Calories from frying

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danrawsterne
danrawsterne Posts: 4
in Food and Nutrition
How do people work out the calories if they fry something? I know it isn't as healthy as, say, grilling, but sometimes only frying will do! I know some of the oil soaks into the food (which is why grilling is better) but how would people account for that? So if you fry some fish in a tablespoon of sunflower oil, how would they add the calories? Obviously, the whole tablespoon of oil isn't absorbed...Is there a standard way of working this out, or is it guess work (like add a tsp for every tbsp used)?

Thanks!

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  • dlaplume2
    dlaplume2 Posts: 1,658 Member
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    You could always measure the oil that's left in the pan when you are done, and subtract it from the tablespoon and count that.
  • seekingstrengthX2
    seekingstrengthX2 Posts: 771
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    I tried what the prior poster mentioned once when I fried tofu. I'm not sure that it worked, lol. I measured out the oil before I put it in the pan, fried tofu, then measured out the oil I had left in the pan. The calorie count ended up being massive and I have no idea if it was right. I decided then to just not fry stuff. :)
  • 123Linz
    123Linz Posts: 80
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    I wanted to deep fry cod in batter, and was wondering the same thing last week.
    I found a web site ......... According to Federation of Fish Fryers cod in batter is 200 cals per 3.5 oz

    For frying anything else, an accurate way to do this would be
    Weigh the raw food
    Measure out the oil you think you will need and put in in the pan, and weigh the oil in the frying pan on a scale
    After cooking let the pan cool and then re weigh it with the oil in
    Subtract the oil left from the starting weight and work out the calories.

    You will only need to do this once (maybe twice if you want to double check it) because you have pre measured your oil, so if you use the same amount to fry in, next time you know what the calories will be.

    Obviously it is not going to be exactly the same every time, this this is the closest you will get to an estimate with our actually measuring every time.

    Hope that helps.
  • danrawsterne
    danrawsterne Posts: 4
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    Thanks all. I'll try the weighing thing next time. I know it's all guesswork anyway to some degree, but maybe this more than some other things. The food you're cooking obviously lets out juices/water etc which will add to the weight, which might end up screwing the results, but I guess better than not recording it! :-)

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