Written by Catherine Saxelby
on Wednesday, 30 September 2009.
Tagged: Calories, dieting, diets, energy, fat loss, food labels, FSANZ, guides, kilojoules, nutrients, nutrition, technology
Just like yards became metres and pounds became grams, so Calories have become kilojoules. Kilojoules are the metric equivalent of Calories and have replaced Calories in Australia and many other metric countries. Yet they're very confusing, especially to my US visitors who have always only known Calories (lucky for me, I grew up with Calories then had to learn kilojoules!)
These are the units used to measure food energy - kilojoules (abbreviated to kJ) and Calories (Cals). Like other food scientists, I use the capital C as shorthand for the longer correct term of kilocalories.
Kilojoules LOOK four times larger than Calories simply because there are more digits eg a bowl of cereal supplies around 480 kilojoules or 117 Calories.
Kilojoules are difficult to grasp if you don't have a feel for the numbers. So here's a handy guide to make things more ‘friendly'.
kilojoules kJ |
Calories Cals |
Intake or level |
10000 | 2400 | Typical level of intake of most teenagers |
8700 | 2070 | Average intake used to calculate %DI on food labels |
7500 | 1800 | Typical weight loss level for a moderately-active man |
7000 | 1650 | Typical weight loss level for a sedentary man |
6000 | 1500 | Typical weight loss level for a moderately-active woman |
5000 | 1200 | Typical weight loss level for a sedentary woman |
4000 | 1000 |
Supervised fast or meal replacement intake |
Food | Amount |
grams |
kJ |
Cals |
Bread | 1 slice | 30 g | 290 | 70 |
Egg | 1 large | 60 g | 335 | 80 |
Canned salmon, drained | 1 can | 150 g | 525 | 125 |
Tim Tam chocolate biscuits | 2 | 38 g | 840 | 200 |
Krispy Kreme doughnuts, original glazed | 2 | 104 g | 1680 | 400 |
Orange juice | 1 glass | 250ml | 400 | 95 |
1 glass orange juice = 400 kJ or 95 Calories
Round the kilojoules to the nearest 0 or 5. So 288 kJ rounds up to 290 kJ, while 292 rounds down to 290 kJ. Five kilojoules translates to 1 Calorie which is hardly anything and makes your useage of kilojoules easier - as there's fewer digits to remember. We round off all the kilojoule counts on our recipes for ease of use.
To obtain Calories, divide kilojoules by 4 for a quick conversion.
Catherine Saxelby has the answers! She is an accredited nutritionist, blogger and award-winning author. Her award-winning book My Nutritionary will help you cut through the jargon. Do you know your MCTs from your LCTs? How about sterols from stanols? What’s the difference between glucose and dextrose? Or probiotics and prebiotics? What additive is number 330? How safe is acesulfame K? If you find yourself confused by food labels, grab your copy of Catherine Saxelby’s comprehensive guide My Nutritionary NOW!
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