Wednesday, January 9, 2013

Random Question?

I value, love, and hoard every calorie that enters my body, haha. So with that information, I have a question for you:

You know the 100 calorie pack popcorn bags? Is the 100 calories assuming that every one of the kernels pops and you consume them? Or does the company assume so many kernels will not pop and therefore guesstimate the calories of the ones that do pop at 100?

The same question applies to potatoes. Do calories listed for baked potatoes include the whole potato or just eating the inside?

It's these tough questions that keep me up at night.

7 comments:

  1. These are very good questions. We that diet want to get all that's coming to us. ;-) Sorry I don't have an answer for you though. I guess I'm glad that I'm counting points and these questions wouldn't make much difference in the point value.

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  2. Potato is entire potato, inside and out. No reason to just get the inside, when the outside is tasty. In life, a little around the outside is as important and getting inside. Oh, wrong blog, my bad. As for 100 calorie popcorn, the 100 calories includes not only the popcorn, but the bag as well. Enjoy.

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  3. You mean I've been peeling my popcorn for nothing. FOR NOTHING! Do you realize how much time this is going to save me going forward?

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  4. Packaged foods are allowed (by law) a 20% margin of error in the calories listed on their labels. But obviously there is no way for you to tell if what you're eating is off by more or less than that. Your bag could be 95 calories, 100, 120 or 130; hell, it could be 150. You have no way of knowing, and I'm sure Big Food "does their best" to be accurate in their lab tests, but it's not like every bag of popcorn gets tested before it's packed up and sold. So ....you're kind of also left doing your best to know exactly how much you've eaten. This is not to say that whole foods are any easier to calculate. I just weighed two apples (on my non-techie food scale, LOL!) from the same bag, same type. One weighed 4.5 oz., the other, just a hair over 5. Is someone really going to be able to say exactly how many calories either one has compared to each other? Nope. Never. There's probably a 10 calorie difference between them (my guess) but this is why I want to smash my head when I see blogs that are entries upon entries of calories in (based on food labels or guesstimates or a program) vs calories out (based on a body monitor, exercise machine, or amount of sweat put out) and the frustrated bloggers behind them.

    Don't get too caught up in the calories, babe. Just eat the best food you can (I'm putting microwave popcorn in a different category than 'best,' but that's just stickler me) and don't trap yourself in the numbers game. xo

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    Replies
    1. That's really the best way, I'm finding. Technically even eating 1200 calories a day, per that guideline, it could be like 1450. Argh.

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  5. 250 calories a day between 1200 and 1450.. 1/10th of a bowel movement, and not really something that needs to be checked or worried about.

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  6. you know what keeps me up at night? Thinking spiders are going to lay babies in my ears while I sleep. Hope you've gotten the answers you needed, me I'm just ridiculous :)

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