This yoghurt tastes like mayonnaise....

Not really. Just a perfect chance to use one of my all time favourite movie quotes courtesy of Spike in Notting Hill. It was with great excitement that my nothing-like-Spike friend Amy V alerted me to the opening of Igloo Zoo in Australia. It's inspired by (read: ripped off from) Pinkberry in the US and it sells delightful frozen yoghurt and a selection of brightly-coloured treats to top it with. I was pleased as unlike ice-cream I can stomach frozen yoghurt.

It pitches itself as a healthy alternative to ice-cream, emphasising its antioxidant content, low-fatness and active cultures. Amy's unbridled excitement was tempered only by a final question to me about whether or not it was really healthy. I felt equal parts pride and guilt at her question - pride that I was her go-to girl for an honest and studied appraisal of the product. Guilt that I may turned my friends to be as cynical as I am.

Igloo Zoo have a very fancy website which is as informative as it is funky. I was able to answer her question from the nutritional information supplied from the site. There have been studies about nutritional labels and how many people have no idea how to read them, even when they think they do. That's mostly because to make a proper assessment you really need to do some reading between the lines, as well as have peripheral knowledge. I won't bore you with a lesson here but have some insights into how I was able to declare Igloo Zoo a good choice as an occaisional treat.

Serving size
Labels usually give info per serve and per 100g. The trouble is, WTF is a serve? These guys were generous enough to point out that a small is one serve, medium is two and large is three serves. Some high school maths and I could properly re-gig the figures for my purposes.

But a new Mexican takeaway joint at my local mall is a good lesson in why all is not as it seems when it comes to serves. They place their nutritional brochure front and centre on the counter. It's an obvious marketing ploy, as in 'We aren't trying to hide anything therefore we must be healthy.' Healthy, I don't know, but faced with other options in the food court I was hoping it would at least be healthier. A quick glance at the brochure led me to believe yes – until I noticed all nutritional info was per 100g. Me: 'How many grams in a burrito?' Teenager behind the counter: 'Er, 200.' Thereby doubling all the figures and quickly demisting my rose-coloured glasses.

Kilojoules v calories
A kilojoule by any other name is a calorie. They are both measurements of energy - one is metric (kJ), the other is imperial (cal). As Australia went all modern and metric in 1966 we're supposed to use kJ. The trouble is the US and the UK are still on calories so both remain in common usage. Damn that imperialistic imperialism. One kJ is 4.184 calories. The number of kJs you need to eat daily is dependent on so many things but should roughly be around 6,500-8,000 for an average-sized woman. For example that might be 1,500kJ for breakfast, 2,500kJ for lunch and 3,000kJ for dinner.

As previously discussed, I'm not a calorie/kJ counter but knowing this makes it easier to understand why you should order a medium at Igloo Zoo, when a large frozen yoghurt has 1,400kJ before you add any of the sugary toppings.

Sugar
Low fat isn't everything when it comes to food. We know Igloo Zoo is 99.4% fat free because their marketing material shouts it at us, so reading that part of the label offers little enlightenment. What they don't print on a sandwich board to put outside their shop, it that a large size, sans toppings, contains about 15 teaspoons of sugar. You can read why I believe sugar is very bad to have in your diet here.

THE VERDICT
I'm not buying into the spin that this frozen yoghurt is a health food. The antioxidant content is not special enough for them to explain it further and the live cultures would be in numbers too small to be useful, not to mention strains that are ineffective. But it is low in fat, decent for kilojoules and as bad for sugar as any sweet treat, and that includes fruit juice. Will I breakfast on it daily? No. But I'll definitely be trying it and hoping it tastes as good as it looks.

Warning: this dish may cause back fat and cellulite

Having just returned from enjoying a delicious lunch at wagamama, I'm now pondering the merits of food outlets providing nutritional information about their dishes. I'm not a calorie counter, rather I try to eat instinctively based on my above-average knowledge of things diet and nutrition related.

For example, at wagamama I ordered the Spice Chicken Itame. It's chicken breast pieces, stir-fried with broccoli, onion, chilli and zucchini, a host of other flavouring and served with white rice. My rationale for choosing is thus: it contains good quality protein (lean chicken), vegies and a satisfying but not ridiculous serve of carbohyrdates. It's also not creamy and rich like the curried dishes on the menu, oh and it tastes really, really good. Like 'I crave it between visits' good.

Once I'd all but licked the bowl I could see it was lined with an oily residue. This reminded me that although instictive eating can achieve much, unless I prepare a meal myself there is no way of actually knowing what it contains. A colleage of mine once interviewed food critic Matthew Evans (now food columnist at Grazia), who explained that most restaurant food is laced with hidden butter and other fat like duck or goose fat. I bet two thirds of a chef's gruelling apprenticeship is spent learning how to skillfully hide it.

I saw this first hand on Sunday while lunching at the Pasta & Panini bar at David Jones Food Hall. It's a sit-at-the-counter affair, where you watch while the cook finishes off the semi-prepared food in front of you. I was virtually mid 'I'll have the pumpkin risotto...' when I caught another customer's being prepared on the hot plate. My best homecook-estimate puts the butter added at 50g. I ordered spaghetti Bolognese.

Despite these experiences, I don't advocate plastering menus with nutritional information. On my recent trip to the US I had the misfortune of eating McDonald's at LAX. Once I'd polished off my faux-healthy grilled chicken wrap (and er, fries), I spotted the tray mat staring back at me with nutritional info for the entire menu. Not much to good to me after the fact, except to make me feel even more disgusting and guilty about what I had eaten. And I venture that for the fast food frequenters who this is designed to empower, it would do little to deter the next impulsive visit.

At the risk of sounding like a Duggar, the answer is we should prepare more of our own food. If we cooked food for ourselves more often, the occasional meal out doesn't need to be overscrutnised. Apart from being better for the budget and waistline, there are broader arguments about cooking in the home being positive enviromentally, socially and mentally. I'm talking about the financial crisis-induced revolution against consumerism, 80-hour working weeks and the disconnected life. It's about nutritional education, not information.

I'll step back from broader arguments now and return to regular hilarious* programming. So wagamama lunch tasted great, I enjoyed my DJs spag bol despite not knowing about its potential hidden fat and I'll try as much as possible to eat in so I can enjoy these meals on a regular (but not too regular) basis.

*According to a survey of me. And my boyfriend.