The FastDay Forum

Hi all, it's my first day of fasting today and and I've been studying the calorific values of my food. I found that 15ml (a tablespoon) of Tesco finest blasamic vinegar is a whopping 34 cals (I had some in the cupboard). 30g of sweetcorn which is about a tablespoonful is 25 cals. On the other hand a goodsized tomato (100g) is only 20 cals and 90g of cucumber is only about 11 cals. Plus a Romaine lettuce leaf is only 3!

Moral of the story get eating the salad and leave the sweetcorn alone haha! I'm only on 400 cals on a fast day as I'm short and sedentary, so every little counts.

What are your shocking or surprising calorie finds?

[Moogie]

Thought you might quite enjoy this
http://www.wisegeek.com/what-does-200-c ... k-like.htm

Thanks Moogie - that's fascinating!

[carorees]

Cheddar cheese...entire fast day calories in only 100g of cheese!!!

Moogie, that's really useful. I'm pretty good at counting cals - comes from years of weighing and totting up! But it's always useful to know what a portion looks like. Of course it's all American stuff. And so much of it is crap that I'd never consider putting in my mouth!

An average sized banana - 176 cals - ouch!
A medium szed orange - 115 - ouch!

One pitta pocket : 150 CALS! Eek!
One slice of M&S carrot cale: 850

75g pickled beetroot - 17 kcals - bargain!

Half a small tin of tuna in brine (drained weight 65g) - 62 kcals - another bargain as it's quite filling for such a small amount!

ASDA Water Chestnut & Bamboo Shoot Stir-Fry with Chinese Leaf, Red Onion & Peppers (Half of the 420g pack) - 81 kcals.

(Serve with half a tin of that tuna - 62 kcals, some of the zero noodles- about 8 kcal and spice up with ginger, garlic, chilli, salt and pepper, and you have a really scrummy fast meal for about 160 kcal. Not bad eh!!)

Re the Balsamic Vinegar, interesting - I checked ours and it is 75% sugar so I guess that is why it has so many calories. We have a bundle of other tasty and healthy vinegars (raspberry / lime black pepper and lavender etc) and they all seem to have the same problem. Sorry, that should have read 'tasty vinegars'...

Our white wine vinegar by contrast is 4 cals / 15 ml.

ASDA Water Chestnut & Bamboo Shoot Stir-Fry with Chinese Leaf, Red Onion & Peppers (Half of the 420g pack) - 81 kcals.

(Serve with half a tin of that tuna - 62 kcals, some of the zero noodles- about 8 kcal and spice up with ginger, garlic, chilli, salt and pepper, and you have a really scrummy fast meal for about 160 kcal. Not bad eh!!)

Amazing, all that for so little, it hardly seems like fasting at all

When I was at school many moons ago our cookery teacher - do they still have those? - put out rows and rows of paper plates each containing 100 calories. I'll never forget the mountain of shredded cabbage sat next to 2 boiled sweets

ASDA Water Chestnut & Bamboo Shoot Stir-Fry with Chinese Leaf, Red Onion & Peppers (Half of the 420g pack) - 81 kcals.

(Serve with half a tin of that tuna - 62 kcals, some of the zero noodles- about 8 kcal and spice up with ginger, garlic, chilli, salt and pepper, and you have a really scrummy fast meal for about 160 kcal. Not bad eh!!)

Thanks for that Lucky7 - what a great meal idea - that's gone on my shopping list!

Half a pack of Quorn smoky ham style slices (4 slices) - 68 kcals.