Does anyone subtract fiber from your calories? Since fiber passes through your body undigested, and therefore has no caloric value to you, but it still (in most cases) is included in the caloric value in foods. Sometimes they subtract it themselves, but other times they don't.

If we did subtract fiber from Fiber 1 , instead of 100 calories in Fiber 1 original, there would only be 44 calories in it! LOL As there is 14g fiber and 4cals in a gram of carbohydrate..100-56=44. It seems generally accepted with many weight loss plans now to subtract fiber (I even saw it on the diabetic association's website)..

I wouldnt be totally anal about it, probably just adjust the calories on very high fiber foods where there would be a big discrepancy.

Any thoughts?

I've read that not every bit of a gram of fiber passes through your body undigested and so each gram of fiber contains between 1 and 2 calories. Personally, I wouldn't monkey around with adjusting calories because they're fiber. To me, a calorie is a calorie. Likewise, it takes more calories to digest protein than fat but I wouldn't adjust those values either.

In the US at least, some manufacturers already subtract the calories in fiber on their nutrition labels. Take Fiber One, for example -- here in the US, it's listed as being 60 calories for a 1/2 cup serving. But it's 25 grams of carbs, 2 grams of protein, and 1 gram of fat, so adding it up tells you that the calorie count (before subtracting out the fiber) is 100 calories of carbs + 8 calories of protein + 9 calories of fat = 117 total calories in a half cup. The missing 57 calories are what they've already subtracted out for the 14 grams of fiber. If you choose to subtract fiber calories, you wouldn't want to end up subtracting it out from something that the manufacturer has already taken it out from!

It bugs me that nutrition labels are inconsistent in this regard -- that some take out the calories in fiber and others don't. You can always doublecheck it yourself by doing the math, of course, but it would be nice to have it one way or the other.

I don't subtract them, and I often get as much as 60 grams of fiber in a day!

I guess that would explain why the American Fiber 1 has way less calories listed than the Canadian Fiber 1.

That is something i have not been able to figure out. I have not bought fiber1, I buy presidents choice fiber first cause it has fewer calories

I never realized that some manufacturers did this....hmmm...

I don't subtract fiber calories out either.

I don't subtract them...but I DO consider them when making choices...I will choose and 80 calorie item with lots of fiber over an 80 calorie item with little or no fiber....

but I still log the calories in my little book...

I definitely DON'T subtract them. I eat over 40 gms of the stuff a day. I look at all the fiber I eat as a bonus. I take everything at face value. I also don't believe in that negative calorie stuff, like celery.

My short answer: Personally, I would just count the calories listed on the box, so I didn't have to double check the math (since it would require up to 4 math calculations, just to determine whether the label's math was correct).

My long answer:

(see this wikipedia article)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cellulose

Cellulose is completely undigestible to humans, so you would not have to count it. A calorie is a calorie, is an oversimplification, because although wood has calories (anything that can burn does, including petroleum products) we cannot digest wood (or mineral oil). For our purposes these would have zero calories. In the 60's using mineral oil on salads in place of vegetables oils was popular (though used regularly it could cause xenical like side effects and strip the body of oil soluble vitamins).

Double checking the math for every nutrition labels seems like a giant pain in the butt. Especially since for anything with less than 6 grams of fiber, you would be a whopping 20 calories more accurate? But would you be? After all much of the food you'll be eating won't have a nutrition label, and does that apple contain 65 or 85 calories? Factors you might not be able to determine might affect the answer. How "accurate" do you need to be? Will doing a lot more math demotivate you in the long run? Will you begin to obsess about tiny calorie differences (I knew a girl who only ate packaged food, so she could be sure of her calorie counts - she was bulimic so eating healthy had gotten lost in the obsession over calories)

I never knew this! This really bugs me. That should be illegal.

Holy moly! I didn't know that manufacturers can do that!! I wonder if that throws things off for folks counting points? If they are using 60 calories instead of the 117, wouldn't that make a difference of one point?

Sheesh... I wonder how many other manufacturers do this? If every food we ate subtracted the calories without telling us, aren't we then eating more calories than we are tracking?

Methinks this is just wrong.

Kimberly

Makes me wonder if we shouldn't be adding calories to some products to get an accurate count. *gulp*

I agree, they should have one consistent label and stick to it. I also miss the old labels, when they would list ALL the nutrients in the foods. I hate not knowing if I am getting enough of selenium.

Adding calories (if the label has done the subraction) is not going to give you a more accurate count - it's going to give you a less accurate one. Since subtacting the fiber(cellulose) calories is the more accurate method, it definitely shouldn't be illegal. If anything it should be mandatory. Human being cannot digest cellulose. If we could, we would be able to eat wood or survive on grass. This is why cows and elephants can survive on grass, and we cannot. They are able to use the calories, and we are not. If you can't digest it, there's nothing to count.


I would take a nutrition label at face value because I don't want to do the math to determine whether they have done the math for me. If they have, fine, and if not, I am going to be underestimating my actual calories by a little bit which doesn't disturb me. If you were trying to GAIN weight, this might be another matter.

The question of WW point values may be a valid one. It would seem, though that points are based on the assumption that the math has not been done for you - which is why you get to eat more "calories" when there is a lot of fiber - the point system takes into account the calories that we can't digest. This might be something to ask a WW leader.

thanks, Colleen, thats my point, LOL just not as eloquent as you

For example, someone in the US eating Fiber 1 for breakie would have around 60 cals in a hlf cup.
Me, for the EXACT same cereal (except sweetened with splenda instead of aspartame) its 100 calories, just becasue the fiber is subtracted from the US packaging..I eat a cup for breakie, and count it as 200 cals (I do have 1/2 honey clusters and 1/2 original) The honey clusters in Canada are 210 for a cup..far more I'm sure than in the US, LOL I think its around 160??

I agree it should be more consistent. Mandatory in fact, one way or the other..most folks would not have a clue, and even the peeps with a semi clue might try to deduct the fiber again if they didnt crunch the numbers. Very misleading.

I hate the practice of some manufacturers, but not others, subtracting out the fiber because whether it's wood or whatever, fiber still has calories, even if they're not digested in the human body. So an accurate cal count on the label, with an accurate fiber count, gives me an accurate idea of whether I'll choose that cereal over another that has maybe less cals but also less fiber. It's extremely confusing not to be given consistent data and really ticks me off; at least Atkins (and others) honestly strove to explain their system of "net carbs" (e.g., subtracting out indigestible carbs) on each and every label.

So Meg's post was a good reminder to continue to check labels very carefully as they are misleading still after all these years.

And no, I would not subtract out the fiber calories from my count.