Fruit cup calories?

Hi everyone:

I am hoping maybe someone can answer a question I have spent a lot of time reasearching and still getting no answer on. If I try to ask anyone in my family their thoughts on this, I get told I am being ridiculous.

I know it's better to eat fresh fruit, but I do enjoy fruit cups as well and usually I eat peaches or pears in light syrup. They're listed on the packaging as 70 or 80 calories a cup (depending on the brand). When I eat them, I usually drain as much of the juice out as I can get. My question is, does anyone have a rough estimate of how many calories are saved by draining the juice?

Thanks,

Nikki

A tablespoon of sugar syrup has about 25 Calories, so you could measure what comes out and subtract.  You should make sure the nutrition information given is for the whole package, and not "drained"

Dole makes some really good fruit cups in water that are only 25 calories each. Think of how many you could eat if you took out the unnecessary syrup!

Nikki,

I can tell you very accurately what the amount of calories you save by draining the juice.  I used to try to eat fresh fruit as much as possible, but I just got so frustrated!  I hated the inconsistencies in fruit, seasonality, etc...  Buy an orange, just to find out it is hard and dry, buy a kiwi that is hard as a rock, etc haha you get the point.

I really wish they would tell you the nutrition of the canned fruit or vegetables after they are drained.  Unfortanately, very few if any do.  But this will help you a little bit, even if you have to drain the juices into a measuring cup to get a more accurates estimate.

There is 110 calories in 1 cup of drained light syrup. 210 calories in 1 cup of drained heavy syrup. 

So for example, if you have 1 cup of fruit and light syrup, and it shows it as 80 calories on the label, drain it into a cup.  It would likely be about 1/4 to 1/3 of a cup of light syrup.  So that would mean that you would have about 2/3 to 3/4 of a cup of just fruit.  So by draining the light syrup, you would be eating about 40-45 calories, and saving at least 30 calories by draining the fruit.

Another tip is I highly recommend that you do not rinse the fruit.  There are lots of people that say you should drain it (I agree) and then rinse it (I disagree).  Yes you will lose some of the nutrients (most noteably water soluable Vitamin A, C, and some B vitamins) when you drain the liquids, but that is only about 20% loss.  If you rinse the fruit, you might save yourself about 5 more calories, but you will also be risking the chance of draining more essential vitamins and minerals and it just is not worth the extra 5 calories. 

There is more than enough research, even fairly recent, that suggests canned fruit and veggies are equal in comparison to fresh or frozen.  And like I said, it is all worth it to pop open a can of fruit, to have a consistent taste and nutrition. 

Justin

Had a cup today and measured out how much I drained from the cup. It was a little over 3 tablespoons.

Fillefollie- I'll look for them next time I am at the store. They sound worth trying.

Justin- I know all too well of getting nasty fruit! I LOVE peaches and either I am too picky with how I like them (rock hard) or they are just not growing good in my area, but it is incredibly difficult to get them the way I like them.

Thanks everyone