One of the reasons that I use an exchange plan to count calories, is to avoid obsessing over minutia (was that 25 calories of broccoli or 30 calories of broccoli? Doesn't matter Colleen, it's one vegetable exchange, move on!)
But it seems I can't avoid the minutia! (Aaaagh!)
Exchange plans are still calorie based:
Carb exchange: 80 calories, 15g carbohydrate and 3g protein
Vegetable exchange: 25 calories, 5g carbohydrate and 2g protein
Fruit exchange: 60 calories and 15g carbohydrate.
Protein exchange: 55 calories, 7g protein and 3g fat.
Dairy exchange: 90 calories, 12g carbohydrate, 8g protein and less than 3g fat.
Fat exchange: 45 calories and 5g fat
So I still use nutrition labels to determine exchange values, especially if it's a combination food or other food that I haven't already memorized, or isn't in my exchange reference books...
and I'm astonished how often nutrition labels are wrong (or worse, true but misleading).
In the USA, the calories from insoluble dietary fiber do not have to be included in the calorie count (which makes sense because humans do not digest dietary fiber. It leaves the body entirely intact). If you're a termite or a cow, you'd have to count those calories, but humans do not.
This means that if a nutritional label reports that one serving of a food contains 1 gram of fat, 23 grams of carbohydrates, including 6 grams of dietary fiber, and 3 grams of protein, the manufacturer could calculate the food to contain 121 calories per serving or 97 calories per serving if that fiber is insoluble.
I guessed (wrongly) that most labels would report 97 calories, but instead I found that it's impossible to predict. Some do, some don't. I've always checked the math on non-USA products (which universally count the fiber calories) but on USA products I thought the lower, more accurate (for humans) calorie count would always be the one listed.
Ironically, the healthiest foods seem to count the undigestible fiber calories (which now explains to me why some calorie counts on frozen vegetable labels, seemed unusually high), making broccoli seem higher in calorie than it is.
Another peeve. When a nutrition label lists a volume (say about 1/3 cup), and a gram weight, you can bet your last dime that the lab analysis was done with the gram weight (labwork would never use an imprecise measurement like that, because the results have to be duplicated and that can only be done with a precise measurement).
But when I use my food scale, the weight listed, comes nowhere near the volume measurement listed (it can be quite a bit more or less).
So if the serving says about 1/3 cup of 112g, the volume I actually get could be 1/4 of a cup or 1/2 cup.
I also hate that the "number of servings" can be so drastically off. If a box reads "about 3" servings, I've found (if you do the math by weight), it might actually contain anywhere from 2.2 to 3.8!"
I guess on the bright side, I'm putting my math skills to good use (the ones I thought I'd rarely use).
That's a really interesting post, as I never though of how they perform a nutritional analysis.
I've also noticed calorie counts on frozen veggies seem high. Sometimes I'd rather "spend" calories on a yogurt than a cup of veggies as that will keep me full longer. I never though that it might be labeled inaccurately.
It's really, really tough for me to avoid the wretched little details of calorie-counting sometimes--and yes, food labels definitely make it harder. It really seems there should be a standard, shouldn't there--that insoluble fiber grams either always count or never count? But nooo, that'd be like having standard dress sizes, I guess.
The "contains about 2-3 servings" labels really throw me. I get why some foods are tougher to measure precisely, but still, shouldn't weighing stuff give an indication of how much is there and therefore a more precise measurement than "maybe two, maybe three--meh, we dunno?"
Weighing has become a favorite hobby of mine...maybe too much of a hobby, if that's possible. My weight loss has slowed, so I'm finding myself doing things like putting back an extra crumb of cereal that takes me from 1 ounce to 1.1 ounces or washing off a spoon so that the 114 grams of cottage cheese in my bowl is the absolute maximum I could consume (if I skip the trace amounts that adhere to the bowl, it might save me a gram or two as well). I'm (so far) drawing the line at measuring the diameters of my apples and oranges--but I have considered it.
That's not how I want to be. It feels uncomfortably rigid and I'm actively trying to record without judging on stuff I weigh so that I'll still keep to my calories, but not obsess over them. It wasn't the extra gram of cereal or the large orange instead of the medium one that made me gain the weight, so I don't need to get obsessive about those things to lose it.
I mean, the weights we're talking about are so small that I'd probably lose that much on the scale if I trimmed my fingernails and blew my nose, y'know? Why do I sweat them so much?
For whole foods, you might look to the USDA site. I don't know that it is perfect ( and it's a bit confusing to use), but at least it probably follows internally consistent rules.
Whole foods are easy. I don't have a problem with whole foods. Even if it's a new fruit or vegetable I've never had before, I can usually make a good guess (most non-starchy veggies are 1 cup raw or 1/2 cup cooked), though I usually look it up, either in an exchange counting book or online.
Whole foods require very little math. Most are in my "Exchanges for All Occasions" Book, and even if they're not, looking them up online is just as easy. Usually they fall into an exchange category very easily also. They tend to be clearly a veggie, fruit, protein, starch, fat, or dairy. Some can be combos (for example beans can be counted as carb exchanges, protein exchanges, or half and half), but usually whole foods fall into only one exchange category (or at most two).
I have found the foods that need to be weighed (I always use grams) and the ones that I can rely on the posted nutritional label are. Sometimes I weigh everything and sometimes I use the label and I soon know what the approximate calories are in half a can or one inch on a salami roll is (I also use a ruler in the kitchen!), etc. I pay more attention to foods that have higher carbs and I am more diligent in weighing that type of food than I am in meats and veggies.
Numbers have a way of making us think it is precise. It's not. No matter how diligently we weigh foods, the calories are an estimate. Also, it is the same about calories in and calories expended. It is never precisely the same every day. So all the calculations about how many calories it takes to lose weight and all the exercise we need to keep the loss at a consistent rate are all an estimate anyways. We aren't robots and know the exact amount of petrol we need to operate.
Basically, counting is a valuable tool and I definitely believe in it. But I have learned to take it as an estimate and watch the averages rather than stress over the one meal or the one day's count. I also work on looking at the whole process of losing weight as multidimensional, not solely based on one thing. I pay attention to how I feel, where my hunger is at, my feelings, my tendencies to indulge, all kinds of things. The biggest "scale" of progress I use is how I feel internally. When I eat the right amount of calories and keep my intake at a ketogenic level, I feel terrific and my BG's are in a normal range. I take this information as more important that the exact number of calories, carbs, fats and proteins that I eat in a day.
Another peeve. When a nutrition label lists a volume (say about 1/3 cup), and a gram weight, you can bet your last dime that the lab analysis was done with the gram weight (labwork would never use an imprecise measurement like that, because the results have to be duplicated and that can only be done with a precise measurement).
But when I use my food scale, the weight listed, comes nowhere near the volume measurement listed (it can be quite a bit more or less).
So if the serving says about 1/3 cup of 112g, the volume I actually get could be 1/4 of a cup or 1/2 cup.
I have found this to be true 99% of the times as well . I started out just measuring with spoons and cups while following serving sizes on the nutrition labels. When I bought my first food scale I was shocked by how much the majority of these servings were off by. I figured I was overeating by 100-300 calories every day. My first discovery was that a "tablespoon" of light peanut butter was really only 3/4 of a tbsp according to the serving by weight. A full tbsp was adding 25 uncounted calories per serving and I was eating it 7-14 times a week. Thats 350 uncounted cals a week just from one food product. Long story short, I try to weigh everything now.
I totally share your frustration with labels in general. They can be so misleading and there is really no need for it if things were more standardized.
All of this is so absolutely true! I have found that if I check different sources like calorie counter books, online calorie counters and then the actual label on the food item that I am going to eat; invariably they will all differ! It is frustrating so what I decided to do was use a combination of standard measuring cups, spoons and a calculator! What I now do is take down the nutrtional label's information (I count all of the macronutrients on my plan) and I use that. However, this is where the calculator comes in handy. For example, I have a favorite brand of frozen boneless, skinless chicken breasts that I buy. On the label it routinely says that there are 12 servings but usually there are 8 chicken breasts in there! So, if I were to ignore that piece of information I would actually wrongly think I was having one portion when I might be having 1.5 portions.
Hey, calories do count, especially as you are moving down the scale and you are eating less and less. When you are first starting out, you can "absorb" this inaccuracy but as you get closer to your goal weight it could be the reason why you aren't seeing the weight lose results that you would like and all along you are thinking "Well, I measured this before and it said....". See what I mean? Through no fault of your own you might actually be eating more calories than you think and have a false sense of accuracy. Thanks to the mislabeling that exists.
This is the main reason that I don't go by how many servings they think it will serve. I have seen it wrong more than right. So, in the case of the chicken breasts example above, what I do is I take the average portion calories x the total amount of stated servings to find the total calorie for the whole package: 110 x 12=1320 calories total then I divide the 1320 calories by 8 pieces (that are actually in the package) which would be 1320/8=165 calories! See, there is a 55 calorie difference. If you do this often enough you could be eating several hundred calories more a week and not even realize it.
I still feel calorie counting is the best way to not only find out how many calories you eat but also it has an added benefit: it indirectly teaches you portion control which for me is a real big deal. It also helps me decide whether I want to continue to add that particular food item in my food plan.
I started counting sodium milligrams last summer and that was so eye opening to me that now that is something else I really eyeball when I am buying a food item in the grocery store. There are a lot of food items that I put back after I read the label!
And, we thought we were safe if we "just" counted carbs and/or fats! As if!
Everything on the nutritional label has to be factored in if you want to lose weight in a healthy way.
Boy, lots of great information here and so many knowledgeable posters. I think I'm going to have to come back to this thread and read it more carefully later.
I did want to say that the software I use for calorie counting will adjust for the dietary fibre if I need to enter a new food using nutritional label info - it will give me the choice of using the label's calories or the calories it calculates. Whenever that happens I feel like I'm getting a little bonus!
calorie counting gets me so hung up on serving sizes and just everything. i guess as i get closer to 'goal' i'll have to count calories, but i'd rather just avoid the whole thing. just concentrating on eating healthy, stopping when i'm full, and getting lots of exercise. when i'm doing it, that works for now. this week i'm about as active as a sack of potatoes with some kind of flu or something.
this post did remind me of something. i always thought it very interesting that the original fiber one cereal has so few calories. but if they didn't count the unsoluble fiber cal. that may explain it. plus the suggested serving size is very small.
Wealth of information!!! I use grams on my kitchen scale because it seems a little more accurate for me. I have to be really diligent because my body is funny with calorie intake. I will say calorie counting is the only thing that has worked for me this long.
Even though I'm not a junk food fan, when I count only calories, I end up eating a very unbalanced diet. I'll go on fruit jags (or worse jags) in general, I'll eat way too many carbs, so then I'm so blippin' starving I feel like an animal in a trap, willing to chew it's foot off to escape.
Now that I know that carb levels affect my health issues it's even more important to maintain balance. I had a few too many off-plan carb and fruit exchanges this week, and my skin is breaking out and my joints are hurting more, as always happens. If I keep my carby exchanges in check, I feel and look a whole lot better (I haven't had skin this clear since before puberty).
That's why I love exchange plans. The counting is still being done, but all I have to do is check boxes (unless it's a combo or processed food, and then I have to some extra math).
I have a favorite brand of frozen boneless, skinless chicken breasts that I buy. On the label it routinely says that there are 12 servings but usually there are 8 chicken breasts in there! So, if I were to ignore that piece of information I would actually wrongly think I was having one portion when I might be having 1.5 portions.
I wanted to comment on this... one frozen chicken breast is usually 2 servings depending on the size of the breast, especially the frozen tyson breasts I buy at Sam's Club.
Frustrated over misleading nutrition labels
. I started out just measuring with spoons and cups while following serving sizes on the nutrition labels. When I bought my first food scale I was shocked by how much the majority of these servings were off by. I figured I was overeating by 100-300 calories every day. My first discovery was that a "tablespoon" of light peanut butter was really only 3/4 of a tbsp according to the serving by weight. A full tbsp was adding 25 uncounted calories per serving and I was eating it 7-14 times a week. Thats 350 uncounted cals a week just from one food product. Long story short, I try to weigh everything now. 
I am in total agreement here!
