Different calorie counts for virtually the same product?

TribeHokie

I have two bags of shrimp in my freezer at the moment. One purchased from Wegmans and the other from Giant. The first bag says that 113 g of shrimp is about 9 shrimp and is 80 calories. The second bag says that 113 g of shrimp is about 10 shrimp and is 50 calories.

The first bag is totally peeled and de-tailed while the second bag includes tails and shells. Obviously the second bag SHOULD have fewer calories for the same weight since there is going to be some waste there when the shrimp are peeled and de-tailed, but I did not expect the difference to be THAT much.

If you do the math, 80 calories of the second bag would weigh in at 180.8 g, an extra 67.8 g to supposedly account for the waste. That would be 16 shrimp total. Does the shell and tail of a shrimp (medium-ish size) really weigh over 4g?

I guess I will use the second bag for dinner and answer that for myself in a few hours but I just thought that difference was much higher than it should be. While it isn't a huge deal when you're doing a standard restricted calorie diet between 1200-1600 (or whatever), I'm currently attempting a 5:2 intermittent fast so there is not a lot of wiggle room on the 500 calorie fast days.

23rochelle23

If it’s a full prawn (head, tail, shell) then it wouldn’t surprise me - I’m always slightly disappointed by how little meat is in one when I deshell it - you might find that they’re much smaller prawns than the others :-) will be interested to hear how you get on x

Francl27

When in doubt, use the USDA info. It's odd though because it's only supposed to be the edible part anyway.