We still hear a lot these days about how we should watch our calories and calorie counting but what actually is a calorie?

To start off a calorie isn’t real like protein or fat or carbohydrates are. A calorie is a unit of measurement. When we speak of calories today we generally associate them with food. However calories actually apply to anything containing energy. And in fact calories are made up of fat, protein, and carbohydrates.

The Definition
The official definition of a Calorie (capital C) is the amount of heat (energy) needed to increase the temperature of one kg of water by 1 °C, which is exactly 1000 small calories, or about 4.184 kJ.

What is this Calories and Kilocalories Stuff?
Under this definition, 1 g of pure carbohydrate yields about 4 Calories of energy, and the recommended intake for an adult person is about 2,000 - 2,500 Calories/day. It is alternatively referred to as Calorie (Cal), kilocalorie (kcal) or even calorie with lowercase ‘c’.

1 g Carbohydrates: 4 calories
1 g Protein: 4 calories
1 g Fat: 9 calories

Hence it turns out that the calories on a food package are actually kilocalories (1,000 calories = 1 kilocalorie). As mentioned above a food calorie contains 4,184 joules. Hence a can of soft drink that labels it contains 200 food calories actually contains 200,000 regular calories, or 200 kilocalories.

Therefore the same applies to exercise. When a fitness chart or a machine states that you are burning 100 calories, what it really means is 100 kilocalories. Confused? Don’t be. Again all that a calories is is a unit of measurement.

Calories Are Energy
The calorie as a unit of measurement tells us the energy in food and beverages that we consume. Everyone needs the energy from calories to function in our daily lives. Everything we do relies on the energy that comes from calories.

Food is fuel/energy to our bodies and we need this to continue throughout the day. Liquids are also considered fuels to our body and likewise contain calories. Soft drinks and some other foods are often referred to as “empty calories”. This means they carry no nutritional value except for the calories that they contain. A sure fire way to put on weight is to consume empty calories without burning them off.

No matter what form the calories come in if you put too much in without burning them off through expending energy you will find yourself gaining weight. Hopefully you are starting to see if you didn’t already that the energy you put in needs to equal the energy out if you want to maintain your weight.

Everyone has a basal caloric need everyday to provide our bodies with enough energy to get through the day and to keep our organs running. When you consume in excess of that caloric need, the body doesn’t have any choice but to store those extra calories in the form of fat.

When you have taken in 3,500 calories above your daily calorie requirements you will gain 1 pound!

Will You Lose Weight And Get A Flat Stomach If You Count Calories

We can then assume that if it is taking us 3,500 extra calories to gain 1 pound, then we would need to cut 3,500 calories from our intake to lose 1 pound.

If your goal is to lose some weight or achieve a flat stomach then a good idea is to try reducing your calorie intake by 500 calories a day or to burn up to 500 calories a day through exercise. This is a safe start to weight loss and will lead to an average of 1 pound lost in a week. One of the most important things to remember is to not cut calories back too much too quickly. This is likely to be unsustainable and could actually prevent weight loss with your body trying to hold on to the fat it has stored, doing so could also put your overall health at risk.

Sources:
http://www.howstuffworks.com/calorie1.htm
http://weightloss.about.com/od/nutrition/a/blwhatcal.htm
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Calorie

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