When I began watching my weight with calorie counting, there were times when I had to determine just how many calories were in some of the recipes I was cooking.
Here’s how you do it.
You must first calculate just how many calories are in each of the ingredients you are adding to your recipe.
For example, we’ll look at the Homemade Granola recipe I recently posted. Now keep in mind, I didn’t follow that posted recipe specifically (I added my own favorite nuts, so therefore I’ll have to calculate it with what I actually used, rather than the exact recipe).
First look at the food label at the calories per serving in each ingredient.
Oats: 150 in 1/2 cup
Pumpkin seeds: 160 in 1/4 cup
Sunflower seeds: 200 in 1/4 cup
Sliced Almonds: 160 in 1/4 cup
Vegetable Oil: 120 in 1 Tbsp.
Honey: 60 in 1 Tbsp.
Brown Sugar: 200 in 1/4 cup
Next, figure up the total calories used per ingredient.
Oats: 8 cups used=150 x 16: 2400
Pumpkin seeds: 1/2 cups used=160 x 2: 320
Sunflower seeds: 1/2 cups used=200 x 2: 400
Sliced Almonds: 1/2 cups used=160 x 2: 320
Vegetable Oil: 3/4 used=12 Tbsp=60 x 12: 1440
Honey: 1/4 cup used=4 Tbsp=60 x 4: 240
Brown Sugar: 1 cup used= 200 x 4: 800
Calculate the total calories: 5920
Yes, that’s ALOT, but stay with me, it gets better.
Add up the total amount of the ingredients you’ve used: 11-1/2 cups
Now, I’m going to divide 11.5 into 5920 = 514.78
This means that there is approximately 515 calories in one cup of this homemade granola.
But because I think that 1/2 cup of granola is a more realistic serving, I know that there is approximately 257 calories in each 1/2 cup!
Pretty cool, huh!?
It takes a minute to figure, but it’s worth it to have the knowledge on how to calculate those calories!
Especially when each calorie counts!
And an easy way I’ve found to know that I’m getting the right size serving is to keep a 1/2 cup measuring spoon (or smaller) in the granola container and only take out one scoop at a time. 🙂
Happy Friday!