[gracesmomma]

how do you all handle casseroles? my family loves to eat alot of them. I make them all so I know whats in them. I just don't know how to get an accurate calorie count. What do y'all do??

[bargoo]

Figure the amount of calories in the entire casserole and divide by the number of servings to get the calorie count per serving.

[KatTheAmazon]

What Bargoo said. Before I serve, I cut the casserole into the serving size I intend to eat.

[zenor77]

There are others online, but I've used this recipe calculator before.

http://caloriecount.about.com/cc/recipe_analysis.php

I use lose it! and you can input recipes into their site also. I portion out my serving first. That way I know I have an actual serving.

I suppose, if you want to be really accurate, you could weigh your casserole dish when empty. Then weigh the finished casserole, subtract the dish weight and divide by number of servings to get an accurate serving weight. That seems like over kill to me though.

[Munchy]

Originally Posted by bargoo

Figure the amount of calories in the entire casserole and divide by the number of servings to get the calorie count per serving.

Yep. And I sometimes make lightened up casseroles (layered enchilada, chicken divan, pot pie, shepherd's pie), freeze them enough so that they're somewhat frozen, cut them into the correct number of servings, then baggie up the serving squares with calorie counts written on the freezer bags. It's a huge time-saver.

[bargoo]

Munchy has a brilliant idea. Bless the person who invented freezers.

[Munchy]

Seriously - if I didn't have a freezer, I'd scrounge around each day.

I love having an arsenal of whole foods for lunch and dinner everyday already in my freezer and I love not having to cook during the work week!

[melodymist]

I have a also wondered about this. Thank you guys

[Unna]

I usually weight my portion - it may not be as accurate as inputting everything, but if you are short on time, it helps control your portion size.

So, I'll usually take ca. 250 grams. Then I estimate, depending on how much cheese and such, how many calories are in it per gram - normally 2 - 2.5 per gram. So, at the end, I know I've eaten around 500-600 calories.

Again, this method is good and somewhat accurate if everything is last minute or if someone else has cooked it.