The Composition of Foods

The Food Standards Agency (FSA) maintains the UK Nutrient Databank, which contains extensive information on the nutrient content of foods commonly consumed in the UK. The McCance and Widdowson's The Composition of Foods (CoF) book series, i.e. the 6th Summary Edition and supplement publications, contains nutrient composition data based on information from this databank.

The 6th Summary Edition is the latest publication (2002) and provides information on the nutrition content of over 1,200 foods, including levels of fat, sodium, fibre, and carbohydrates, vitamins and minerals. This includes nutrition information on key foods, such as milk, cheese, bread and meat, as well as entries for many foods that have become popular in recent years. There are currently nine supplement publications on specific food groups and a supplement publication on fatty acids.

This 2002 McCance and Widdowson's The Composition of Foods integrated dataset (CoF IDS) brings together all the data from the CoF series into a single electronic file with a single entry for each food (based on the most up-to-date published values). Foods calculated by recipe, or that are calculated based on another food, have been recalculated based on the most recent data for ingredients. This version of the CoF IDS therefore contains a reorganisation of existing data rather than new values. The Agency nevertheless intends to update the dataset as new analytical information becomes available from the Agency’s Nutrient Analysis Programme, and to publish these revised versions here.

The CoF IDS lists analytical nutrient data for 3,423 foods. The data are divided across 16 worksheets and include nutrient data for macronutrients, vitamins, vitamin fractions, minerals, fatty acid fractions, phytosterols, and organic acids, as well as providing recalculated values for a selection of foods in the format required for nutrition labelling. For more information on data within the CoF IDS, please see the CoF IDS User Document below.

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Users are reminded that this dataset does not include any recent analytical data and only contains data from the CoF series. Therefore analytical nutrient data for the most recently analysed foods dates back to 2002.

Results of two recent FSA analytical surveys, the Nutrient Analysis Catch-up Project (September 2004) and the Nutrient Analysis of Pasta and Pasta Sauces (September 2004) can be found at the links below.

In addition the analytical reports from the Nutrient Survey of Flours and Grains (September 2005 LBC/FA/2004/151) and the Nutrient Survey of Breakfast Cereals (June 2004 LGC/FA30/2004/116) are available from:

Food Standards Agency Library
email: infocentre@foodstandards.gsi.gov.uk
tel: 020 7276 8181