How to count calories for sauce?

Live_life_well
Live_life_well Posts: 86 Member
in Health and Weight Loss
I like to add a lot of sauce when slow cooking chicken breast (butter chicken sauce) but when it is cooked I make sure to wipe the sauce off of each chicken breast before eating.

Do I count 100% of the sauce, 50%, none? Worried if I count none that some of the calories in the suave are absorbed into the chicken breast.

Replies

  • SteamPug
    SteamPug Posts: 262 Member
    edited January 2018
    You could weigh the amount you take off and subtract that from the amount you put on originally? You could probably just do that a few times to get a feel for what percentage of the sauce you’re actually eating, then you should be making a relatively accurate guess in the future.
  • TonyB0588
    TonyB0588 Posts: 9,520 Member
    edited January 2018
    If you weren't wiping it off I'd say 100% and make it part of your recipe.

    As you're slow cooking, some will definitely be absorbed so I imagine you're wiping off 50% and consuming the remainder.
  • Live_life_well
    Live_life_well Posts: 86 Member
    edited January 2018
    SteamPug wrote: »
    You could weigh the amount you take off and subtract that from the amount you put on originally? You could probably just do that a few times to get a feel for what percentage of the sauce you’re actually eating, then you should be making a relatively accurate guess in the future.

    What about evaporation during the cooking process? If I have learned anything on these forums is that shoddy logging is often a key culprit so I want to avoid it.
  • Live_life_well
    Live_life_well Posts: 86 Member
    MegaMooseEsq wrote: »
    Live_life_well wrote: »
    I like to add a lot of sauce when slow cooking chicken breast (butter chicken sauce) but when it is cooked I make sure to wipe the sauce off of each chicken breast before eating.

    Do I count 100% of the sauce, 50%, none? Worried if I count none that some of the calories in the suave are absorbed into the chicken breast.

    I’d count 100%, but I wouldn’t wipe off the sauce either. Count it and enjoy it, and if you overestimate a little, it’ll come out in the wash.

    That's not an option. I am on a deficit and don't want to go back to old ways.
  • SteamPug
    SteamPug Posts: 262 Member
    edited January 2018
    Live_life_well wrote: »
    SteamPug wrote: »
    You could weigh the amount you take off and subtract that from the amount you put on originally? You could probably just do that a few times to get a feel for what percentage of the sauce you’re actually eating, then you should be making a relatively accurate guess in the future.

    What about evaporation during the cooking process? If I have learned anything on these forums is that shoddy logging is often a key culprit so I want to avoid it.
    I would assume that what was evaporated would be mostly water.

    Edit: oh wait yeah that’d still affect the weight.
    Uhh how about use less sauce so you don’t need to wipe it off?
  • SteamPug
    SteamPug Posts: 262 Member
    I mean.. logging is an issue but really if you’re being super accurate with everything else I’m sure a minor over or under estimate for one meal shouldn’t throw you off too hard.
  • TonyB0588
    TonyB0588 Posts: 9,520 Member
    Live_life_well wrote: »
    MegaMooseEsq wrote: »
    Live_life_well wrote: »
    I like to add a lot of sauce when slow cooking chicken breast (butter chicken sauce) but when it is cooked I make sure to wipe the sauce off of each chicken breast before eating.

    Do I count 100% of the sauce, 50%, none? Worried if I count none that some of the calories in the suave are absorbed into the chicken breast.

    I’d count 100%, but I wouldn’t wipe off the sauce either. Count it and enjoy it, and if you overestimate a little, it’ll come out in the wash.

    That's not an option. I am on a deficit and don't want to go back to old ways.

    You can have a deficit with any food. It just needs accurate recording of all your meals against your total for the day.
  • megs_1985
    megs_1985 Posts: 199 Member
    Maybe find sauces with less calories? You don’t need to use butter. I often roast chicken with just some herbs, white wine or vinegar and maybe just a bit of olive oil.
  • lynn_glenmont
    lynn_glenmont Posts: 10,092 Member
    Live_life_well wrote: »
    SteamPug wrote: »
    You could weigh the amount you take off and subtract that from the amount you put on originally? You could probably just do that a few times to get a feel for what percentage of the sauce you’re actually eating, then you should be making a relatively accurate guess in the future.

    What about evaporation during the cooking process? If I have learned anything on these forums is that shoddy logging is often a key culprit so I want to avoid it.

    Isn't the point of a slow cooker that you leave the lid on the whole time it is cooking? Shouldn't liquids that evaporate just recondense on the underside of the lid and drip back down on the food. If much liquid were escaping through evaporation, you'd end up with dried-out food. If you're losing a lot of liquid to evaporation, you need a new slow cooker, or at least a new lid.

    Plus, any liquid that manages to escape the cooker through evaporation is going to pretty much be just water. A slow cooker doesn't get hot enough to turn fats and sugars (the source of calories in sauces) to gases. If yours does, it's a fire hazard and you should throw it out.
  • collectingblues
    collectingblues Posts: 2,541 Member
    Looking at your diary, you're eating 2000+ calories a day. You can't spare some sauce in there?
  • bvff35
    bvff35 Posts: 74 Member
    Live_life_well wrote: »
    Thanks for the advice everyone. I can't afford the extra calories so I am just going to go with slow cooking chicken with chicken broth and lime juice.

    This actually sounds good to me and never thought of adding lime juice! Thank you!
  • Live_life_well
    Live_life_well Posts: 86 Member
    collectingblues wrote: »
    Looking at your diary, you're eating 2000+ calories a day. You can't spare some sauce in there?

    Not enough to want to trade something else for it. This isn't a big deal for me - was willing to do it if it was a freebie but if anything I need to make more space for my two loves - cookies and ice cream (haven't had much of them lately).
  • Poisonedpawn78
    Poisonedpawn78 Posts: 1,145 Member
    collectingblues wrote: »
    Live_life_well wrote: »
    collectingblues wrote: »
    Looking at your diary, you're eating 2000+ calories a day. You can't spare some sauce in there?

    Not enough to want to trade something else for it. This isn't a big deal for me - was willing to do it if it was a freebie but if anything I need to make more space for my two loves - cookies and ice cream (haven't had much of them lately).

    Well, then don't go on about how you don't have room in your deficit for it. You are making different choices in your deficit, but you could make it work if you wanted to. But you don't want to.

    I would take the butter chicken over cookies today. Then tomorrow have a different meal that allows the cookies, then the next day have sesami chicken and rice .. and then the next day have a salad and ice cream ect...

    It doesnt have to be an all or nothing situation all the time!
  • ladyhusker39
    ladyhusker39 Posts: 1,406 Member
    Live_life_well wrote: »
    MegaMooseEsq wrote: »
    Live_life_well wrote: »
    I like to add a lot of sauce when slow cooking chicken breast (butter chicken sauce) but when it is cooked I make sure to wipe the sauce off of each chicken breast before eating.

    Do I count 100% of the sauce, 50%, none? Worried if I count none that some of the calories in the suave are absorbed into the chicken breast.

    I’d count 100%, but I wouldn’t wipe off the sauce either. Count it and enjoy it, and if you overestimate a little, it’ll come out in the wash.

    That's not an option. I am on a deficit and don't want to go back to old ways.

    Here's the flaw in your thought process. You've never left your old ways of thinking about food.

    Your old ways as you call them are in reality that you have an unhealthy relationship with food, but you think the problem is that you eat too much. In fact, eating too much is a symptom of the problem that you have an unhealthy relationship with food.

    In an admirable attempt to solve the problem you're only addressing the current symptom- eating too much. You're doing nothing to solve the actual problem - an unhealthy relationship with food. In fact, I would argue that you're re-enforcing the actual problem by replacing one symptom - eating too many calories - with it's opposite - obsessing over calories to the extent of wiping excess calories off food before you eat it.

    Work the problem and not the symptoms and you'll be able to not only find sensible answers to your questions, but develop the skills to ask the questions that will really help you be successful in your goal especially over the long run when these symptoms can weight on us and cause discouragement and burnout resulting in giving up.

    I hope that makes sense and maybe gives you something to consider in your quest to create a new and improved you.

    (And I truly hope the rambling and confusing way I'm explaining it doesn't come across as unkind of disrespectful. Tone is hard to convey in writing, but I really do mean to just give you something to consider that might be helpful.)

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