Do toasted foods have less calories than non-toasted?

glevinso wrote: »

Technically? Yes. Instead of 110 calories in a slice of bread there might be 109.5 in the toasted bread because a very miniscule microtiny amount got "burned" in the toaster.

The amount that gets "burned off" is well within the margin of error permitted on the packaged nutrition information.

That's a crumb of chocolate I can eat extra, score! LOL

PeachyPlum wrote: »

In fairness, I burned 75%* of the calories out of our bread while making toast for Sunday breakfast over the weekend.

The fire department came because the alarm company dispatched them automatically. It was embarrassing.

*It was really effectively 100% of the calories, because we threw the toast away. So if you toast it real good, you can make bread calorie-free by toasting it.

PeachyPlum, I dare say... you appear to have attempted the 'carbon lite' version of what was actioned by George H. Goble, nearly 20 years ago... when he demonstrated for the world just how 'efficient' (massive understatement) a liquid oxygen 'barbecue' could 'cook' something (if what happens can even be called that, what with it essentially going straight past 'cooking', to downright incinerating any food being 'heated' in such a manner (basically, anything that remained would involve carbon solids and 'ash', at that point))...

Yes, his 'clarifying' for the world just what would happen were one to utilize an insanely dangerous form of 'accelerant', for the sake of lighting charcoal (let alone, utilizing a 'technique' that showed just how stunningly *brief* any related 'cooking times' could be), was an achievement for which he was awarded a Nobel... an Ig Nobel, to be more precise...

The wiki page for this fortunately-known-for-many-other-creative-explorations scientist happens to mention, regarding this illustrious prize --
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In 1996, Goble was awarded the Ig Nobel Prize in Chemistry, for preparing a barbecue for cooking in less than 5 seconds by the use of a smoldering cigarette, charcoal and LOX (liquid oxygen). This act attracted the attention of the West Lafayette, Indiana fire department, which warned him to never let them catch him in the possession of LOX near a barbecue fire ever again.
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Of course, a video of this 'cookout' can be found online (and was, in fact, one of the 'highlights' of posted videos, many years ago).

Additionally, Dave Barry's comical 'take' on Goble's LOX barbecue (titled "Nuclear Picnic" (from The Boston Globe Magazine, back in 1995)), provides some more context, and 'background', regarding the crazy actions in question --
http://www.humournet.com/collage.archives/collage096.txt

z1ng wrote: »

It's just a fun science question.

Charred food would result in fewer calories. That stands to reason just based on how calories are determined. The difference in typical cooking would be trivial.

Yep...

z1ng wrote: »

If you have burnt the food to the point where it is half ash, then it should have about half the calories, but then it isnt really food at that point.

Yep...

z1ng wrote: »

For a standard piece of toast we are talking about a rounding error.

Yep...

z1ng wrote: »

As the op said, this is pointless for some kind of crazy diet. The calorie difference is negligible.

Yep...

z1ng wrote: »

Plus, heavily charred foods have potentially negative health consequences.

Yep...


http://www.huffingtonpost.com/nalini-chilkov/grilling-health_b_1796567.html

http://www.cancer.gov/cancertopics/causes-prevention/risk/diet/cooked-meats-fact-sheet

http://www.menshealth.com/best-life/do-charred-vegetables-contain-same-carcinogens

http://www.abc.net.au/health/talkinghealth/factbuster/stories/2011/01/25/3093063.htm

http://www.sciencefocus.com/qa/can-eating-burnt-toast-cause-cancer



Last, but certainly not least... getting back to the OP's original question...

http://www.thenakedscientists.com/HTML/questions/question/2005/

(If you're going to read the Q&A associated with the link, be sure to scroll down and take a look at (and read) the first Comment...)

...a few excerpts --
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Question

Recently a friend of mine was telling me about a pizza that he burned to the point of becoming a charred husk ten times smaller than the original. At that point I realised that this pizza had now become a very low-calorie alternative to its former self. My question is whether all types of cooking result in loss of calories as well?


Answer

John Fry, Food Scientist and Chemist:

[...] Burning the pizza will certainly reduce its energy content because some of the energy that you might otherwise have digested and turned into you goes up in flames and smoke. The black carbon that’s left after you’ve burnt the pizza has got a lot less energy in it than the original.

Other cooking processes also cause loss of fat. [...]

[...]

In short cooking can increase or reduce the energy content of a food depending what you do. If you want to eat pure calories then consuming less food is preferable to incinerating your pizza. Burnt food may have fewer calories but it also contains a lot of very toxic materials created by excessive heat and it doesn’t taste that great.
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Any type of cooking that results in a "burning" or more technically a combustion reaction in the food, should lower the calories present. Boiling or steaming probably won't do much, since they're often not hot enough to burn the food. I have seen microwaves burn food before, so [...]
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DaneanP wrote: »

Yeah, but what about the risk of acrylamide? http://www.forbes.com/sites/alicegwalton/2013/11/15/the-fda-calls-out-yet-another-food-chemical-to-avoid-acrylamide/

Acrylamide is mentioned in at least one of the articles referenced in the links from my post (I'll grab an excerpt)...

http://www.abc.net.au/health/talkinghealth/factbuster/stories/2011/01/25/3093063.htm

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[...]

Acrylamide risk

The most well-known chemical in burnt toast is acrylamide, which is produced when sugars and certain amino acids – the building blocks of proteins – are heated together during the cooking process.

This potentially harmful chemical is mainly found in starchy foods such as potatoes (and other potato products), along with baked goods, including bread and, of course, toast.

The level of acrylamide in these foods increases with higher cooking temperatures and longer cooking times. "You would expect there to be reasonably high levels of acrylamide in burnt toast," says Brent.

While toast contains less acrylamide than potato chips and fries, work by FSANZ in 2004 found that toasted white bread is one of the main food sources of acrylamide in the Australian population. This is because we eat more white bread than brown, but white bread might also have slightly more acrylamide in it than other types of bread.

Acrylamide is also used in many industrial processes (paper and plastic production for instance) and at high levels of exposure, it is known to be toxic to the nervous systems of animals and humans.

But acrylamide in food would be unlikely to reach the kind of high levels that industrial workers have sometimes been exposed to, says Brent.

[...]
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DaneanP wrote: »

I know. I just thought the OP could say that to these people the next time they are toasting something. One quick sentence tends to work better that way. Let them look it up and see what acrylamide means.

Gotcha (sorry)... and... good idea!

Dbl post.