What's 100 Calories? - Nourish Coaches

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This podcast was inspired by clients asking us: “Are 100 calorie snack foods ok to eat?” It got us thinking – What makes up 100 calories of snack food?

Here is our answer.

In this Navigating Nourishment Podcast, Wendy and Debbie discuss the importance of prioritizing nutrient-dense snacks for sustainable health. Debbie highlights the manipulation of taste buds by the processed food industry, leading to false cravings. Wendy emphasized the importance of choosing snacks that provide a good balance of nutrients. They compared and contrasted various snack options, including blueberries, radishes, and cheese, and encouraged listeners to prioritize whole, nutrient-dense foods for optimal well-being.

Transcript

Debbie 0:01

I was out and about the other day, and I overheard a conversation – a couple of women talking about calories. They were talking about choosing between a couple of different foods because one had more calories, and one had less calories. The foods that they were talking about, to me were not the most nutritious choices. And it made me think about how people focus on calories without thinking about the difference between one calorie means next to another kind of calorie.

Wendy 1:17

We’ve been trained to talk about all food being equal, and it’s just about calories in and calories out – as an energy expenditure, and it’s so much more rich and nuanced. And this, I think, is where a lot of the confusion and difficulty comes with people and we want to simplify it by sharing some really interesting data.

Debbie 1:45

Exactly. In talking about the different foods that are of the same amount of calories, you can get very different effects in your body. And and it doesn’t come down to losing or gaining weight necessarily, because what happens in your body is so different when you eat one thing next to another one.

Wendy and Debbie discuss the nutrient density of different foods, highlighting the difference between 100 calories of real food versus ultra-processed foods.

Wendy 2:18

Absolutely. Some foods are more easily broken down. The calories in their whole food form act differently once they’re broken down inside our body. So there are so many layers to how our body absorbs and processes foods. That’s where the confusion is. So let’s come back to what is nutrient dense. What gives your body the language and the fuel and the energy to turn it into the skin and blood and energy. We are walking food.

Debbie 2:53

We are what we eat. And besides that, 100 calories of one food versus another one can fill you up and make you feel satisfied and make you feel really good. And another 100 calories keeps you jonesing for something else 20 minutes later because it didn’t fulfill any nutrition needs.

Different foods can provide varying levels of satisfaction and nutrition, despite having the same number of calories.

Wendy 2:53

Satisfaction – is one of the big things we want to talk about today. Satisfaction in the palate, like on our tongue has been manipulated so much by highly processed food industry, that our dopamine receptors are all firing with this false food.

Debbie 3:39

Our taste buds had been hijacked. We have a podcast about that very sadly.

Wendy 3:43

So we don’t know what an apple really tastes like anymore. And so some of the calories we’re going to talk about, they might make us tick, give us some sort of happiness via the taste, but it gives us no energy. It gives us no strength. And it’s just empty calories.

Debbie 4:15

So let’s just start with our little list of 10 or 11 things, right? We

Wendy 4:22

We’re kind of doing a comparison with this list. We aren’t demonizing any of these foods or making any of them a halo food. We are simply bringing awareness to what 100 calories looks like in food. The first example is 1/3 of an average size avocado is 100 calories, and so is one bite of a brownie.

Debbie 4:46

One bite.

Who has one bite of a brownie?

I would eat a third of an avocado and be like, okay, good.

Wendy 4:55

It fills you up. It’s got fiber and it’s got great fat and you’ll I have some energy from it longer than just one bite of a brownie. Absolutely. So there’s one example.

Debbie 5:08

Another one is one large apple is 100 calories. Think of that compared to a pop tart. A half of a pop tart is 100 calories.

Wendy 5:25

I used to like Pop Tarts! And now that’s one of those ultra processed foods that has 100 ingredients in it. If you’ve got Pop Tarts in your kitchen right now, look at the very long list.

Debbie 5:40

There’s 100 Ingredients for each calorie. There’s one for each ingredient! The apples I get are called envy apples. I don’t know we’re out of Apple season, but I’m having the stored apples from the from the fall season. They’re still so delicious. It’s like candy. It’s so delicious. I’m getting the fiber and the real sugar that my body knows what to do with.

Wendy and Debbie emphasize the importance of chewing and digesting food properly, and how it affects our overall health and well-being.

Wendy 5:40

And you’re crunching – you’re actually chewing which is really good for the jaw. The shape of our face has gotten flat right and flabby because we aren’t chewing our foods. When you bite into an apple and you’re chewing you’re also getting all of the bolus with the saliva and everything which starts your digestive process. All the mechanicals behind chewing an Apple versus a pop tart that is to kind of melts in your mouth.

Debbie 6:35

And it’s only half of one anyway. Again, you’ll be more satisfied with the large apple.

Wendy 6:45

The next example we have is blueberries. We’re coming into blueberry season here in a couple months. Blueberries are just so fun to eat. A half cup of blueberries is about 100 calories. And we just arbitrarily threw that up against Oreos and 100 calories is under two Oreos. And who’s going to cut an Oreo, right? We just recently had a very long, funny conversation about splitting Oreos.

Debbie 7:20

Right! Who’s gonna cut Oreo? Nobody.

Wendy 7:29

A half a cup of fresh blueberries (or defrosted) popped into your mouth one by one, they’re just fantastic.

Debbie 7:40

And that blue color includes all those phytonutrients and fiber and other things that we don’t even know about.

Wendy 7:44

Even frozen ones popped into your mouth when it’s really hot is very cooling. They’re sweet and yummy. This next one is interesting.

Debbie 7:54

100 radishes is 100 calories. So one each radish is one calorie basically. Or you can have eight Doritos.

Wendy 8:24

Again, who eats just eight Doritos?

Debbie 8:28

I mean, I’m sure there are people who portion out Doritos or whatever because they know they probably are not going to be feeling so great.

Wendy 8:40

And both liven up your taste buds. Radishes are crunchy and they have a little bit of spice to it. Again, you’re chewing a lot. And the Doritos have a combination of sugar, salt and fat and artificial flavors. But bite into a crispy radish and it makes your taste buds zing also.

Here’s another one. And they’re pretty opposite. 13 large shrimp – and that’s a lot – it’s more than one serving – is 100 calories.

Surprising right!? And then we we put that up against something that we both used to eat in college a lot, which is the ramen noodle containers. And it’s only half of a container of ramen noodles for 100 calories. We’re getting a really rich source of protein in that shrimp, which turns into strength and muscle and all things good for the brain.

Debbie 9:50

And shrimp has some good fats in there too. And unless you’re sharing a ramen thing, nobody eats half of that. Next – here’s a really popular yummy treat for people – hummus. So four tablespoons of hummus, which is a good serving size is the same as a third of a cup of ice cream. Now, a third of a cup is probably even smaller than those little kitty cups that you get. Not very satisfactory to eat a third of a cup of ice cream.

Wendy 10:43

I don’t think so. If I’m eating ice cream, I’m having more than a third of a cup. Right?

Debbie 10:48

So if I have three tablespoons of houmous with a few radishes, there’s 100 calories. Nice and creamy too.

Wendy 10:59

Oh, this one’s fun. Another 100 raspberries is 100 calories and they’re absolutely delicious. Pop in your mouth with all those little tiny seeds vs 41 grams of marshmallows, which we didn’t convert to cup.

Debbie 11:28

Probably equals a couple marshmallows.

Wendy 11:34

Marshmallows just kind of melt in your mouth. They’re so temporary. 100 Raspberries take a little bit longer to eat and have all that great fiber and again, phytonutrients with that red brilliant color.

Debbie 11:49

And if love olives 16 black olives is 100 calories. I love olives.

Wendy 12:04

If I’m snacking on olives as I’m cooking or have it out as an appetizer on a platter with other food, I never eat that many.

Debbie 12:17

Right, I wouldn’t say I would eat 16 olives in one sitting. And 18 cheezits is also 100 calories. Roll that around in the brain.

Wendy 12:33

Both have fat. Yes. But completely different kinds of fat.

Debbie 12:40

The ones in olives is so good for us in so many ways. Olive oil is like the number one wonderful oil in the world. There’s no downside to olives and olive oil

Wendy 12:54

We both have asparagus growing in our garden. You have at least 31 spears right now, which is a lot a lot of asparagus to eat at one time. We would eat that over a few days. But 31 spears is 100 calories. And we’re tossing that up against 12 Gummy Bears.

Debbie 13:18

12 Gummy bears is 100 calories. And that that one really surprises me. Can you just visualize 12 Gummy Bears next to 31 spears of asparagus!?

Yeah, that’s pretty funny.

Another one is 15 dry roasted cashews. 15 is a good size handful which is really satisfying. And you probably won’t be hungry for a couple hours after that. Right? Or you could have two medium chocolate chip cookies. Which is very different. And you’d probably be hungry within 45 minutes. And there’s nothing wrong with chocolate chip cookies.

Wendy 14:06

No. In fact, we have a delicious chocolate chip cookie in our cookbook called amazing chocolate chip.

Debbie 14:12

It’s not your typical chocolate chip cookie, and it tastes really really good. Yeah. So two chocolate chip cookies I think people would be satisfied with. But again, you’d be hungry in 45 minutes. So if you’re looking for a sustainable snack, and you like cashews, 15 cashews is 100 calories.

Wendy 14:32

All right. So here, here’s another one. Maybe the last one we’re going to highlight is 25 baby carrots versus carrot cake. And I like carrot cake. I’m going to eat carrot cake. That’s one thing if I make it or if it’s homemade from someone, I’m gonna have it. I’m just going to remember that one baby this slice is 100 calories versus 25 baby carrots. Again, one of the things we’re trying to outline here is showing what real whole foods does for us and the nutrient density of what 100 calories of real food is versus ultra processed foods. It’s a big difference with both satisfaction with our palette and also our longevity.

Debbie 15:24

True. And I’m visualizing, if we put together a small meal or a snack of a few of these to total 500 calories of whole foods next to 500 calories of the other foods that we were talking about – the pile of real foods would be huge. It would probably be almost too much to eat next to the little bit that would lead us to feel unsatisfied, too. Yeah. Because we want more

Wendy 15:51

We want to be satisfied and to not bonk. I know for me, when I have excess sugar, I get a spike and then a fall.

Debbie 16:02

I’m not as sensitive to sugar as you are but I get the same thing. And it’s not as much the fall makes me go downhill as much as it makes me wanting more of something and so I keep looking for more things to eat to keep that energy going. Do you keep getting up and looking in the frigerator and the cabinet and you can’t find anything.

Link to one of our favorite home made energy bars.

Wendy 16:30

Right, because we don’t get satisfied.

Debbie 16:33

That’s right. And again, we’re not demonizing these foods. We eat some of these foods too – like ice cream, for sure. I love ice cream and don’t think of calories when I’m eating ice cream, either. I have ice cream every once in a while because I’m eating real whole foods most of the time. And so that’s really what we want you to think about. It’s not so much the calories. It’s what kinds of foods are you eating? And how do you feel when you eat them?

Wendy and Debbie emphasize the importance of considering how food makes you feel, rather than just the calorie count.

Wendy 17:08

How do you feel? That’s our number one takeaway. When you eat a food, how do you feel afterwards?

Debbie 17:13

We’d love to hear comments and questions. So if you have any, please share them with us. And also share our podcast.

Wendy 17:25

Thanks for listening and thanks for passing it along to friends and family.

What’s 100 Calories?