Just wondering about food and the calories in them...
Are they correct ??
For a start things like chicken is supposed to be good for you with little fat in there but was that based on statistics taken in 1950?.. when chickens were real free range and not forced fed and bread to make the put weight on ? This could make the modern chicken/fish/beef/pork/lamb much fattier than those that the stats were based on !
Then the other thing I was pondering is the way calories are worked out. As far as I'm aware its something along the lines of puting a measured amount into a vacuum seal unit that then burns it and works out how much heat energy is given off (which is converted into energy/calories). If this is correct how accurate is it ? If you break down what works as energy and what is good for you then how near is it to how well it burns ? For example pure sugar will burn and give off a lot of calories, all of which would be useable by the body...However something like Petrol (to be very extreme and to prove a point, please don't consider drinking petrol) would also burn giving off loads of energy but would do nothing to help the body and wouldn't be a good source of calores/energe/fuel for the human body.
Celery as far as I'm aware takes more energy to eat (chew, digest, pass through) than you get from it... but I'm sure it would dry and burn to give off some calories...
Am I on the wrong track or are the statistics not exactly accurate ?
Steve
we know enough about calories (calorific value) to not do the tests anymore (AFAIK they were burnt in pure oxygen, in a pressure vessel called a bomb (calorimeter). Now we know that for every gramme:
of carbohydrate, there are ~4 kcals (kcalories to be pedantic)
of protein, there are ~4 kcals
of oil/fat, there are 9 kcals
so knowing what is in a particular food, we calculate the calorific value.
BUT, as Steve is alluding to, are all those calories useable by the body? My guess is not. Also, if you have a look at the governments daily recommendations, and do the sums using the values above, it doesn't add up.
IMHO, it needs looking at again, after all, we don't have a bomb calorimeter inside us, do we!! Considering the waste products, much is not digested.
Celery is made of cellulose rather than starch (which most carb sources are). We can digest starch, but not cellulose. Even cows have to have bacteria in their rumen to start the digestion process, (hence chewing the cud).
A very interesting subject Steve. Generally, food calories are calculated these days by working out how many calories per grams the ingredients contain and how much of each ingredient there is, which is already known for most things by now, as you say. My view on this is that simply knowing the calories of a food doesn't help us completely anyway, even if we have worked them out accurately. Our bodies burn them at different rates, depending upon a lot of factors, including our metabolism and activity levels. More active you are, more calories you require and vice versa. Mtabolic rates also vary, depending upon a lot of internal factors. Basic rule of weight loss is to eat less than you burn, generally speaking. We can see this in ourselves; a few good meals and the weight goes up by a few pounds!
You are right in saying that free-range meats of old were less fatty, but the weight gain these days is not simply because of that. Meat portions were probably a lot smaller too. We have become more greedy as a race. There were no desserts after every meals, no packets of chocolates to ingest at will! There were less or no snacks in between meals. We did not consume so much of high fat junk food containing high levels of fats, sugars and fast burning carbohydrates and E fatcors. Another small factor; people who eat a lot of roughage probably absorb less calories, perhaps because food passes a bit faster through their GI system.
Thanks for the replies its now made me expand my thoughts slightly..
If we talk about dieting/weightloss then another factor needs to be thought about... I know this is getting down to the ridiculous level but - Different foods with the same calories could be lighter/heavier and take more effort to eat/chew/breakdown in your system. So they would have different effects on the weight you may or may not put on ?
A small lump of cheese may carry the same calories as 8 sticks of celery, but eating the cheese would take little effort, while eating the celery would take a lot of reaching and picking up, then chewing so the overall end result could be less weight gain ?
Again once in the body it maybe that more processing is needed for one food over another which will take the bodies energy so could use more calories to break it down...
the more you think about it and the deeper you get its no wonder keeping a good diet isn't as easy as you might like !
Steve
you have to walk a considerable distance to make any difference to the calories you burn! so reaching for the celery isn't going to make any difference!
What has not been stressed is the combination of food groups we eat. It is known that protein digestion slows the rate of carb digestion, for example. So simple calorie counting is only an estimate, and crude at that. I think we should aim for a more balanced diet, maybe not over a day, but certainly a week. However, it is possible to balance even the most 'unhealthy' foods, like rogan josh, apparently mostly fat, but if we eat it with rice, it is possible to accommodate the Government's suggestion ratio of carbs:protein:fat.
And don't forget, we need fat to live, but just enough ;?)
thats what the diet books say, but I wouldn't want to lose more than a pound a week. Eating 500 less calories a day is an effort, and I wouldn't recommend it for long. And shedding weight by rigorous exercise is demanding. Burning off 5oo calories a day (on a 1500 calorie diet) is asking for trouble, IMHO.
and thats another trouble... all those 'facts' are based on averages (from who knows when) and none of us are actually 'average'
Steve
This is true. Exercise makes you fitter, but doesn't burn enough calories to loose much weight. You will have to be doing it all the time to make that much difference. Also, excercise gives you muscles and muscles are heavier than fat!
ummm... all i know i that 1 kg of fat contains 7000 calories, so if you want to loose 1 kg... then I m afraif you need to spare around that same amount!
Just been back from a wee holiday with full ( yes full!!!) scottish breakfast every day... how am I going to loose those calories?!??!
Any ideas for a light meal-lunch-dinner??? Leaving out the rice as a side doesn?t seem the appropriate choice
Cheers
"Eat less and excercise more - easy equation."
Easier said than done!! LOL!