Review: Supreme Protein Bars

Walking through Wal-Mart today I came across a protein bar I’d never seen before. Granted there are quite a few protein bars on the market, and most of them aren’t anywhere near low-carb, but when I do see a lower-carb bar I’m always game to give it a try.  I bought the two flavors available and headed home.

Supreme Protein Carb Concious bars are a pretty good price at $1.66 per bar. Thankfully you can purchase them by the bar to see if you like them before investing a larger sum in an entire box. I opened the Peanut Butter Crunch flavor and gave it a try. (I started with peanut butter because, seriously, how bad can peanut butter anything be?) The bar was rather small, which surprised me since the wrapper looks bigger. Inspecting the other bar I bought, I realized that there’s a good little amount of air in the package making the bar appear larger than it is. That little eye-trick aside, it tasted pretty good. Not amazing, but good. I could eat it again. I’m glad to say it doesn’t have the cardboard or soy taste that many low-carb bars seem to be riddled with.  It does however contain soy. (Strike one!)

It has a few crunchy soy-nuggets on top of the bar that give it texture and the middle is very chewy. So chewy that it seemed to stick to my teeth. The package proclaims the primary source of protein is “powered by” whey isolate, so you get a whole 15 grams of power per bar. The carb count will vary depending on how you count the carbs on your specific plan. The total carbohydrate count is 13, with less than 1 gram of fiber. I realize you are probably gasping for air at the thought of 1.75 ounces of franken-food depleting that many carbs from your daily allotment. It’s a big number for most of us. It does however contain sugar alcohols, which totals 7, and  some of you may be comfortable deducting those. This would be a net count of  7 carbs.  Sadly, the sugar alcohol involved in this concoction is maltitol. Add to the fact there are at least two forms of regular sugar in the gynormous ingredient list, and I’m less impressed by the minute. (Maltitol, sugar and never-ending ingredient list – strike 2, 3, & 4!)

Since my rating scale only goes to 5, it may not even be worth going on any further. This bar is already at a 1. If you are still interested in trying one, the other flavor I found is Caramel Nut Chocolate, which contains 18 carbs and 14 sugar alcohols. And by now my readers know how I feel about sugar alcohols. A little is slightly acceptable. A lot (like 14 grams), for most people, is like asking for Godzilla to stomp your intestines.

Nutrition info, Peanut Butter Crunch:

Calories: 190 g

Fat: 9

Carbs: 13 g

Fiber: less than 1 g

Sugar Alcohols: 7 g

Protein: 15 g

Ingredient list: Way to dang long to type out and full of ingredients I can’t even begin to pronounce.

Nutrition Info, Caramel Nut Chocolate:

Calories: 200

Fat: 8 g

Carbs: 18 g

Fiber: less than 1

Sugar Alcohols: 14 g

Protein: 15 g

Ingredients:  Same as above.  I quit counting at 35 ingredients and gave up. It’s not worth squinting my eyes at all the little print.

My rating: 1 star (and it only got that because it actually tasted good).

Disclosure