Hello all,

I made the "chocolate-cherry zone muffins" from the recipe in the Dr. Sears book "Zone Meals in Seconds" -- which are really good.

Too good in fact.

When I calculated the calorie count, I was very disturbed to find that each muffin had approx. 650 calories!

And when I calculated the nutrient percentages for each muffin, I estimated that each muffin had 45.7% carbs, 34.9 % fat and 19.5% protein. (74.4 grams of carbs, 25.3 grams of fat, and 31.6 grams of protein).

So not only are the calories per muffin astronomical, the nutrient balance is not zoned at all.

The recipe states that the yield is 4 four block servings. Could this really mean 4 muffins, at 650 calories each?
Have I completely missed something here?

Thanks very much for any suggestions or comments!

Hi, you might want to check your calculations. I just took a quick look at that recipe. For starters, there are approximately 68 grams of fat in the entire recipe (according to nutrition data.com). One fourth of the recipe, which would be 4 blocks according to the yield stated in the recipe, contains approximately 16 grams of fat, a very acceptable amount for a 4 block Zone balanced meal (minimum for a 4 block meaL is 12 grams of fat). Also, when rechecking, remember to subtract the total fiber from the total carbohydrates when calculating the percentages of P, C and F.

Hi, you might want to check your calculations. I just took a quick look at that recipe. For starters, there are approximately 68 grams of fat in the entire recipe (according to nutrition data.com). One fourth of the recipe, which would be 4 blocks according to the yield stated in the recipe, contains approximately 16 grams of fat, a very acceptable amount for a 4 block Zone balanced meal (minimum for a 4 block meaL is 12 grams of fat). Also, when rechecking, remember to subtract the total fiber from the total carbohydrates when calculating the percentages of P, C and F.

Hi Sue,

You were right! I had misread how much oil is required -- I put in tablespoons instead of teaspoons.
And subtracting the fiber makes a difference in the carb count.

But now I'm even more confused -- after changing the amount of oil needed, for the whole recipe I have a tally of:
35.4g of fat (not 68g), 264g carbs (minus 21g of fiber), and 124.6g of protein.

This comes out to a balance of approx 17% F / 58% C / 25% P.

The calories per muffin also remains quite high for a single meal, at 480 calories per muffin.

By the way, I am using "Lose It" to get the nutritional analysis, a website that allows me to create a recipe.
I have personally entered the nutritional information for each individual ingredient into this program.

Am I still getting something really wrong? It's hard to believe that there would be a recipe in this book that produces a single serving muffin with
66grams of carbs (fiber subtracted) -- that's approximately 7 blocks of carbs per muffin.

Thanks very much for your help!

I'm not familiar with the program you're using but I think you're still miscalculating. The oil and egg yolk together contain about 35 grams of fat, and then you still have to add the fat in the oat flour.

Try Spark (People) Recipes.
I find it has a good database, and some things not in the database are added by users - though their accuracy is not guaranteed.
The only thing with this and with MOST if not all food Nutrition databases, is that they inherently count the Protein in foods that we know for which the Protein is not countable. But it is usually a negligible amount in the total scheme of things.

Make sure you are using the right form of oats, sometimes the info on oat flour can get confusing.