There's no way some foods are zero calories right?

2

Replies

  • greenlizard72
    greenlizard72 Posts: 76 Member
    baconbutt1996 wrote: »
    Heck, even a long black has energy in it! Even if it's 4kj / 1 cal

    I had to look up what a long black was. Now I want one.

  • mph323
    mph323 Posts: 3,566 Member
    edited November 2017
    zoekravitz wrote: »
    If something is labeled zero calories, most times its because it takes more energy to digest it than the energy provided by the food itself.

    No. It means it has less than 5 calories per serving. There are no foods that take more energy to digest than they contain.

    eta: But wouldn't that be awesome! :)
  • Alatariel75
    Alatariel75 Posts: 17,945 Member
    zoekravitz wrote: »
    If something is labeled zero calories, most times its because it takes more energy to digest it than the energy provided by the food itself.

    Wrong.

    It's labelled 0 calories because it has less than 5 calories per serve and they're allowed to round down.

    No food burns more calories digesting than you take in eating them and even if they did, for labels would never reflect that.
  • Aaron_K123
    Aaron_K123 Posts: 7,121 Member
    edited November 2017
    zoekravitz wrote: »
    If something is labeled zero calories, most times its because it takes more energy to digest it than the energy provided by the food itself.

    If such a thing existed you could just lose weight by eating a ton of that thing. Unfortunately (or fortunately) no such thing exists.
  • stevencloser
    stevencloser Posts: 8,911 Member
    Aaron_K123 wrote: »
    zoekravitz wrote: »
    If something is labeled zero calories, most times its because it takes more energy to digest it than the energy provided by the food itself.

    If such a thing existed you could just lose weight by eating a ton of that thing. Unfortunately (or fortunately) no such thing exists.

    In fact, if that were a thing, you'd lose weight faster gorging yourself on that food than if you were eating nothing at all.
  • paperpudding
    paperpudding Posts: 8,162 Member
    Aaron_K123 wrote: »
    Christine_72 wrote: »
    Is this the case for all American foods? I have packets of truvia here, and on the label it states 0.4 calories per pack. If this was American would it say 0 calories?

    Yeah, not sure if it is just the United States or other countries as well but basically the rule is if it is less than 5 calories it is zero calories.
    .

    I can't speak for all other countries - but here in Australia this is not the case.
    All foods/ drinks have nutritional information per 100ml or 100 g regardless of size of container.
    They can optionally also show information for the container or for a serving but they must show the kilojoules per 100g or 100 ml

    As Christine said above, her truvia was 0.4 calories.
    And I know diet soda drink cans are about 3 calories per can
    And their ads here cannot describe them as zero calories. Diet soft drinks here are marketed as zero sugar because that is true, not zero calories ( well, kilojoules in our metric system) because that is not true.

  • mph323
    mph323 Posts: 3,566 Member
    paperpudding wrote: »
    Aaron_K123 wrote: »
    Christine_72 wrote: »
    Is this the case for all American foods? I have packets of truvia here, and on the label it states 0.4 calories per pack. If this was American would it say 0 calories?

    Yeah, not sure if it is just the United States or other countries as well but basically the rule is if it is less than 5 calories it is zero calories.
    .

    I can't speak for all other countries - but here in Australia this is not the case.
    All foods/ drinks have nutritional information per 100ml or 100 g regardless of size of container.
    They can optionally also show information for the container or for a serving but they must show the kilojoules per 100g or 100 ml

    As Christine said above, her truvia was 0.4 calories.
    And I know diet soda drink cans are about 3 calories per can
    And their ads here cannot describe them as zero calories. Diet soft drinks here are marketed as zero sugar because that is true, not zero calories ( well, kilojoules in our metric system) because that is not true.

    I really love the calories per 100g requirement and wish it was a requirement in the US. It makes it a snap to compare information on foods with different serving sizes, like a serving of corn flakes vs a serving of granola, where the calories per serving may be similar but the serving size of one may be 3/4 c and the other 1/4 c.
  • diannethegeek
    diannethegeek Posts: 14,776 Member
    Aaron_K123 wrote: »
    stevencloser wrote: »
    Aaron_K123 wrote: »
    Christine_72 wrote: »
    Is this the case for all American foods? I have packets of truvia here, and on the label it states 0.4 calories per pack. If this was American would it say 0 calories?

    Yeah, not sure if it is just the United States or other countries as well but basically the rule is if it is less than 5 calories it is zero calories.

    I mean if you really REALLY abused that rule I think you'd get called out on it.

    For example if a 8 oz bag of potato chips claimed to have zero calories because it had 200 servings and each of those 200 servings was less than 5 calories I don't think that would fly.

    But I mean diet soda's have some number of calories as well, probably like 2 or 3. They get away with "zero" calories because whatever it is its less than 5 in a serving.

    I am pretty anal when I am calorie counting but that policy of rounding down to zero never really bothered me. I mean seriously if there are less than 5 calories in serving you are going to be very hard pressed to derail your diet on the basis of consuming those items.

    I remember a thread where someone was ranting that the cooking Spray can was lying cause it was 0 calories per serving even though it was pure oil.

    Hah yeah actually I can see that being abused. I looked it up thinking what brand I could think of and PAM cooking spray has a "serving" of 1/3 second of spray (so basically just a spritz). Looking up online a "serving" is 2 calories which means that technically they could call that zero calories. But yeah if you hold that sucker down and soak your pan it'll be more than that.

    I guess you have to think now and again. Dang.

    That said good luck getting fat on pickles.

    A few months ago we had a poster who wasn't losing weight. After a while it turned out they were going through a can of PAM spray every couple of days thinking it was zero calories. Needless to say, it was wiping out their deficit completely.
  • born_of_fire74
    born_of_fire74 Posts: 776 Member
    diannethegeek wrote: »
    Aaron_K123 wrote: »
    stevencloser wrote: »
    Aaron_K123 wrote: »
    Christine_72 wrote: »
    Is this the case for all American foods? I have packets of truvia here, and on the label it states 0.4 calories per pack. If this was American would it say 0 calories?

    Yeah, not sure if it is just the United States or other countries as well but basically the rule is if it is less than 5 calories it is zero calories.

    I mean if you really REALLY abused that rule I think you'd get called out on it.

    For example if a 8 oz bag of potato chips claimed to have zero calories because it had 200 servings and each of those 200 servings was less than 5 calories I don't think that would fly.

    But I mean diet soda's have some number of calories as well, probably like 2 or 3. They get away with "zero" calories because whatever it is its less than 5 in a serving.

    I am pretty anal when I am calorie counting but that policy of rounding down to zero never really bothered me. I mean seriously if there are less than 5 calories in serving you are going to be very hard pressed to derail your diet on the basis of consuming those items.

    I remember a thread where someone was ranting that the cooking Spray can was lying cause it was 0 calories per serving even though it was pure oil.

    Hah yeah actually I can see that being abused. I looked it up thinking what brand I could think of and PAM cooking spray has a "serving" of 1/3 second of spray (so basically just a spritz). Looking up online a "serving" is 2 calories which means that technically they could call that zero calories. But yeah if you hold that sucker down and soak your pan it'll be more than that.

    I guess you have to think now and again. Dang.

    That said good luck getting fat on pickles.

    A few months ago we had a poster who wasn't losing weight. After a while it turned out they were going through a can of PAM spray every couple of days thinking it was zero calories. Needless to say, it was wiping out their deficit completely.

    Ew. Were they cracking the can open and drinking it? Spaying the entire can into a bowl and dipping their food in it? How the hell do you use that much cooking spray??
  • GottaBurnEmAll
    GottaBurnEmAll Posts: 7,722 Member
    born_of_fire74 wrote: »
    diannethegeek wrote: »
    Aaron_K123 wrote: »
    stevencloser wrote: »
    Aaron_K123 wrote: »
    Christine_72 wrote: »
    Is this the case for all American foods? I have packets of truvia here, and on the label it states 0.4 calories per pack. If this was American would it say 0 calories?

    Yeah, not sure if it is just the United States or other countries as well but basically the rule is if it is less than 5 calories it is zero calories.

    I mean if you really REALLY abused that rule I think you'd get called out on it.

    For example if a 8 oz bag of potato chips claimed to have zero calories because it had 200 servings and each of those 200 servings was less than 5 calories I don't think that would fly.

    But I mean diet soda's have some number of calories as well, probably like 2 or 3. They get away with "zero" calories because whatever it is its less than 5 in a serving.

    I am pretty anal when I am calorie counting but that policy of rounding down to zero never really bothered me. I mean seriously if there are less than 5 calories in serving you are going to be very hard pressed to derail your diet on the basis of consuming those items.

    I remember a thread where someone was ranting that the cooking Spray can was lying cause it was 0 calories per serving even though it was pure oil.

    Hah yeah actually I can see that being abused. I looked it up thinking what brand I could think of and PAM cooking spray has a "serving" of 1/3 second of spray (so basically just a spritz). Looking up online a "serving" is 2 calories which means that technically they could call that zero calories. But yeah if you hold that sucker down and soak your pan it'll be more than that.

    I guess you have to think now and again. Dang.

    That said good luck getting fat on pickles.

    A few months ago we had a poster who wasn't losing weight. After a while it turned out they were going through a can of PAM spray every couple of days thinking it was zero calories. Needless to say, it was wiping out their deficit completely.

    Ew. Were they cracking the can open and drinking it? Spaying the entire can into a bowl and dipping their food in it? How the hell do you use that much cooking spray??

    IIRC, it was butter flavor, and she was spraying it liberally on top of her veggies to make them tasty.
  • collectingblues
    collectingblues Posts: 2,539 Member
    GottaBurnEmAll wrote: »
    born_of_fire74 wrote: »
    diannethegeek wrote: »
    Aaron_K123 wrote: »
    stevencloser wrote: »
    Aaron_K123 wrote: »
    Christine_72 wrote: »
    Is this the case for all American foods? I have packets of truvia here, and on the label it states 0.4 calories per pack. If this was American would it say 0 calories?

    Yeah, not sure if it is just the United States or other countries as well but basically the rule is if it is less than 5 calories it is zero calories.

    I mean if you really REALLY abused that rule I think you'd get called out on it.

    For example if a 8 oz bag of potato chips claimed to have zero calories because it had 200 servings and each of those 200 servings was less than 5 calories I don't think that would fly.

    But I mean diet soda's have some number of calories as well, probably like 2 or 3. They get away with "zero" calories because whatever it is its less than 5 in a serving.

    I am pretty anal when I am calorie counting but that policy of rounding down to zero never really bothered me. I mean seriously if there are less than 5 calories in serving you are going to be very hard pressed to derail your diet on the basis of consuming those items.

    I remember a thread where someone was ranting that the cooking Spray can was lying cause it was 0 calories per serving even though it was pure oil.

    Hah yeah actually I can see that being abused. I looked it up thinking what brand I could think of and PAM cooking spray has a "serving" of 1/3 second of spray (so basically just a spritz). Looking up online a "serving" is 2 calories which means that technically they could call that zero calories. But yeah if you hold that sucker down and soak your pan it'll be more than that.

    I guess you have to think now and again. Dang.

    That said good luck getting fat on pickles.

    A few months ago we had a poster who wasn't losing weight. After a while it turned out they were going through a can of PAM spray every couple of days thinking it was zero calories. Needless to say, it was wiping out their deficit completely.

    Ew. Were they cracking the can open and drinking it? Spaying the entire can into a bowl and dipping their food in it? How the hell do you use that much cooking spray??

    IIRC, it was butter flavor, and she was spraying it liberally on top of her veggies to make them tasty.

    I can't even...
  • Christine_72
    Christine_72 Posts: 16,049 Member
    edited November 2017
    mph323 wrote: »
    paperpudding wrote: »
    Aaron_K123 wrote: »
    Christine_72 wrote: »
    Is this the case for all American foods? I have packets of truvia here, and on the label it states 0.4 calories per pack. If this was American would it say 0 calories?

    Yeah, not sure if it is just the United States or other countries as well but basically the rule is if it is less than 5 calories it is zero calories.
    .

    I can't speak for all other countries - but here in Australia this is not the case.
    All foods/ drinks have nutritional information per 100ml or 100 g regardless of size of container.
    They can optionally also show information for the container or for a serving but they must show the kilojoules per 100g or 100 ml

    As Christine said above, her truvia was 0.4 calories.
    And I know diet soda drink cans are about 3 calories per can
    And their ads here cannot describe them as zero calories. Diet soft drinks here are marketed as zero sugar because that is true, not zero calories ( well, kilojoules in our metric system) because that is not true.

    I really love the calories per 100g requirement and wish it was a requirement in the US. It makes it a snap to compare information on foods with different serving sizes, like a serving of corn flakes vs a serving of granola, where the calories per serving may be similar but the serving size of one may be 3/4 c and the other 1/4 c.

    It does make life so much easier. When comparing calories in foods i just automatically go to the 100g listing on the back of the pack, much easier/quicker than trying to compare different grams in serving sizes.
  • mph323
    mph323 Posts: 3,566 Member
    edited November 2017
    zoekravitz wrote: »
    mph323 wrote: »
    zoekravitz wrote: »
    If something is labeled zero calories, most times its because it takes more energy to digest it than the energy provided by the food itself.

    No. It means it has less than 5 calories per serving. There are no foods that take more energy to digest than they contain.

    eta: But wouldn't that be awesome! :)

    Actually there are, such as apples, apricots, celery etc. But I guess in this case, since it is pickle chips, your pov is probably valid in this case :)

    <blink> You're saying apples, apricots and celery take more calories to digest than they contain? Have you really thought this through?

    eta: So a person eating at maintenance could add 300 calories of apples and apricots a day and not gain weight?

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