How we calculate nutrition
Every nutrition figure here is calculated from the ingredients: each line converted to grams, multiplied by the ingredient's reference value, divided by the number of servings. If one ingredient is missing, we show no total at all – an incomplete one would be two hundred calories off and still look plausible.
- 93 %
- calculated from ingredients
- 305
- recipes in total
- 22
- estimated instead of summed
Calculated, not guessed
Every ingredient line is converted to grams, multiplied by that ingredient's reference value and divided by the number of servings. The values apply to the raw ingredient as listed. Canned goods count at drained weight, bone-in meat at purchase weight – you eat roughly 70 per cent of a chicken thigh.
All or nothing
If a single ingredient has no reference value, the recipe gets no total at all. That is deliberate: a figure that leaves out the butter looks entirely plausible and is 200 calories wrong. An obviously absent number is more honest than a quietly incorrect one.
Two reasons a number can be missing
One is our job: an ingredient is not in the table yet, and we add it. The other is the dish itself. Frying oil mostly stays in the pan; in a strained stock the solids go in the bin. Counting a litre of oil in full would give five times the real figure, leaving it out would suggest a fat-free dish – both wrong. Those recipes carry an editorial estimate, and they say so.
Percentages depend on the country, not the language
In the EU energy is given in kilojoules and kilocalories per 100 grams, as Regulation 1169/2011 requires. In the US the label says “Calories” and shows no percentage – the FDA panel does not carry one for energy. Fibre has no official EU reference amount at all, and the US daily value for sugar applies only to added sugar. Where there is no official figure, we show no percentage.
What the number is not
A laboratory result. Two onions do not weigh the same, fat content varies from pack to pack, and water evaporates during cooking – the energy stays in the pot, the weight does not. That is why the figure is per serving and not per 100 grams of finished dish. Stating a cooked weight would be guesswork.
Frequently asked questions
- Why do some recipes have no calculated calorie count?
- Because an ingredient is missing, or the dish fundamentally does not add up – deep frying, for instance, where the oil never reaches the plate. Those recipes carry a labelled estimate instead of a total that would look reliable without being so.
- Do the values apply to the raw or the finished dish?
- To the raw ingredients, divided by the number of servings. Water evaporates during cooking while the energy stays, so a per-100-grams figure for the finished dish would be guesswork and we do not give one.
- Does “salt and pepper” count?
- No. Anything listed without a quantity does not enter the total.
- Why do I see different percentages than on an American site?
- Because the reference amounts differ. The EU follows Regulation 1169/2011, the US the FDA panel – the latter shows no percentage for energy at all, and its daily value for sugar applies only to added sugar.
- Does the number change when I adjust the servings?
- The ingredient quantities do; the per-serving figure does not, because it already refers to one serving. For build-your-own recipes it applies to the default selection, and a different combination shifts it, sometimes considerably.