Anyone know the calories?

Almost everything in the MFP database is wrong. And those nasty little things they call raisins in the product have no reliable calorie data. I mistakenly posted 250 instead of 190 above but the real difference is still sugar added to the product.

Mofee1 wrote: »

Thanks for your responses!
So...Kelloggs Raisin Bran is 190 cals per cup (with raisins). Generic Bran Flakes are 150 cals per cup according to a myfitnesspal database search. I measured out a cup of the Kelloggs raisin bran three times, separated out and weighed the raisins in grams for each. Not surprisingly I got three different weights for the raisins. 17 grams (51 cals), 23 grams (69 cals), and 32 grams (96 cals). The way I see it, I have three options: Option 1 is to average out the raisin calories between the three readings which comes to 72 raisin calories and subtract that from the 190 calories for a 1 cup serving (sans raisins, of course), Option 2: weigh the raisins each time I measure out a cup of raisin bran and subtract those exact calories. And, finally, Option 3: Buy justBran Flakes cereal from now on. Since I am a control freak, I will likely go with Option 2 until I have consumed all three of my boxes of Kelloggs Raisin Bran, then switch to Bran Flakes or a different bran cereal that has waaaaay more fiber in it, like Trader Joes brand bran cereal (they look like pellets, LOL). I mean, why eat bran cereal unless your goal is fiber, right?

What DID surprise me was to discover that the Raisin Bran flakes have no discernible sugar taste to them. The raisins, however, are completely coated in sugar!

I hear what you're saying about being a control freak, so this may be beside the point, but, just as a matter of perspective . . .

Let's say you eat a cereal serving every single day. Then, let's assume that in reality all of your samples had less than the average weight of raisins, and there are really 100 calories of raisins on average. Next, let's assume you were going to use the average number from your sample, 72 calories, to estimate your cereal calories (I know you don't plan to do that). That would be 72 calories of raisins logged, and 100 consumed. So, you would have wiped out 28 calories of your daily calorie deficit, *if* you did it that way.

I don't know how fast you're trying to lose weight, but for the sake of discussion, I'll assume it's 1 pound a week, which is a common goal, sensible for many people. That means that MFP will have given you a 500 calorie daily deficit, if it could do that without putting you below 1200, the minimum it will assign a woman.

In this imaginary scenario, your theoretical daily deficit would be 472 calories daily, instead of 500.

If all these estimates and your other logging was perfect (very unlikely in totality), what would this mean? It would mean that by the end of the week, you theoretically would lose 0.944 pound, rather than a whole pound, so you'd lose 0.056 pounds per week more slowly. It would take well over 4 months for there to be a whole pound difference in total weight loss.

Now, in reality, you're planning to do something that will be more time-consuming, but more accurate than the above scenario. The above is probably more inaccurate than any of your actual options (because I assumed all of your raisin samples were smaller than the average number of raisins in a serving, which is improbable).

Here's the question: How much futzing around with raisin separating is that kind of difference worth to you? That's a very personal, individual-preference question, one that doesn't have an objectively right answer (and I'm not asking you to post an answer).

Accuracy is indeed helpful if you're calorie counting, so it's good to be careful. (I've been counting calories through nearly a year of weight loss, and 5+ years since of maintenance). But it's a bad thing, IMO, to be literally *obsessed* by calorie counting accuracy, a thing that can happen for some people. The difference between obsessive and careful lies in the mental state of the individual whose behavior is taking place. You're the one who know how this thought process *feels*, and I wouldn't second guess where this falls for you. Still, if you're going to be counting for a while - losing a meaningful amount of weight takes time, realistically - it's the kind of question you might want to ask yourself, IMO.

Wishing you success!

I'd just log it as if I'd eaten the raisins and err on the side of overestimating rather than overeating.

Or get rid of the Raisin Bran and eat something that doesn't taste like wet cardboard for breakfast.

I'm curious...why did you buy raisin bran if you don't like raisins?

Liquid density, surface tension and eyeballing are the biggest reasons not to use "cup" as any form of reliable measurement. No one involved in science in the US would ever use the term "cup" as a unit of measurement. If something is 237 ML, say so. It won't help, however, because density of liquids varies and only the grams of weight are relevant to nutrition.

Cups and tablespoons are an impediment to sensible cooking.

It mostly is a minor problem until you get to baking where being 10% off can actually affect the result. Measuring spoons come in all shapes and getting a level tablespoon of a sticky or lumpy substance is difficult using any spoon and impossible in shallow spoons.

The whole thing is just a mess. Weight is all that matters anyway.