The End of the Calorie (encore)

Gastropod

Cynthia Graber and Nicola Twilley

Science, Food, History, Arts

4.7 • 3.5K Ratings

🗓️ 17 January 2023

⏱️ 46 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

For most of us, the calorie is just a number on the back of the packet or on the display at the gym. But what is it, exactly? And how did we end up with this one unit with which to measure our food? Is a calorie the same no matter what type of food it comes from? And is one calorie for you exactly the same as one calorie for me? To find out, we visit the special rooms scientists use to measure how many calories we burn, and the labs where researchers are discovering that the calorie is broken. And we pose the question: If not the calorie, then what? (This is an encore presentation.) Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Transcript

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0:00.0	Happy 2023, Gastropod listeners.
0:03.0	I'm not sure I believe it yet, but that's what the calendar says.
0:05.8	And in terms of believing the number in front of you,
0:08.6	we have an episode all about whether those official numbers are really what they seem.
0:13.7	I'm talking about the calorie.
0:15.3	This is an encore episode.
0:17.0	It's one we both love because it's something that people are so conflicted about,
0:20.3	but we just can't seem to quit them.
0:22.2	Listen in now for the weird and surprising story behind the numbers.
0:26.4	I don't really buy into this calorie, the calorie thing.
0:31.4	In the end, and I guess this is set of treating it as a chemist,
0:36.4	calories, the calorie, it's a unit of energy.
0:40.4	I think all calories are not the same when it comes to how satisfying they are.
0:44.4	You can't count calories anyway.
0:47.4	It's not really possible for anybody who's just an eater to figure out how many calories you're eating.
0:52.4	Calorie is the only darn thing we've got in this game at the moment, isn't it?
0:57.4	But it gives us a sort of unfair sense of precision.
1:02.4	The calorie is a somewhat dangerous item because it leads us to thinking that we solve the problems
1:09.4	when in fact we haven't.
1:11.4	This is Gastropod, the podcast that looks at food through the lens of science and history.
1:16.4	I'm Nicola Twilly and I'm Cynthia Graber.
1:18.4	And I bet you listeners have no idea what we're going to be covering in this episode.
	...

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