Snacks: Ritz Crackers Vs Late July Organic Cheddar Cheese Crackers Vs Sunshine Cheez-It Original Snack Crackers

Comparing Ritz® Crackers, Late July Organic Cheddar Cheese Crackers and Sunshine® Cheez-It® Original Snack Crackers is like comparing two mostly rotten apples to a golden apple. Even if you were to try and make all things equal between the three different snack crackers, one cracker is so glaringly different, towering high above the other two snacks, to try to do so would be like trying to paint a picture of the sun while looking directly at it. The organic qualifier in Late July Organic Cheddar Cheese Crackers is a complete game changer in the food industry and with regard to your health. Foods, including snack crackers, are either organic or not.

For the sake of keeping the comparison as close as possible between these three snacks, rather than use the high sounding but low grade Ritz Original Crackers, we'll be comparing Ritz Bits Cracker Sandwiches Soccer Cheese (cheddar cheese) to the other two cheddar cheese cracker snacks.

Ritz Crackers Vs Late July Organic Cheddar Cheese Crackers Vs Sunshine Cheez-It Original Snack Crackers (Ingredients)

Late July Organic Cheddar Cheese Bite Size Crackers isn't even a whisper on most anyone's lips compared to the two most popular snack cracker in the land: Sunshine® Cheez-It® Original Snack Crackers and Nabisco® Ritz Crackers. However, after reading the ingredients and nutrition comparison of these three snacks that follows, if Late July crackers aren't passing through your lips rather than the latest partially-hydrogenated mess of a cracker sandwich snack from Nabisco and the so-called Big Cheese crackers Sunshine claims its Cheez-It snack crackers are, maybe you just don't really appreciate better things and better health.

Cheez-It Original Snack Cracker Ingredients: enriched flour (wheat flour, niacin, reduced iron, thiamin mononitrate [vitamin B1], riboflavin [vitamin B2], folic acid), soybean and palm oil with TBHQ for freshness, skim milk cheese (skim milk, whey protein, cheese cultures, salt, enzymes, annatto extract for color), salt, contains two percent or less of paprika, yeast, paprika oleoresin for color, soy lecithin.

Ritz Bits Cracker Sandwiches Soccer Cheese Ingredients: enriched flour (wheat flour, niacin, reduced iron, thiamine mononitrate {vitamin B1}, riboflavin {vitamin B2}, folic acid), whole wheat flour, palm and/or soybean oil, whey, sugar, high fructose corn syrup, partially hydrogenated cottonseed oil, sunflower oil, salt, leavening (calcium phosphate and/or baking soda), cheddar cheese powder (made from pasteurized milk, cheese culture, salt and enzymes), contains less than 0.5% of the following: disodium phosphate (stabilizer), natural flavor, maltodextrin, yeast, modified corn starch, buttermilk, artificial color (includes yellow 6), lactic acid, soy lecithin (emulsifier).

Who wants to snack on enriched flour? TBHQ? Why is high fructose corn syrup in a cracker, of all things? And hasn't it been well-established partially hydrogenated anything will partially block everything? Then there's the modified corn starch-have you ever wondered what that means? Now, if you knew the meaningful difference between organic soy lecithin and soy lecithin you surely wouldn't be so quick to let your kids snack on anything that didn't have organic soy lecithin as its emulsifier? Toss in some artificial this and artificial that and no longer is the snack cracker getting stale your worst worry: eating it is!

On the sunny side of the street, though:

Late July Organic Bite Size Cheddar Cheese Crackers Ingredients: organic wheat flour, organic oleic safflower oil and/or organic oleic sunflower oil, organic cheese blend [organic cheddar cheese ( organic cultured pasteurized milk, salt, enzymes), organic nonfat milk, organic whey, salt, disodium phosphate], organic palm oil, sea salt, yeast, baking soda, organic evaporated cane juice, annatto, enzymes.

More light can be shed on the difference in ingredients and by extension nutritional benefit between the two most popular snack crackers and this last example of the three snacks by reading this quote from a box of Late July Organic Cheddar Cheese Crackers:

"The organic ingredients in our bite size cheddar cheese crackers are produced without synthetic pesticides, chemical fertilizers, genetic engineering, antibiotics or added growth hormones. They also contain real organic cheese, no trans fats, no hydrogenated oils, no corn syrup, no artificial flavors, no artificial colors, no preservatives and are Kosher U D and Lacto (Dairy) vegetarian."

Do you know why Ritz Crackers and Cheez-It Snack Crackers don't say the same thing or something similar on their snack cracker boxes? They'd be breaking FTC truth-in-advertising laws for just about every single word, since none of it would be true

Ritz Crackers Vs Late July Organic Cheddar Cheese Crackers Vs Sunshine Cheez-It Original Snack Crackers [Nutrition (notables)]

Cheez-It Original Snack Crackers:

Serving size: 27 crackers: calories 150; calories from fat 70

total fat 8 grams or a DV of 12%; Saturated fat 2 grams or a DV of 10%; monounsaturated fat 2g; polyunsaturated fat 3.5g

sodium 250mg or a DV of 10%; total carbohydrate 17g or a DV of 6%; Calcium 4%

Ritz Bits Cracker Sandwiches Soccer Cheese:

Serving Size: 29grams: calories 140; calories from fat 60

total fat 6g or a DV of 9%; saturated fat 2.5g or a DV of 13%;

sodium 280mg or a DV of 12%; total carbohydrate 19g or a DV of 6% Calcium 6%

Late July Organic Cheddar Cheese Crackers:

Serving size: 30 crackers: calories 130; calories from fat 40

total fat 4.5 grams or a DV of 7%; saturated fat 1.5 grams or a DV of 7%; monosaturated fat 1g; polyunsaturated fat 2g

sodium 310 mg or a DV of 13%; total carbohydrate 19 grams or a DV of 6%; calcium 2%

If you're someone concerned about calories from fat, notice the 30 calorie difference between Late July Cheddar Cheese Crackers and Cheez-It Original Snack Crackers. Thirty calories less is thirty calories less, no matter how insignificant that may seem to other persons.

Ritz Crackers Vs Late July Organic Cheddar Cheese Crackers Vs Sunshine Cheez-It Original Snack Crackers (Price)

It almost goes without saying, on the whole, organic food still costs more than non-organic food. Here's the difference in price between the three snack crackers. All prices were taken from Wegmans or ShopRite at the time of this writing.

Ritz Bits Cracker Sandwiches Soccer Cheese: 7.5 ounce box costs $2.79 or .37 cents an ounce, $5.92 a pound.(Wegmans)

Sunshine Cheez-It Original Snack Crackers: 9 ounce box costs $2.49 or .28 cents an ounce, $4.43 a pound. (ShopRite)

Late July Organic Cheddar Cheese Crackers: 5 ounce box costs $2.99 or .60 cents an ounce, $9.60 a pound. (Wegmans)

If you don't know the difference between 5 ounces (Late July), 7.5 ounces (Ritz Bits) and 9 ounces (Cheez-It), basically, it's the difference of a small handful more from Late July to Ritz Bits and a large handful more from Late July to Cheez-It. In other words, it's hardly a difference, maybe a serving at the most as far as amount goes.

Snacks: Crackers: Ritz Crackers Vs Late July Organic Cheddar Cheese Crackers Vs Sunshine Cheez-It Original Snack Crackers (Conclusion)

Sunshine is owned by the Keebler Company, which in turn is owned by the Kelloggs Company.

Only recently has Nabisco come from under the Altria Group, formerly Philip Morris, along with Kraft Foods. Kraft Foods now owns Nabisco.

Late July is owned by Late July.

After reading this comparison review, which of the three snacks would you prefer to own? Which would you prefer to give to your children? As you can see, Late July Organic Cheddar Cheese Crackers is glaringly different, towering high above the high-sounding but low grade Ritz Crackers and the so-called Big Cheese Cheez-It Crackers are supposed to be. Enjoy!