Determine Calories in Salmon Without Nutrition Label

JasonCalifornia

I went to the store to pick up some fresh salmon (raw/unfrozen). It goes by "1 LB Fresh Atlantic Salmon Fillet". However, when I went home I realized there was no nutrition label describing the calories in Salmon.

There's seems to be so many types of Salmon in the MyFitnessPal food database, that I'm not sure which is correct or not since the calories are all over the place.

I'm guess the 1 LB says the Salmon was originally 1 LB when caught?

Does anyone have a good way to determine what the Calories may be along with the macro-nutrients associated with it (carbs/fats/proteins)? Or is there a good way I can make a good guess what the calories and macro nutrients would be per gram or oz?

Thanks!

CyberTone

Search for "fish salmon Atlantic wild raw" to bring up the food item entered by MFP from information found in the USDA National Nutrient Database.

JasonCalifornia

Thanks CyberTone for the response. So I see that the USDA National Nutritient Database would be a good place to get the numbers from then.

Going with "Fish - Salmon, Atlantic, farmed, raw" as I think the fish I picked up may be farmed, I am seeing in MyFittnessPal:



However, when looking at the USDA database we get:



If you compare the Calories, you see the MyFittnessPal reports 183 calories per 100g, while the USDA database reports 208 calories per 100g. Am I missing something? I realize the difference is only 25 calories, but it does add up.

Does this mean that the USDA may have updated the nutrition information which may not have then been reflected back into the MyFittnessPal database?

So which Nutrition Info would you rely upon if you had to pick? MyFittnessPal or USDA data?

Thanks!

lynn_glenmont

I would use the USDA data, rather than the MFP data, because even supposedly "verified" entries can be wrong because users make mistakes or only care about calories and leave out some macro or micro info, or (in other situations, but not here with a commodity like raw fish) can reflect different manufacturer packaging and formulations (i.e., "recipes") in other countries or that have been changed since the entry was made.

You can make your own entry or edit an existing one to reflect the USDA data. The next time you make salmon and search for that entry, it should pop up near the top of the results, and you'll find if you click on "check nutrition" for that entry, it won't give you the options to verify or edit it, because the database remembers that you created it. (Once you'd been doing this for a while and have made a significant number of entries, you'll probably find it's pointless to look under the My Foods tab for the entries you created, because they seem to be randomly ordered and there's no way to run a search for a specific entry, at least not on the website. I don't know about the app.)

Also, you mentioned in the OP guessing that the 1 lb means the salmon weighed 1 lb when caught, but that really should not be the case. It should mean 1 lb as packed (at least if you're in the U.S.). Since the label says fillet, that excludes internal organs, bones, head, tail, and scales. It should be 1 lb as packed, but to avoid falling afoul of consumer protection laws, packers will often go a little over the stated weight, so it would be best to weigh the fillet raw before cooking (and if you don't eat the whole thing yourself, you could weigh the entire cooked filet and your own portion to determine what percentage of the total raw weight you are actually eating, although many would find that overly fussy and would just eyeball whether they were taking a half or a third or a quarter).

MelaniaTrump

If it doesn't specifically say Wild caught - It's farmed. It will be lower in fat if farmed, and boy can you taste the difference.

Unknown

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Francl27

vinegar_husbands wrote: »

JanetYellen wrote: »

If it doesn't specifically say Wild caught - It's farmed. It will be lower in fat if farmed, and boy can you taste the difference.

Uhhh, that's not how it works. It's lower in fat if it's wild caught, and it's higher in fat if it's farmed.

This.

And yeah, trust the USDA info... Once again MFP is wrong apparently.

cwolfman13

most entries in MFP are user entries. personally i'd just tag my database search with "USDA".

beyond that, there's a lot of estimation involved...calorie counting isn't 100% accurate so don't expect it to be. just be as accurate as you can be and don't sweat the small stuff.

Francl27

cwolfman13 wrote: »

most entries in MFP are user entries. personally i'd just tag my database search with "USDA".

beyond that, there's a lot of estimation involved...calorie counting isn't 100% accurate so don't expect it to be. just be as accurate as you can be and don't sweat the small stuff.

Not true, a lot of them are MFP entries. It used to be easier to find them though, but typically it would show up like fish - salmon, farmed, raw and have a ton of measurement options.