The woes of air-popped popcorn... a tale of properly counting calories

So, I have been loving losing weight.

I still get to eat what I normally want, but just less of it.

Well, for the last 6 months, I have been eating air popped popcorn. It's less calories than bagged popcorn, less oil, and overall healthier.

Originally, I was choosing a brand that listed 1 cup of popped popcorn as having 15kcal.

I'm thinking... holy damn. That's a big ass bowl of 10 cups for only 150 calories! Sign me up!

Then, I said, "I'll just use cooking spray instead of butter." The can listed zero calories. So, even a couple extra sprays couldn't be THAT much, huh?

Similarly, I found a nacho cheese powder for popcorn that is 200kcal for the entire container, and I made a total of 11 bowls out of the one shaker. Pretty good.

So, my bowl of popcorn, was a total of 168kcal. I was happy. I was free.

Then last night, I'm like.... well.... one can of Pam has 5 oz of canola oil. That CAN'T be zero calories, so how much is it...

1,250kcal. Per can.

Welp. That sucks. So, I did the math. That's 142gr of oil in the whole can. So, I made a normal bowl of popcorn. Put a normal amount of oil on it. I then weighed the Pam can afterwards and saw I used 10gr of oil. That's an extra 88 calories. Per bowl.

Well, I guess I can live with that.

So, now, my bowl of popcorn is actually closer to 250 calories.

However, I noticed that the popcorn my wife bought was measured in grams per unpopped kernels. Wondering how many grams were in a 10 cup bowl, I measured as much as I normally do, weighed it. 93gr. Ok, so 93gr of unpopped kernels. Let's just take a look at the package and.........110 calories per 30 gr.....

10 cups of unpopped popcorn is 340kcal. Plus 88 calories from the oil. Plus 18 calories from the cheese powder.

My 168kcal bowl of popcorn suddenly became almost 450 calories per bowl.

Then I thought about the nights I was super hungry and would make two bowls.

So, that is my story. Don't use cups to measure non-liquids. It's just not right. Use grams. Or ounces. Because on a night where I'd have two bowls (yes that's a lot), instead of having 336kcal of popcorn, I'm eating almost 900 calories of popcorn. And I wondered why my weight loss had slowed recently...

So anyway, that's that. Be mindful of your WEIGHT of your food, and how much each item weighs. If it says "zero calories", don't trust it. Look online. Look everywhere you can. Don't cheat yourself. Because you'll end up like me, kicking yourself for the thousands of extra calories you consumed without knowing it.

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