretzels?
I'm gonna eat a second pretzel, and I'm gonna be like,
why do they taste so burnt?
I'm gonna eat a third pretzel.
I'm gonna be like, why do pretzels exist?
That's my relationship with pretzels.
I just...
They fizzle out.
So I eat three to come to that realization.
- I'm a 16 pretzel guy.
- And then like six months later, I eat more pretzels.
Why don't they have peanut butter in them?
Why don't I eat peanut butter
with something else besides pretzels?
These are the things I think about.
- I never get 'em, but I love 'em when I eat 'em.
- Yeah. Why are pretzels?
- This would be good fishing food, too.
- Why are pretzels?
- 'Cause what you could do,
you could take some of your fishing line,
and you can string up some pretzels right next to your head,
'cause one of the things I do when I'm fishing,
my hands are occupied the whole time.
- Right. You just gotta have a string here.
Mm-hmm.
- That's what I would do.
- So did you count how many you had?
One, two, three, four, five, six.
- I got 16 but- - Seven, eight.
- ... I've got my guess in.
- Nine, 10.
- And I want you to end up with your guess before I do it.
- You know what? I'm going with 11 again.
That looks like a nice, conservative FDA average. 11.
- I'm going in with seven again
'cause I think there's a little bit more pretzel
than there's a chip.
It's deceptive.
- [Stevie] Well, the serving size is also 28 grams,
but that means 17 pretzels in this case.
- All right!
Yeah, 'cause they're hollow. That's right.
- She's right. 17 pretzels.
She's not lying to us.
(upbeat music)
- [Stevie] Up next, we have Ritz crackers,
which I've never seen presented
in this particular manner before.
- Oh you haven't? This is how I do it.
- A big old bowl of Ritz crackers is nothing to sniff at.
And that's all I'm doing, so...
(crew laughs)
- [Stevie] And the serving size is in crackers,
individual crackers.
- The way I determine how many Ritz I'm going to eat,
and I think every person should do this,
is how many can you fit
in between your thumb and your finger?
- They're so good.
- The bigger the hand- - Your thumb?
Your thumb and your finger?
- Like this, comfortably.
- Oh.
That's how you're doing it?
- Yeah. This is what I do.
- I mean, typically when you pick these,
you're then, you're doing something with 'em, right?
You're- - Eating them.
- You're putting 'em on...
No, you're putting peanut butter on 'em.
- Not if you're me.
- You're laying them flat across a saucer.
- I do it all.
- And then you're putting cheese over top of 'em.
- I do it all.
- What did you call that? The-
- Cheese disc.
- The cheese disc.
- It's Ritz crackers with shredded cheese on top
and some gorgonzola, if you're fancy like me,
and then you put it in the microwave for about a minute
and then you pull that Frisbee off of the plate,
and you have a good old night.
That's how many I would get.
- That is way a lot.
(crew laughs)
- Well, let's count it real quick.
- Dude, that is a lot, dude.
And I'm even thinking this is too much,
because you know what?
Ritz doesn't want their serving size to be too big
'cause then all of their values go up underneath that.
I can just tell that all these corporations-
- 30!
- There's a moment where they're waiting for the FDA
to come out and tell 'em what their serving size is,
and they're like, "Well we're hoping for two and a half.
But we also know that most people would eat 18."
And that's the big moment.
- Who looks at the serving size?
- And then somebody gets fired.
- [Stevie] Wait. I don't understand this logic.
Ritz wants a smaller serving size because of what?
All their values?
- So that the nutritional values underneath
don't look as scary.
There's not that much fat in these.
- We thought you were talking about stock value.
- No, I'm talking about the fat number, the sodium number,
all the bad numbers you want to be small.
- I'm a big investor in Ritz.
- People look at that,
but they don't look at the serving size.
I think this is the amount that I would eat.
- Mine's 30, by the way.
- And then I think that the amount...
There's a lot of fat and sodium in these,
and I think they want to keep it small,
so they're making arguments to the FDA.
It's like, "You know what?
They make a cheese disc, and you know, so?"
- Who would be that guy? Can I be that guy?
Can I be the guy that argues with the FDA over things?
- I think its serving size- - Send in Rhett.
He's the Ritz guy.
- It's an even number,
because you want to be able to sandwich 'em.
I'm going with eight.
- You know what?
I'm going with nine,
'cause I don't think it's an even number.
- Well, nine isn't an even number.
- 'Cause so far, everyone has not been an even number.
- Well, it's about to change, brother.
- [Stevie] The answer is 16 grams or five.
- Five? We are both over.
Are you lying, though?
Nope, she wasn't.
(crew laughs)
- Why is it so-
- [Stevie] That means Rhett's serving size is six times
what it's supposed to be. (crew laughs)
- Hey, Stevie!
- I mean,
even mine's pretty big.
- Sometimes I like to stack three on top of each other.
- And just eat 'em?
- Because the way it crunches on top, it's a triple crunch.
- You don't need anything else.
They are so good.
- Now, Ritz not a good fishing food. Here's why.
When I'm reeling in a big 18-pound bass-
- Biggest ever caught on camera.
- ... I mean, once I get him to the shore,
there's a flopping thing that happens.
Water's going everywhere.
A few drops of pond water on a Ritz,
and you've got a bad day ahead of you.
- Yeah, that ain't good. - You know what I'm saying?
- So I don't bring these when I fish.
- It's not the type of pate that I want.
I will point out that it's still an odd number.
- It's still an odd number.
And Link, you've taken these last two rounds,
so we're tied going into the last round.
You were technically over, but you were closer, so you win.
- Okay, good.
- [Stevie] Now...
Oh. You're gonna be...
We weren't gonna be that generous.
- Yeah, because it makes it fun to be tied
to go into the last round.
- [Stevie] Oh, okay. Yeah, we like fun.
(bell chimes)
(upbeat music)
Pop Secret Movie Theater Butter Microwave Popcorn-
- Shh.
- [Stevie] ... in increments of a cup.
- [Link] It's a secret.
- Now, I come from a family.
(crew laughs)
That's all I wanted to say.
- They didn't love him that much, but he did come from-
- I come from a family where one bag of microwave popcorn
is not enough for the family.
- That's the serving?
- Everybody gets their own bag.
- I mean one- - Right?
Everybody gets their own bag.
- One freaking cup is...
That is sad.
That's a sad little clump of corn.
- I mean, especially if you make it even like that.
- So that's one cup.
- I mean, it does almost fill up the bowl,
now that I see it.
- So two cups.
Two cups is...
I can't, yeah.
It's like- - No, but hold on.
- There's this whole thing where it's like,
if you pick out a smaller plate
and then you make your meal-
- But is it compressed? - It's psychological.
- Is it compressed popcorn?
'Cause I bet you I can get-
- That's something Trader Joe's is gonna be selling soon.
- I'm gonna make a- - Compressed popcorn!
- Well, we call it a popcorn puck.
(crew laughs)
And really-
- I think that's called a rice cake.
- If you want to get it right,
you gotta put a little pond water in there.
- Corn cake?
- Just a little, 'cause that really gets it going.
- Get some of that bass juice in there.
- Oh my gosh.
I think I could get...
Oh my goodness!
Look how small I got that.
How much popcorn do you think I could get in there?
In this puck?
- Three.
- You drop this in the middle of a pond,
the fish would go crazy.
They would come from all corners of that pond.
- Five.
I mean, I'm gonna eat five cups of popcorn, uncompressed.
(crew laughs)
And I...
- It is wild how that happens.
- I hope that the secret is not that it's only one cup.
- I'm like one of those hydraulic machines.
- Two cups is just not-
- Hydraulic press.
Hydraulic Rhett, that's what I say.
- Now that we've both taken out everything outta here,
this is about, this is a movie's worth of popcorn.
- I've made grits!
I mean, look at this.
How? I'm going into that one.
I mean- - Is this the point?
- No!
(screen beeps)
(cup clinks)
Hey! There comes the puck!
- Oh wow.
- Kick it. Get a load of that.
- Why is it moist?
- Pond water?
I've been adding pond water to it this whole time.
You weren't paying attention.
(crew laughs)
(screen beeps)
- So I've measured out five, and that's very conservative.
Just go off of my five.
- I know what I'm gonna do.
- You say 10, right?
- What's your guess though?
What's your FDA guess?
- Cup and a half.
- I went with two cups.
Locked in.
- [Stevie] One serving size of popcorn
is two tablespoons unpopped,
which comes out to three cups.
- Oh, good for us.
- Really?
So you can eat a lot of popcorn.
Link, you took it, man.
You took it home. You served.
I don't want to hear it from you.
I wanna hear it from somebody who can mean it.
- Link, you are serving.
(bell ringing)
You're serving.
- Keep that up.
- That was very convincing.
Now, but hold on, Stevie, this is-
- [Stevie] Uh oh.
- You're not...
Stevie is lying to us.
This says-
- It says it makes about three cups.
- Three cups popped, two tablespoons unpopped.
- That's what I just said. - That's what she said.
- Yeah, I don't know, though.
(crew laughs)
- Well, I wasn't listening.
- I don't know. I feel like you were lying.
- How many popcorn puffs?
- The correct answer is two tablespoons unpopped,
which nobody measures.
- How many popcorn puffs is that, Stevie?
- Three servings per bag.
- [Stevie] I couldn't tell you.
Wet popcorn is like wet socks to me.
Seeing you do that.
- You like it?
- [Stevie] No!
(crew laughs)
- Oh let me douse my sock before I put it on.
What do you mean "Do you like it?"
I don't know.
- So that's the secret.
There's 54 servings in this box.
- Wow!
- Thanks for subscribing and clicking that bell.
You know what time it is.
- What's going on?
It's Ryan, and we're in Harnett County, North Carolina.
And it's time to spin the Wheel of Mythicality.
- Harnett County built a tall boy water tower
next to we remember to the other top water tower?
- We remember when they put that big one on the right up.
- [Both] That was was a big day.
- And now they put a tall boy over there beside it.
- Click the top link- - Water all the way
to the bottom.
- To watch us guess the other's perfect portions
for non-food things in "Good Mythical Morning."
- And find out where the wheels gonna land.
- Okay. Not bad.
99 Cents Store chicken stock.
Oh, the Whole Foods chicken stock is terrible.