I called the atkins center hotline and asked about hidden carbs because I have had people tell me that atkins bars have hidden carbs.
They said it's truley a misunderstanding and that most people blame the bars and such for lack of weight loss when in fact their not doing the diet correctly.and If they are...there is a small percentage of extra sensitive people to the ingred contained in the bars and shakes such as maltitol...and so any thing that contain the ingred will stall their losses. but it still doesn't mean that the carbs they ingested were any higher it was the effect of the chemicals working with their body.....so hidden carbs are not really a fear. and we should count the carbs stated on labels of at least atkins bars and probably most bars as the count that is stated. one exception, products like russel stovers candy(yum) have total grams of carb including the ones from the maltitol,but they state the grams of maltitol that are in the servings so....just subtract the grams of maltitol from the grams of carbs and you got the total amount of carbs that we need to count...don't forget to subtract your fiber! basically do what works best for you, if these products stall your losses don't use them, but many people are succesfull using these things within the diet...
And that's what they told me so I say...it's their diet, I think they would be the experts!and I don't think their out to sabotoge anyone...because they would loose alot of money------------ I'm so relieved
although this has taken away my fears of these products...they also did say that bars and shakes should never be a meal replacement, eat them as snacks after you've had your meals(kind of a bummer)...and we need remember that we should be getting most of our carbs from veggies and later from veggies and fruit to make this a healthy way of living.