Just one more question

Question
Sorry to bother you again, but I value your advice, this question should be simple for ya. Here goes; I have looked at several online calorie counters and they all seem to differ on how many calories that a specific amount of food contains. Is there a calorie counter that you recommend? Or should  I just go by food labels? It would be really cool if you could add a calorie counter to your already awesome website
;-). Thanks for your time!

Answer
You are no bother and this is what I'm here for!  I'm thrilled to have the opportunity to help others who are where I've been (weight problems, eating disorders and frustrated!).

http://www.calorie-count.com/   is a decent, FREE calorie counter site, but some of the counts seem a bit high (ie: bananas are said to be 200 calories, but generally, a small/medium banana is just about 100 calories).  The discrepancy in calories for for things like this is the size.  
In other cases, 'serving size' varies, sometimes by up to 3 times!  A croissant, for example, in France is about 1/3 the size of the croissants typically available in the U.S.  A soft drink in the U.S. that's considered 'small' or 'regular' is frequently 2 or 3 actual "servings" (which are based on 8 ounces each).  

Food labels are a good guide, but they've been found to be 'off', depending on what they think the consumer wants. If it's a diet or 'health' food, they'll likely underestimate their calorie count/fat percentage, etc..  

OH! And be very, very careful about what the packages indicate a serving is!  I absolutely hate this, but it's a way to mislead people legally.  Just the other day I picked up a little carton of those cheese crackers - a very little carton, certainly no more than a handful, or handful and a half.  The calorie count seemed reasonable UNTIL I read that it was supposed to be TWO servings (that means DOUBLE the listed calories if you eat the thing like any normal person would).  
Many other foods do this too.  So be careful....it's not just the calories listed that matters, but how many servings the manufacturer says is in the package.

Write anytime - and thanks for suggesting the calorie counter on my site.  I'll try to put one on in the next couple days.  I appreciate the input!

http://www.geocities.com/thereverend1investigates/  

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