Are ALL the foods on the database wrong?!

I just started using Calorie Count Plus to help me get started with losing about 40#....and have been really disapointed with the food log database. Almost everything I've looked up has been wrong when I compare it to the package, by like a factor of 2 or more (on calories - and yes I'm comparing apples-to-apples on the serving sizes). That is, what I can find data for, at least!! I guess I'm the only one that eats Newmans Own Lite Lime Vinagrette.

Has anybody else noticed this problem? I'm thinking about switching to Daily Plate but hate to lose a weeks worth of data....it is getting annoying entering everything in manually though.

Does user-entered data become part of the database? I would think that if so, more diverse foods would be able to be found.

Anyway, rant off!

CR

You'll probably find that the daily plate or another food database site isn't any more accurate than this one. The problem is that manufacturers are ALWAYS tweaking their products to try to make them taste better, or look more appealing, or more often nowadays to cut their costs by a few fractions of a percent... and every time they change something, the stats for the food change too. Your record-keeping doesn't have to be 101% accurate to still be valid -  80 or 90% accuracy is more than enough. You might not be able to find your favourite salad dressing in the database, but is there another one that's similar to it already listed? If so, you can just use that instead. (eg. I like Kraft light thousand island dressing and it's not in the database at all, but there's another brand with the same calorie count listed so I just use that instead.) What often happens is that the portion size has been shrunk a little since the database entry was made... so you can always just fudge your numbers a little to make it up. (eg.Kozy Shack pudding used to be made with 2% milk but they changed to 1% and cut the calories a little, so I just say that I ate 0.8 cup instead of 1 cup so that the calories match up to real life.)

And lastly, if you do enter your own food into the database it doesn't get saved for anyone else to use (that would be a neat feature but I expect very complex for them to enable!)... but you can tag it and save it to your own personal list so that it's easy to log next time.

Good info, thanks.  I was a bit peeved because almost everything I've gone in to enter in the past 2 days has been off by a factor of 2 on the calories.  I don't mind adding in my own data and I have tagged a bunch of stuff to re-use, but I figured if the site was full of a bunch of user-entered data that was erroneous I'd cut my losses and go elsewhere before I had a lot of time invested.

Anyway I'll keep after it - I find the calorie tracking really helpful and the analysis tool is pretty slick too.  I'm trying to get down to 200# from 250 and have already lost almost 8 lb this week - that's a record for me in one week - and should be able to break the 240# plateau that I was holding at forever, in about another 3-4 days.

Best part is I can keep the doctor and the wife happy because I can prove I'm not being unhealthy - I am eating about 1500 calories per day and feel good, and the analysis tool shows a good balance :D

Anyway thanks again for the info & tips.

CR

We tried the Daily Plate when we first started out and switched over to CC and liked it a lot better. It does get fustrating at times, but I just add what I can't find or as someone else mentioned, find something that is close to the calories in what ever you are trying to enter. We have been at this about two months now. Hubby has lost 33 pounds and I have lost 11 1/2. Good Luck in your losing weight.

Wendy In Alaska

Could you give some specific examples?  I've found the data base here to be very accurate.  I've been using it to log my food since Jan of 2006 and I've lost a good bit of weight (see my profile)

Is it possible that the serving sizes don't match?  Most items in the database allow you to choose the serving size, or to put in a specific number of ounces or grams.

If you can post links to the items you're having trouble with, maybe we can help. 

Claire,

The two that I can think of most recently were:

Green Giant Szechuan Stir-Fry

and

Uncle Bens Ready Rice Teryaki flavor

Both were off by half on the calories - I ended up entering my own data.  I'm sure the serving sizes matched, I was surprised that they were off by that much and triple-checked.  There were some other anomolies too but not as easily noticed because they were for "generic" items like bread, apples and green beans. 

It would be great if users could save their data into a common database that other users could pull from - maybe have a "flag" and "ranking" system on the items too so users can identify errors and confirm accurate entries.

The purpose of my post wasn't to criticize as much as to honestly ask if the database was "generally bad" - I do not have a significant amount of experience using it yet and wanted to make sure I wasn't investing my time in the wrong site.

Overall I'm very happy with the tools, just wanted to find out if there was a major problem I should be wary of.

Thanks again,
Chri

For prepared foods CC gets information from the manufacturer.  If they change the package label, it won't match any more.  The best thing to do is scroll down to the bottom of the page and click on contact.  Choose the right category, type your message, and it will go straight to the person who takes care of that - there's a whole team who work on the database.

If you can provide a link to the item in the database, and then list the information that doesn't match on the actual label, it would be a great help.

Personally, when I use packaged foods, which is very, very seldom, I simply enter a custom item and tag it for future reference. 

I notice this all the time. Just today I was adding a whole wheat english muffin and it said 65 in two places. No WAY is an english muffin 65. Maybe half an english muffin but it didn't say that.

Also the Michelob Ultra is 95, and thats wrong in two places as well. This database needs a good scrubbing.

cjrpn, we realize you need information and would like to help.  Those are both processed foods.  Our database maintenance team gets the information directly from the manfacturers who often provide incomplete information.

Manufacturers often change their labels when they modify a formula or adjust a serving size, or correct a mistake.  In these cases, go by the package label.  I was hoping for links to these items so I can look at them.

In the mean time, please do see if the items have a Report Bad Grade link.  If so, just click on it to report the item.  If no link is available, use the contact link at the very bottom of the page.

Original Post by cab_codespring:

I notice this all the time. Just today I was adding a whole wheat english muffin and it said 65 in two places. No WAY is an english muffin 65. Maybe half an english muffin but it didn't say that.

Also the Michelob Ultra is 95, and thats wrong in two places as well. This database needs a good scrubbing.

 Once again, there is no way to tell if there is a problem unless you provide a link to the item.  I suspect that with the english muffin you chose the wrong serving size.  There are so many english muffin listings that it's impossible for me look it up for you. 

If you believe an item is wrong, as we've pointed out ever so many times on this forum, you can use the contact link at the bottom of the page to report it.  Or, on most items, scroll down and find Report Bad Grade to report it.  This is your website and you can help our great team correct any mistakes to the huge database.  Remember CC is free and won't start charging us money for hireing extra database maintenance people.

Clairelaine,

This certainly isn't a factor of 2, and it IS basically a serving size discrepancy, but check Cheerios

My box of Cheerios says that 1 cup of Cheerios weighs 28 grams and contains 100 calories.  CC says that 1 cup of Cheerios weight 30 grams and contains 110 calories.

I have always measured my Cheerios by weight alone, so I don't know which weight estimate is more accurate.  I would say that unlike the flakey cereals, it seems like the listed weight should match the volumetric serving.

That is the only discrepancy I've ever seen, and frankly, I couldn't care less about a 10-calorie (okay, 15ish, since I eat 42 grams of Cheerios) difference.  If I were seeing factors of 2 differences, I would definitely complain!!!

Original Post by megsambit:

Clairelaine,

This certainly isn't a factor of 2, and it IS basically a serving size discrepancy, but check Cheerios

My box of Cheerios says that 1 cup of Cheerios weighs 28 grams and contains 100 calories.  CC says that 1 cup of Cheerios weight 30 grams and contains 110 calories.

I have always measured my Cheerios by weight alone, so I don't know which weight estimate is more accurate.  I would say that unlike the flakey cereals, it seems like the listed weight should match the volumetric serving.

That is the only discrepancy I've ever seen, and frankly, I couldn't care less about a 10-calorie (okay, 15ish, since I eat 42 grams of Cheerios) difference.  If I were seeing factors of 2 differences, I would definitely complain!!!

 that seems to me like a typical case of the manufacturer changing the label slightly.  And you're right, it's insignificant.

If you were to find a big discrepancy, don't just complain - report it!  We'll all benefit.

What bothers me sometimes about the database is that so much of the food in it is branded. You want to up a basic food and half of the time your only choices are branded by a manufacturer or store. "Wegaman's stew beef" comes to mind just from today's experience. I forget whether I was able to find just plain "figs," for my salad today, but there was definately no "mixed greens" that didn't have a company's brand attached.

It would be really nice to offer "super-user" accounts to a few of the more dedicated users here, and allow them to act as data stewards on the database.