Calories in Food
The amount of calories in food is a huge subject in the health conscious society of today and on this site we will explore the amount of calories that are contained in a variety of specific foods and food groups. This site will be very useful for those people that carefully calorie count in order to ensure that they only consume certain calories in foods, but also to those that just want some general information on different foods and their nutritional values. We will also provide a list of calories in foods that you may find useful when planning your diet, this is known as calorie counting and we also explain just how people go about counting calories on this page.
Calories are found in all foods, however the amount of calories that each food contains will vary dramatically between each food and food group. There is often a negative stigma surrounding calories in food, however this does not need to be the case as long as you understand what a calorie is, what it can do, and how to control how many you consume.
Let's first quickly explain exactly what a calorie actually is: In the most basic of terms a calorie is a unit of energy. As we have said there are calories in all foods, which you will take on board when the food is consumed. If you eat a chocolate bar that has 100 calories in it, this chocolate bar contains enough energy to raise water temperature by a single degree Celsius 100 times. Naturally with calories being a unit of energy this is what your body will use the calories consumed for. Calories are stored as fat so the more calories that you burn, by using the energy they provide, the less fat that you will retain on your body. 
This is the whole point of calorie counting and dieting, you want to extinguish your energy reserves as this will involve burning off unwanted fat. The more calories that you burn, the more weight that you will lose.
The calories in food that are stored on your body can be gotten rid of by exercising, this can be doing anything from a quick walk to work to a hard session at the gym. Anything physical that you do will burn calories to a degree, even some foods that you eat will actually burn calories as they are being digested and processed by the body, these are known as metabolism boosting foods. Obviously the harder you work physically the more calories will be burned away. This is why people eat less in order to consume less calories or exercise more in order to burn more calories than normal, both in an attempt to lose weight or prevent themselves from putting weight on.
On this site we have several informative pages providing you with information on calories in foods that you eat every day and also foods that are popular in healthy lifestyles. Generally the unhealthier a food is deemed to be, the more calories it is likely to have in it. For example there are more calories in a chocolate bar than there are calories in an apple.
Please see our dedicated pages for the following calories in foods:
- How many calories in an egg?
- How many calories in a banana?
- How many calories in avocado?
- How many calories in pizza?
- How many calories in wine?
We also have dedicated pages for calories in foods by categories:
You can find the calories in foods on a label on the packaging that it comes in along with the other nutritional values such as how much protein and fat is contained in it. This is vital information for the consumer and it is a legal requirement of the FDA (Food and Drug Administration) that this information is accurate and clear.
There are a wide range of people that will make a conscious effort to count calories before they decide which foods they are going to consume, these people may include those that are on a strict weight loss diet, body builders, athletes, people generally watching their weight.
What is calorie counting?
Counting calories is where people will actually count the amount of calories that they eat on a daily basis or make a pre-determined plan of what they are going to eat over a day/week/month by counting how many calories they are allowing themselves to consume over this period and make their dietary decisions based on this. As calories in foods can vary this can mean a lot of research is needed before any sort of calorie counting plan can be made. This is made easier online by many websites providing the nutritional values of many everyday foods.
Many people will count calories as they go by recording what they eat over a period of time and counting the total calories that they are eating. They can then make a plan in order to reduce the calories by knowing what they regularly eat and how they can balance their diet by taking certain calories in food out or by eating more of one food and less of another.
List of calories in food
Most people have no idea just how many calories are in the food they eat so now let's explain what the average intake of calories is, what you would need to do in order to burn off these calories to prevent them from being stored on your body as fat and also some of the foods that everybody eats and the calories that these foods contain.
The amount of calories that you should consume each day will depend on your gender, age, height, weight and how active you are. There are many calorie calculators online where you simply fill these details in and this will show you your recommended daily intake of calories in food is.
For example:
A sedentary 30 year old male who weighs 156 pounds and who is 72 inches tall would need to consumer 2095 calories a day in order to maintain their weight. Obviously to gain weight they would need to consume more calories in foods and less in order to actually lose weight.
A male of the same age who exercised lightly (1-3 times a week) who also weighed 156 pounds and stood at 72 inches tall would need to consume 2400 calories a day to maintain their current weight.
A sedentary 30 year old female, who weighs 140 pounds and who is 64 inches tall would need to consume 1700 calories a day in order to maintain their weight. As above to gain weight they would need to consume more calories in foods and less if they wanted to lose weight.
A female of the same age who exercised lightly (1-3 times a week) who also weighed 140 pounds and who is 64 inches tall would need to consume 1947 calories a day to maintain their current weight.
Now here is a list of calories in foods that most people can expect to find in their daily diet so you can begin to see how many calories you may consume and then use the above to grasp a rough idea of how many calories you should be consuming in order to maintain your weight.
Brewed coffee with 2tbsp whole milk - 20 calories- Cappuccino with whole milk - 73 calories
- Cup of tea with milk and sugar - 2 calories
- Hot chocolate with whole milk - 226 calories
- Cup of cola (8fl oz.) - 88 calories
- Orange (8.7 fl oz.) - 119 calories
- Regular beer (8fl oz.) - 102 calories
- BLT sandwich - 550 calories
- Bowl of cornflakes (0.7oz) - 76 calories
- Plain salted potato chips/crisps (1 oz.) - 155 calories
- Hamburger roll or hotdog bun (1oz) - 84 calories
- Corn bread (2.1 oz.) - 188 calories
- Mars chocolate bar - 441 calories
- Ham and cheese burrito (3.5oz) - 212 calories
- Frozen lasagne (10.5oz) - 377 calories
- Spaghetti with meat sauce (10 oz.) - 255 calories
Small banana - 72 calories- Small apple with skin - 52 calories
- Fresh pasta salad (1/2 cup) - 197 calories
- Tuna salad (3oz) - 159 calories
- Drained boiled potatoes (1.2oz) - 21 calories
- Whole ripe tomato - 3 calories
- Mushrooms (0.2oz) - 2 calories
- Whole kernel yellow sweet corn, no salt or butter - 66 calories
- Chicken breast meat and skin (4oz) - 194 calories
- Lean half leg lamb shank roasted (4oz) - 203 calories
- Bacon breakfast strip (0.4oz) - 52 calories
- Lean sirloin steak pan fried (4oz) - 269 calories
- Cheeseburger (8.3oz) - 450 calories
- Hot dog (6.4oz) - 464 calories
- Pepperoni 6 inch pizza (8.6oz) - 660 calories
As you can see the list of calories in foods for things that we eat every day can soon mount up and the closer we get towards fast food and take out the more these calories mount up!
We do hope that this page has been useful in helping you find out more about calories in foods and also the principle of calorie counting. Please check our other pages out for a full breakdown of certain popular foods and liquids such was how many calories are in a banana and how many calories are in alcohol.
