I just bought a jar of TJs Kosher Dill Pickles. I was going to enter the nutritional stuff into Fit Day. Imagine my surprise when I read that 1 oz of the pickles (about 1 of the baby pickles) has 0 cal, 0 fat, 0 carbs and 0 protein. I have to say, it is the tastiest chewy air I've ever consumed.

I just went into Fit Day and use the values for baby dills. The calories are minimal but they are more than 0.

Just doesn't seem quite right, does it?

Maybe the baby dill pickles you are entering in have some sugar in them? It may also be that the baby dill pickles don't hold as much water as a larger pickle would.

Anyway, calories are pretty nominal in pickles as long as sugar isn't part of the pickling spice. The calories would probably range between 0-10 at most.

Provided there's no sugar in the pickling liquid, a pickle has basically the same calories as a cucumber. 1 oz of cucumber is around 4 calories. I believe that if the calories are under 5, the manufacturer can round down to 0. So in reality, you're probably looking at around 4 calories per pickle.

You'd have to eat a lot of pickles before they'd make a difference in your weight. If each pickle weighs 1 oz, then that's 875 pickles to gain just one pound. Of course, if you really ate that many pickles, you'd be retaining a lot of water from all the salt in them.

I eat pickles with my lunch every day and I'm pretty fast and loose with how I count them. I always log them as 1 oz of cucumber, even though I'm sure I eat more than an ounce of them (I never actually bother to weight them). I figure, what's 4 calories here or there. If I'm having trouble with my weight, it's not the pickles that are the problem.

Barb's right -- If the calories in a "serving" are <5, they can say it's zero. That's sprays like Pam can call themselves 0 cal.

The calories in pickles aren't worth worrying about as much as the sodium levels - they can be astronomical.

I've been making my own refrigerator pickles lately. It's much cheaper than buying them prepared and I think they taste great, fresh and crunchy. And it's low sodium, because you control the ingredients.

For a "pickling liquid" base, I use approximately 1.5 cups vinegar (white or rice) and add 2 cups sugar equivalent of liquid sucralose. You can adjust according to taste, for more or less sweetness. To that you can add mustard powder or mustard seed, garlic or onion powder, and/or hot sauce, depending on what you like. I pour the pickling liquid over sliced veggies -- cucumber, zuccini, green/red bell peppers, sweet onions, green beans -- whatever you want, and refrigerate/marinate for at least 48 hours.

Since I use sucralose concentrate as the sweetening agent, the only calories are those of the vegetables themselves. If you use another sweetener, like granulated Splenda, you'd have to add those calories in. But even then, it's pretty minimal.

Where do you get sucralose concentrate? I don't think I've ever heard of it.

Thanks for the recipe! I think I'll try it.

It's not available in stores -- I have to mail-order it. I buy from http://www.ez-sweetz.com. Basically, sucralose is the "sweetening" ingredient in Splenda. Splenda is only a few calories if added to your coffee, but granular Splenda is 96 calories per cup, because of the starches in the product to make it measure like sugar. I don't like that! I want my sugar-free sweetener to be zero calorie! In recipes, those calories can really add up. The ez-sweetz version is sucralose in water, and it really is zero calories. 12 drops equal the sweetening power of a cup of sugar, approximately. It looks pricey, but a little goes a really long way.

Just to clarify - the recipe I posted is for a sugar-free "bread and butter" type pickle, the sweet/sour variety. Not like dill pickles, which is what the original poster was referring to.

Let me know if you like it!