No calories per gram option.

missmyler
missmyler Posts: 1 Member
in Food and Nutrition
I am new to myfitnesspal, so apologies if I have missed something. When adding food items to my diary, there does not seem to be an option for calories per gram.

For example, if I search for avocado, it shows me a large, medium, half a cup, boiled, etc etc but no simple option of per gram there are 2 calories - or least this option does not show in the first few items of the lists.

Can someone please direct me? I would have assumed, this would be the most common way of calculating food calories?

Replies

  • Lietchi
    Lietchi Posts: 6,899 Member
    The units used depend on the specific entry. There are many using 1gr or 100gr as a unit, you just need to look around.
    It's a crowdsourced database, so you'll often find multiple entries for the same food, with different units (and not always correct, so it's worthwhile checking against labels or the USDA database)
  • yirara
    yirara Posts: 9,993 Member
    If you select an entry you can change the unit settings. But not all of them have calories per 100 or 1 gram. Often, entries that contain the addition of USDA have.
  • neugebauer52
    neugebauer52 Posts: 1,120 Member
    Agree - half a cup, a portion, a slice, a piece of whatever is totally useless. Even 1 soup spoon, 1 tea spoon measure etc. differs from country to country. Best would be to use 100 gram or 1 ounce for easy calculation.
  • yirara
    yirara Posts: 9,993 Member
    On that note: MFP occasionally has problems dealing with 1g units, possibly due to rounding errors. 100g units and then using e.g. 0.5 for 50gr is better.
  • SafariGalNYC
    SafariGalNYC Posts: 1,635 Member
    I go back and forth between ounces and grams since I live between NY and Italy during the year..

    I found the easiest way was for me to just convert it for my own needs.

    1 ounce is equal to approx 28.35 grams

    1 cup/ 8 oz - 226.8 grams

    1 tablespoon is 14 grams

    For fruit such as an avocado, etc - i would weigh it for the most accurate number. Someone’s small, medium and large also varies.



    YMMV

  • yirara
    yirara Posts: 9,993 Member
    SafariGalNYC wrote: »
    1 cup/ 8 oz - 226.8 grams

    1 tablespoon is 14 grams

    Both would depend on what you use. I just made a recipe from an American cookbook that required 1/2 cup of parley. I have no idea how to put stalks of parsley into a cup (if I had one) but used 20gr, and it worked. If I were to use a cup of butter then that's probably a lot more than a cup of strawberries. The same for spoons. And also for fluids as each fluid has a different weight per volume.
  • SafariGalNYC
    SafariGalNYC Posts: 1,635 Member
    yirara wrote: »
    SafariGalNYC wrote: »
    1 cup/ 8 oz - 226.8 grams

    1 tablespoon is 14 grams

    Both would depend on what you use. I just made a recipe from an American cookbook that required 1/2 cup of parley. I have no idea how to put stalks of parsley into a cup (if I had one) but used 20gr, and it worked. If I were to use a cup of butter then that's probably a lot more than a cup of strawberries. The same for spoons. And also for fluids as each fluid has a different weight per volume.


    Ounces to grams definitely isn’t perfect - especially when using cups. It’s the easiest I’ve found when putting things into my food diary when on the go and I don’t have the option of being as specific as a scale.

    When logging fruits and vegetables at home .. grams are my way to go.. especially since everyone’s version of large or medium fruit is going to be different.

    I logged this avocado this morning.. I think of it as a large.. my friend from Cancun thinks it’s a medium. Lol

    f8qtwzqkmb64.jpeg

  • AnnPT77
    AnnPT77 Posts: 34,669 Member
    yirara wrote: »
    If you select an entry you can change the unit settings. But not all of them have calories per 100 or 1 gram. Often, entries that contain the addition of USDA have.

    Oddly, some of the very best entries are the ones whose default quantity is in cups (when that's completely irrational for the food, such as watermelon or eggs), especially if they also have a name only a bureaucrat could love ("Tomatoes, red, ripe, raw, year round average" for example).

    Often, in the drop-down, you'll find serving sizes not only in weights, but also volumes, sometimes inch sizes or counts. Almost always, that includes grams. Those are the database entries that were loaded to MFP from the USDA database when MFP first started up. They don't say USDA anywhere in the title, but with a little practice they're IME pretty easy to find and recognize. (They don't always have green checks.)
  • kshama2001
    kshama2001 Posts: 28,052 Member
    ADMIN-created entries that MFP pulled from the USDA database generally have grams.

    To find ADMIN entries for whole foods, I get the syntax from the USDA database and paste that into MFP. All ADMIN entries from the USDA will have weights as an option BUT there is a glitch whereby sometimes 1g is the option but the values are actually for 100g. This is pretty easy to spot though, as when added the calories are 100x more than is reasonable.

    https://fdc.nal.usda.gov

    Use the “SR Legacy” tab - that's what MFP used to pull in entries.

    Note: any MFP entry that includes "USDA" was USER entered.

    For packaged foods, I verify the label against what I find in MFP. (Alas, you cannot just scan with your phone and assume what you get is correct. Note: scanning is mostly only available with Premium these days.)

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