CARB SOLUTIONS......
Hi, Kristin!
The other thing you want to look at is how many grams of carbs there are and what kind of carbs. Total carbs includes fiber, sugar and sugar alcohol. Fiber is something good and you can deduct that from the total number of carbs. Neither sugar nor sugar alcohol is "evil", but different people react differently to them...some dump from any sugar, some dump from lots of sugar, some dump from any sugar alcohol, some dump from excess sugar alcohol, some don't dump at all... In general, as a pre-op when my diabetes wasn't under control (as opposed to now when it is), the guideline regarding carbs was to take the total number of carbs, subtract the fiber and then subtract half of the sugar alcohol (not all of it as suggested by Atkins and others to get to "net carbs"). The reason for that is that it's thought that sugar alcohol, rather than having no effect on your blood sugar levels, has an effect that takes about twice as long as sugar, so blood sugar levels don't spike and then drop as quickly as they do after eating something with sugar. I don't remember off-hand the maximum number of carbs suggested per shake or bar, but if you look at the info. you got from Elina, it should be in there.
In general, I choose a protein bar based on (besides taste) it not having lots of carbs, and the ratio of calories to protein. My standard for comparison purposes is a stick of string cheese. The brand I buy has 80 calories and 8 grams of protein in a 1-oz. stick, so that's 10 calories per gram of protein. Most protein bars have at least a little more than 10 calories per gram of protein, but there's also something to be said for portability and how long it stays fresh in my purse compared to a stick of string cheese (I always carry at least one protein bar in my purse.) From what you wrote, the Carb Solutions bar has 200 calories and 13 grams of protein, so that's a little more than 15 calories per gram of protein.
Hope this helps,
Debby