Cooking Food Adds Calories?

May 7, 2023 Ashley 0 Comments

Did you know that calorie counts change when you cook food?

That’s right. The same stick of celery or stalk of broccoli you could be miserably eating raw and cold actually gives you more calories just by the process of you scorching it for supper. And, no, we’re not talking about deep frying. We’re not talking about adding sauces or oils. Nothing like that (which would add obvious calories). We just mean straight up cooking sans any frills or fun stuff. That alone increases the calorie count you take on. Crazy, right? Well, not really, when you think about it. When you cook a food, you’re essentially “pre-digesting” it. You’re doing part of what your body has to work to do to digest it. If you ate a normal, raw stick of celery, the total calories you’d acquire would be in the single digits because by the time you finish processing it, you’ve already burnt some of what you’ve consumed. However, when it’s cooked, it’s a different story. Because you’ve already done some of the internal dirty work externally on a stove, you get more calories out of it. You’re body’s not doing any of the work to burn it. Those calories aren’t getting spent. So you get the extra calories from the food itself.

This was great in primal times and eras of food shortage and starvation.

Having a little extra energy thanks to last night’s flambéed campfire vermin meant being able to go a little longer between meals and better energy for hunting. But what does it mean when it comes to weight loss? It’s caused many an “expert” to say that we should quit counting calories. That the calorie doesn’t matter. Eat intuitively, they say. Just balance your macros and portion control. Information like this tends to lead people into trying other extreme diets in lieu of monitoring mathematical intake of energy. Keto. Gluten free. Vegan. Whole30. Eating raw. Sure, for some that works. For many, though, it’s not sustainable, they ultimately fail, and the weight packs back on.

Okay, so… what should we do?

Well, I’ll tell you what we shouldn’t do. We should not disregard calories suddenly. We do that and we throw the baby out with the hot water we cooked it in. (Or however that idiom goes…) Calorie counting, monitoring, and mindfulness all serve a purpose. It collectively keeps us aware of what we’re eating, how much, and portion control as well. When we tell ourselves that calorie counts are inaccurate, the idea is often that we don’t pay attention to anything else and we live like lawless goblins, gobbling whatever we want because nothing matters. My take on this is very similar to the “treadmill calorie counter” philosophy. It’s a ballpark estimate. That said, if the machine says I’ve burned 200 when I’ve only burned 95, I’m more likely to go for another 200 than I would be if it kept low-balling me. Either way, I come out on top because I feel like I’m winning at my weight loss workout – so I wanna keep heading in a healthy direction. Similarly, when a package of celery says it’s fourteen calories and then cooking it takes it up to eighteen, you have to see the bigger picture here. That’s not a massive difference. (Unlike my wildly inaccurate treadmill.) So, this shouldn’t feel like grounds to throw out your healthy foods and stop monitoring calories altogether just because the cooked version is a nominal amount more. Bottom line? Keep monitoring your calories – in a healthy way – giving yourself some grace and leeway, while being reasonable about it.

And when you do cook your food, prep it as naturally as possible.

Lose the sugar. Lose the deep fry. Lose the excess salt.

And lose the weight.