I saw this recipe advertised on Yahoo's front page just now; it's for a "made-over" macaroni and cheese dish that they're touting as "guilt-free". Uh...the thing's got 560 calories--I'm assuming that's per serving.

Now, I always considered mac and cheese to be a side dish, but that's over the limit I have to allow myself for meals.

Granted, there's a lot of protein and a good bit of fiber in this, but still. I couldn't eat it.

http://food.yahoo.com/recipes/eating...mac-and-cheese

Anyone else kind of horrified by that calorie count, or is it just me?

That is a LOT of calories for a "made-over" recipe.

If you're gonna splurge, may as well go for the real thing, as far as I can tell.

That reminds me of the "guilt free" Toll House Pie recipe I found last year on the Nestle website. They replaced 1/4 cup of the sugar with Splenda blend. It says each slice has 560 calories and 38 grams of fat! Plus you still have 32 grams of sugar.

I then checked the original Toll House Pie recipe and it contains 580 calories and 38 grams of fat, and only 38 grams of sugar. There's hardly any difference!

What surprised me more were all of the kudo reviews excited about the healthy dessert

It just goes to show ya.....if it sounds too good to be true, it prolly is. Healthy - my (!).

I read the same article a few days ago and thought to myself "that's not guilt free." I try to do around 1200 calories and minimal fat would take up a huge chunck of my daily allowance for both. So I totally agree!

"Guilt free" meant that Yahoo felt no guilt in putting that out there as a "healthy alternative"! *tee hee*

I don't really think it is that bad. I eat less than 1800 cals a day and I eat 3 meals a day with 1 snack (about 200-300 cals). I could eat this as a main dish and eat some steamed broccoli with butter spray as a filler and be completely satisfied. Maybe not guilt free, but it would work for me. I might have to have a lighter lunch though. Plus, there are times when I've felt like eating mac and cheese (one of my weaknesses), and have went out and bought either Stouffer's mac & cheese or Kraft mac & cheese, both having a lot of cals because I would eat the whole thing. I could eat this mac & cheese and not feel too guilty (and I would be more likely to portion it out).

How many!!! Just thinking about that number gives me heeby-jeebees. All that just for mac-n-cheese? No way would I eat that. You know how much i could eat for all those calories. A lot more than one serving of mac-n-cheese. I agree w/ u-not so guilt free after all.

Speaking of mac & cheese...... does anyone eat Easy Mac & Cheese? They are little single size serving cups for 200 calories. I probably have one once or twice a week. You get the rich creamy cheesy taste but in moderation.

Main Course Grown Up Mac and Cheese (makes 8 servings)

Reading this thread made me want to make a better recipe! I got this down to 430 calories according to fitday, but a portion big enough for a main dish (especially with a light salad).

This is a hard dish, though, to make low-cal, so give the authors some credit for trying (after all, I had to add nearly as much broccoli as there was pasta to get a good-sized portion)! Oh, and this sizes down nicely to a 4-portion serving as well.

- 3/4 pound whole wheat elbow macaroni or other pasta with plenty of sauce-holes or ridges. This is about 3/4 of a standard package. Boil according to package directions, drain, and cool.
-6 cups chopped broccoli, steamed until just barely tender.
-1/2 cup reduced fat (40% fat) margarine
-1/2 cup white flour
-4 cups skim milk
-3 cups shredded lowfat cheddar cheese
-1/2 cup lowfat cream cheese
-1/2 cup grated parmesan cheese
-1-2 roma tomatoes, sliced very thinly
-1/2 tsp ground black pepper
-salt to taste

Cook and drain pasta, cool. Chop broccoli into small pieces, steam until barely tender, and cool.
In a medium sauce pan, melt the margarine. Sprinkle with the flour and whisk over medium-low heat for 1-2 minutes. Remove from heat, stir in milk and whisk well to remove any and all lumps. Return to heat and cook over medium heat until the sauce thickens and comes barely to a boil. Remove from heat. Add the cream cheese and all but 1/2 cup of the shredded cheddar cheese, and whisk until completely smooth.
Add the pasta and broccoli to the sauce and toss well to combine. Add the pepper and salt, if needed, and stir.
Spray a large glass baking pan with cooking spray. Pour in the pasta with broccoli and sauce. Lay the tomato slices evenly over the top. Sprinkle with 1/2 cup parmesan cheese and 1/2 cup reserved cheddar cheese.

Bake in oven at 400 degrees until heated through and bubbly, and cheeses on top are dark golden brown.

Nutrition facts (according to fitday)

Total Calories: 430
grams cals %total
Fat: 15 138 33%
Sat: 7 59 14%
Poly: 2 22 5%
Mono: 5 44 10%
Carbs: 51 174 41%
Fiber: 7 0 0%
Protein: 27 110 26%
Alcohol: 0 0 0%

Wow, their makeover uses full fat cheese, and 2 cups of it, for 4 servings. So you get 1/2 cup of full fat cheese in each serving. And it must be a pretty huge serving too. You can lose 60 calories and 6 grams of fat just by switching to low-fat cheese. (Have I renovated the renovated recipe now?)

I make PMS craving mac n cheese with Barilla Plus macaroni and Velveeta light (now called 2%) (2c uncooked pasta, 4 oz velveeta, 2T milk)

A pretty big portion is 418 calories, 5g fat, 7 g fiber and 23 g protein. That would be a main dish portion.

The Hungry Girl website has some pretty good mac and cheese reviews. I also love their 80 calorie Alfredo using the Shiritaki Noodles. Check out www.hungrygirl.com for some great recipes using the Shiritaki noodles.

This reminds me of a feature that appeared in Martha Stewart Living about a year or so ago on "lighter" versions of comfort food like meatloaf, chicken pot pie, mac-n-cheese, etc. They didn't include any nutritional data for any of the recipes (which to me seemed inexcusable for a feature on "lighter" recipes). After adding up the calories on my own for a couple of the recipes, I can only surmise that they meant lighter in color not calories, because the recipes were all still way high in calories. The calories in the pie crust recipe were actually higher than the calories in store-bought crust (for that, I might as well just buy the pre-made crust)!

Dinner that is 560 calories is totally out of the question for me. In fact, I pretty much require my main dishes to be under 400 calories (and try to keep them around 300 calories) so even the Mac-n-cheese recipes mentioned above wouldn't work for me (except for the 80 calorie Alfredo, which I may have to try if I can ever find those Shiritaki noodles). Here is a link to a recipe for Vegetable Mac & Cheese that appeared in the SF Chronicle that has a mere 285 calories per serving: http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/articl...IGHDLM51G1.DTL. The nutritional info is for 8 servings and without the bread crumbs. For six servings (w/o the bread crumbs), it works out to about 375 calories per serving (350 if you substitute 1 cup of chicken broth for 1 cup of the milk). I haven't tried it yet but I use a lot of the Chronicle's recipes and most (esp. the ones from this particular columnist) have been fabulous.

BlueToBlue - Try Safeway for the shirataki noodles....