Why the Internet Finds This Photo of a Jar of Nutella Terrifying

Late 90s Vincent D'Onofrio aside, how many times in a week do you find yourself waking up in the morning and eating a fistful of sugar? How about sprinkling a half-dozen spoonfuls onto your toast? Or maybe you'd just prefer to dip a strawberry or two into an Everest-sized mountain of powdered sugar?

You would never do that, right? Because you eat healthy things, like avocado toast and açai bowls—or maybe an egg or two to start the day.

But then there's Nutella. It's European. And chocolaty. And hazelnutty. And the nectar of the gods. So delicious, so beloved—it can't be that bad for you, can it?

After all, in its advertising, Nutella—the wildly popular chocolate and hazelnut spread manufactured by the Italian company, Ferrero SpA—purports that an average-sized jar contains "94 hazelnuts." That's a lot of hazelnuts! And nuts are pretty healthy, right?

The problem is, until you've seen the below photo, which is going viral right now, you might not know that those 94 hazelnuts are almost completely dwarfed by a massive amount of sugar.

Yes, a little over half the jar is said to be made up of sugar.

Since being posted on Reddit five days ago, the photo has been commented on nearly 1,500 times. The now-viral image was actually created by Verbraucherzentrale Hamburg, a consumer protection agency based in Hamburg, and originally appeared in German on the news site Die Welt.

Yoni Freedhoff, a doctor and professor at the University of Ottawa, says that eating two tablespoons of Nutella is equivalent to eating five Oreos. "Make no mistake, Nutella is spreadable candy. It is not healthy. Breakfast does not love it. You might love it. But this does not help to make a nutritious breakfast fun, it helps to make a nutritious breakfast non-nutritious."

In the past, Ferrero USA has been targeted by a false advertising class action lawsuit for "misleadingly advertising Nutella as a healthy breakfast food."

Looks like it might just be time to rethink our crippling Nutella addiction. Chia bowl, anyone?