Your entries are wrong!

m00tmike · March 2014

I've been eating 6 ounces of broiled chicken breast every day for lunch for the last few weeks. Today I was just clicking around in my diary and realized that I have accidentally used different entries for my chicken a few times. These entries are quite a bit different in calories and protein. So I decided to dig a little further. I googled the nutritional info for "boneless skinless chicken breast broiled" and again found different sites all with different data. In the end I have decided to go with the USDA (united states department of agriculture) data as that seems like it would be the most reliable.

Now I know I should just use the info on the packaging buuuut the chicken I buy is butchered there in the store. It doesn't have nutritional info on it. Just weight and price and blah blah.

So, why does nothing match? I didn't find a single entry on mfp that matched the USDA data. And I didn't find very many entries on mpf that even matched other entries on mfp. I know that it's not a huge deal to some, but it is to me. I want to hit my protein goal everyday and this discrepancy has caused me to think that I missed it on multiple occasions. Any thoughts? Sites you always trust for nutritional info in a situation like this?

smn76237 · March 2014

Weigh your meat raw. Everyone cooks meat differently so my 6oz raw chicken breast might cook down to 5.5oz broiled, and yours may be 5oz broiled. ..even though we started with the same piece of raw chicken. Much more uniform weighing raw.

Krys052490 · March 2014

Different chickens are built differently.... They each have a different amount of fat etc. in the breast.

Also, the way you cook makes a difference.

jackielou867 · March 2014

Anything I eat regularly I research and make my own listing. I like to add things like iron and potassium accurately. I usually use usda but I always compare. If it is prepackaged and I scan or search it I always check the version I use is correctly entered, or again I make my own. Drives my family crazy but if I am gonna waste time logging then I'm gonna waste time logging it right.
If its just a one off treat food then I look for the most realistic listing, or the best average:-)

970Mikaela1 · March 2014

Anything I eat regularly I research and make my own listing. I like to add things like iron and potassium accurately. I usually use usda but I always compare. If it is prepackaged and I scan or search it I always check the version I use is correctly entered, or again I make my own. Drives my family crazy but if I am gonna waste time logging then I'm gonna waste time logging it right.
If its just a one off treat food then I look for the most realistic listing, or the best average:-)

This and I shop at the same stores buy the same brands and always use my same entries .

CarolinkaCjj · March 2014

I am glad that I can remember rough caloric counts of foods from my young dieting days (back when you had to look them up on paper!) Somewhere, I have an old USDA book from my college nutrition class - I should dig it out. Yesterday I logged a head of romaine lettuce and it said 106 calories. I knew it was wrong but put it in anyway. Today I weighed to be sure - should be 30 to 40 calories for an average heart of romaine. And yes, I ate a head of romaine two days in a row and I am not ashamed :happy: