A Question about the nutional facts of raw meat.?

Question

Are the values calculated as it is (raw) or are they referring to the cooked product? For example with ground meat If it says it has 280 calories per 1/4 lb is that cooked or a raw weight? How would you calculate it for cooked? When you drain ground meat a lot of fat goes away as do calories I am assuming. I count calories and this one makes me wonder. any help is appreciated.

Answer 1

Calorie counts are based on the raw weight of the meat, after that meat is cooked and lifted away from it's natural fats. Calorie can be further reduced by squeezing the fat out between paper towels. Figure a savings of about 9 calories for each gram of fat you can get out of the meat.

You can also save a lot of calories by buying very lean beef cuts like Flank steak and then processing(chopping) it into ground meat. Very lean beef tends to be pretty dry so add a tablespoon or so of beef broth for each 4 ounces of beef.

Another very easy way to save calories is to make 3 ounce burger patties instead of 4 ounces. This is barely noticeable after the meat is cooked and is an automatic 25% calorie savings.