While I'm not a calorie counter, I do check calorie content on things I buy. My husband hates going to the grocery store with me because in order for me to buy something new, I will compare prices and nutrition labels before making a decision. I like being an informed consumer!

The other day we were running low on mayonnaise. We use real mayo and the last time I bought it was from the store down the street so instead of paying an outrageous amount for Kraft, I chose the generic brand that was on sale. There is a difference between the taste of some generic products versus brand name products. Mayonnaise is not something I will by the generic brand of again. However, I normally don't like "light" or "fat free" products, but after reading the calorie content on the jar of mayonnaise I had, I decided to try Kraft light mayonnaise. How are you going to change your eating habits if you don't like the taste of what you eat? So, after eating cheap bland mayonnaise for a while, the Kraft light mayonnaise was a very welcome change with so much more flavor.

Regular mayonnaise contains about 100 calories a tablespoon. Light mayonnaise is less than half of that. I've never really measured out exactly how much a tablespoon of it is. Yesterday, I decided to see exactly how much mayonnaise I use on my sandwich and discovered I was only using about 1/2 of a tablespoon.

1 tablespoon of mayonnaise

1/2 a tablespoon of mayonnaise

I put the tablespoon of mayonnaise on my bread, as you can see in the pictures above. It was a very thick layer on both sides of the bread. Then I scrapped off the excess mayonnaise so that there was just a thin layer. If you buy a sandwich from a restaurant, normally you will only get mayonnaise on one side of the bread. So if you feel like a thin layer isn't going to be enough, try putting a thick layer on one side of the bread and you'll still only be adding about 25 calories to your sandwich if you're using light mayonnaise.