I don't know where to put this question, but I think that the most experienced people who can answer me are here... Well, anyway, I was wondering if I can drink a "cappuccino for kids" that I have at home - whether I should count it as part of my blocks, or not... 100 g: carbs - 76.0 g proteins - 11.3 g fat - 5.3 g 1680 kJ/397 kcal A serving size is 13g. I am a newbie and all this is still kind of complicated... Today is my first day! :D So, can anyone help me? BTW, can I drink coffee or tea only as a part of a meal, or at any time?

The nutritional information is for 100 g of the powder...

I'm pretty new at this too, but the first thing I see in your cappuccino is that it has way too many carbs ... i.e. sugar. With 76 grams, that translates into 8 carb blocks (76 divided by 9). No meal should contain more than 4 blocks.

:shock: The info you gave is for 100 g, and the serving size is for 13 g. 8) The first thing to do is to get the numbers per serving. :o To do that we start by taking 13 (serving size) and divide by 100 (the size for the information given). This gives us 0.13. :roll: Now to get the carbs per serving, we multiply the 76 by 0.13 76 x 0.13 = 9.88g carbs :P Like wise for protein and fat: 11.3 x 0.13 = 1.47g protein 5.3 x 0.13 = 0.69g fat :) To get block size, we divide by the grams per block: 9.88/9 = 1 Carb (about that much) 1.47/7 = 0 Protein (really 0.2 rounding down) 0.69/3 = 0 Fat (really 0.2 rounding down) :roll: So your drink is about 1 block of carbs per serving and you need to add about 1 protein and 1 fat block to balance it for every serving. :wink: But as said above, it is probably all sugar and is therefore "unfavorable", so limit it to only 25% of total carbs (ie the other 3 blocks of a 4 block meal should be favorable carb). I would recommend, that if you are just starting, you avoid unfavorables and caffiene, at least for a couple of weeks. Then you might try to ease them back in if you want to, but that's my opinion.

JJinNJ, thank you SOOOO much. I understand now how to calculate it! Thank you!!! :D

And... can I drink coffee or tea only as a part of a meal, or at any time?

Sears doesn't recommend caffeine at all--says that it can spike blood sugar. I've gone off it except for one cup of coffee with breakfast, which I seem to tolerate fine. I've noticed that drinking coffee without a meal now makes me jittery and hungry, so I do the decaf thing if I really want it (which isn't often). It's different for everyone, but I'd suggest going off it for a few weeks, and then reintroducing it to see how you deal with it. Keeping water around and drinking that all day has made me feel a lot better, and since we need to drink a lot of water to keep hydrated (and to keep from retaining water), it's easier for me this way. Just my experience. Different for everyone. :)

yeah, I asked about decaffenated coffee...

How can I figure out how many grams are in the standard U.S. measuring devises? The teaspoon has 5 ml (for liquid), yet the fructose ingredients says 1 tsp. = 4 gms. How can I figure out for 1/4, 1/3, and 1/2 cups? My conversion calculator can't convert cups to grams, as the weight is different. It can't do oz. to tsp. or Tbs. either, for the same reason. There are a 3 block and 4 block Zoners in my house, so I need to convert a lot of recipes. Thanks. :?

If I want conversions, I go to this site, its about the best I know: http://www.onlineconversion.com/ If it can be "converted" its got it. The problem you are having is that you can't easily convert weight to volume as you said, because different products have different density, shape, etc... The best you can do then is see if you can find ounces (weight) and convert those to grams, like you did for 1tsp=4gram fructose. Use the site above to see that 0.25 cup=12 tsp, so 1/4 cup of your fructose = 4x12=48 grams.

Your help in this, and in other threads has been invaluable! I think that I might be able to uncross my eyes now...until the next time, LOL. :wink: Don't think that all the time you spent in researching and replying isn't appreciated: it IS! Thanks again. I do have that URL bookmarked, in addition to http://www.nutritiondata.com/index.html, but when 1 measuring spoon can have 3 different measurements, that's time to scream :)

So... :lol: :oops: can I drink decaffenated coffee only as a part of a meal, or at any time?

I have a great program for my Palm called YAUC - yet another unit converter. http://www.pilotzone.com/palm/previ...59856.html is the website to get it from. It's freeware and I've found it very useful, even moreso since I've been Zoning. Here's the blurb (though I most often use it for oz. to grams :-)) "But Yet Another supports more than 561 units (and nearly every letter of the alphabet!) for acceleration, angle, angular acceleration, angular velocity, area, capacitance, charge, current, dynamic viscosity, energy, force, inductance, kinematic viscosity, length, magnetic flux, mass, power, pressure and SI prefixes. But hold on. Yet Another Unit Converter also supports conversions for solid angle, specific heat, speed, temperature, thermal conductivity, time, velocity, voltage, volume and weight." Robbin

[quote:667a94e16b="angelrob"]I have a great program for my Palm called YAUC - yet another unit converter. http://www.pilotzone.com/palm/previ...59856.html is the website to get it from. It's freeware and I've found it very useful, even moreso since I've been Zoning. Here's the blurb (though I most often use it for oz. to grams :-)) "But Yet Another supports more than 561 units (and nearly every letter of the alphabet!) for acceleration, angle, angular acceleration, angular velocity, area, capacitance, charge, current, dynamic viscosity, energy, force, inductance, kinematic viscosity, length, magnetic flux, mass, power, pressure and SI prefixes. But hold on. Yet Another Unit Converter also supports conversions for solid angle, specific heat, speed, temperature, thermal conductivity, time, velocity, voltage, volume and weight." Robbin[/quote:667a94e16b] I don't have a Palm :( but thanks for the info. Hopefully someone else can benefit from the link. Joan

I would think you could drink decaf any time, if you really need it, but most Zoners do the water thing. I've found that my stomach will get upset with just coffee (even decaf) unless it's with a meal. But, if coffee is part of your routine and is important, you should be able to drink it, I think. I'm sure others will have more info on the pros and cons on it. So, enjoy your decaf! :)

I've been avoiding the coffee question, because as stated Zoning frowns on the caffiene - insulin response issue. Some recent work indicates this may not be the case, but that jury is still out. Personally speaking, when I die, they will be prying a steaming mug of regular, black, unsweet from one hand and a cognac (in moderation of course) from the other! When I started Zoning I refrained from coffee for about 2 weeks and then started adding coffee back in after that. I personally have not felt any difference with or without, but found I missed that bitter, black gold, steaming cup of goodness. So here I sit, sippin on a mug between keystrokes and saying no more than do what works for you. But I will say, do not ruin the coffee by putting creamers/milks/sweets/flavors in it. The real culprit in coffee, IMHO, is not the beverage so much as the junk (ie really dense calories) everybody puts in it!

The average serving of real coffee (grounds) is about 7g and has one carb and nothing else worth mentioning - it actually has a teeny amount of protein but not enough to count. (It's worth 5 calories btw.) The average spoonful of instant coffee (decaf or caffeinated) is 1.7g and has 2.6 carbs and basically nothing else( and it's worth 6 calories). I've checked a couple of brands and this is true for them (one was Nescafe which is a big brand here). All kinds of tea (including herbals) come out at 2.5 grams of carb and virtually nothing else (and it's 10 cals). There may well be herbal and fruit blend teas these days with more - the herbals I meant are the old fashioned old herb teas such as pepermint, camomile, etc. For those of you using Splenda in your hot drinks the tabs are about .33grams of carb per tablet and 2 tsp of the powder is about 1 carb. Apparrently the sachets are double the powder but I can't confirm this as we don't get the sachets in Australia. You'd need to check the website. I'm a coffee addict (and I don't plan to give it up as it doesn't seem to affect me at all) so what I do for my two morning cups is measure one block (P&C) skim milk if I'm having it white and use it to make two lattes and I either eat something with 1F if it'll be a while before I eat any more, or eat my remaining two blocks of breakfast at the same time making sure that I've balanced the fat for the total. Mostly I have it black and unadulterated. I don't count the real coffee as two cups is worth very little but if I have two cups of instant (which is rare) then I count the carbs for those as 1/2 carb mini block [i:8a1e0500f1]for both cups of black coffee[/i:8a1e0500f1]. That said, if it doesn't cause problems then you can probably tolerate a little - but I should stress that I'm not a purist and I'd rather coffee than sweets/desserts any time lol.