MPG

When you think about a car and the miles per gallon (MPG) you can get driving around, that it is pretty easy to understand.  One of the problems with talking about the calories in food is it isn’t easy to understand what that means.  The number of calories in food tells you the amount of energy in a food. But once you know the amount of energy in a food it still doesn’t really tell you how fast you can use that energy or the MPG.   Just like you may know how many gallons of gas are in your tank, but you won’t know how long that lasts if you don’t know how many MPG you car usually gets.

Ever see one of those 100 calorie snack packs?  Many people think that 100 calories isn’t much, because you can suck one of those snack packs down and still not be full.  But the MPG is more important.  So 100 calories roughly means that it will take 30 minutes of comfortable walking to burn up those 100 calories.

The average can of sugary soda has more than 200 calories.  So it takes roughly one hour of walking comfortably to burn up that can of soda.

When you choose vegetables instead of other foods you can fill up, but with fewer calories.  A diet plan that promises you’ll be full but with fewer calories is not a bad deal.  It’s the fiber and the water in these foods that makes them low calorie.  Think about gasoline again, only now you want low octane fuel. Vegetables and some fruit are low octane, fewer calories per bite than fatty foods.  So your tank is full.  You won’t be so hungry and you won’t have to walk as much to empty the fuel in your tank, but you’ll still have to walk.

Skip the 100 calorie snack pack; skip the high octane fatty food.  Instead pick up the vegetables and fruit.  Remember 100 calories is the energy you use in a 30 minute walk.