How to Calculate the Caloric Value of a Meal

Determining the caloric value of a meal is a simple process when you eat packaged foods. All the information you need is on the nutritional label. When you are cooking homemade meals, however, calculating the caloric value may seem like more trouble than it's worth. But there are several free websites offering nutritional information for various foods and the caloric value can be determined using basic math skills.

Things You'll Need

• Calorie counter (online or book)
• Calculator

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Instructions

• 1

  Add up the calories for all ingredients used in each dish. For example, if you made spaghetti with 26 ounces of sauce (40 calories), one pound of ground turkey (760 calories), and one pound of pasta (1,680 calories), you would add the calories of the entire dish together. So the entire spaghetti dish would contain 2,480 calories.

• 2

  Divide the total calories of the dish by the number of servings. If you divided the spaghetti into six servings, each would contain about 413 calories.

• 3

  Repeat Steps 1 and 2 for any other homemade dishes included in the meal.

• 4

  Determine the caloric value of any other food items included in the meal, such as fruit or vegetables. Remember to include the calories of butter or other condiments you add.

• 5

  Determine the calories in the beverage you consume with the meal. These items may be easy to overlook but they can add hundreds of calories to your meal.

• 6

  Add up the calories in each food serving to calculate the total caloric value of the meal.