## Friday, June 06, 2008

### The Colarie: A new way of measuring calorie intake

Recommended daily energy intake for a man is generally considered to be roughly 2,500 Calories (or kilocalories: 1 Calorie = 1,000 calories) and for a woman it's 2,000. The problem with those figures is that they are rather abstract. If you are trying to count your energy intake it would be much easier to deal with something smaller and easier to understand.

Hence my idea for the Colarie.

1 Colarie is the number of Calories in a single can of non-diet Coca Cola. It's easy to appreciate that a single can of Coke isn't very good for you and so comparing a food stuff to a can of Coke is an easy measure of whether you are eating something that's got too much fat or sugar in it.

The actual Calorie count for a Coke can varies by country. In France there are 139 Calories in a can, in the US there are 155. So I've settled on 147 as a good measure. So 1 Colarie = 147 Calories.

That means a man needs to consume the equivalent of 17 cans of Coke per day; for a woman it's 13.5 cans of Coke per day. That isn't a recommended diet, however!

So next time you are faced with a snack bar, use the Colarie measure. Just the other day I was presented with a small biscuit to go with a cup of tea on a BA flight. Looking at the Calorie count it was around 230 Calories for this tiny biscuit. That's 1.5 Colaries!

I didn't eat it.

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If you enjoyed this blog post, you might enjoy my travel book for people interested in science and technology: The Geek Atlas. Signed copies of The Geek Atlas are available.

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