Almonds - less calories absorbed than nutritional advice would suggest?

[twinkle]

I was looking up calories in almonds as I've just started a diet and calorie counting is the easiest way I know. I've found info saying 160-170 calories per ounce, but also an interesting article (http://heartscanblog.blogspot.com/2008/04/when-is-calorie-not-calorie.html) which reckons not as many calories as that are absorbed due to the structure of raw almonds.

I'm not very "sciency" - how credible do people think this might be? Also, I soak my almonds because it makes them more munchy and delicious - might this actually make the fat more absorbable? (Even if it does I'll still do it because they expand to twice the original size so you eat less!)

[Back-Space]

I noticed the high calories on them aswell. But they're so healthy I really don't care :p Most nuts are high in fats, but they're healthy fats. They're also high in protein. And almonds are reasonably high in calcium. So the calories are only so high because of how much is in them. Calories don't mean anything :p

I eat about a cup of them a day, myself, and I've been losing weight.

[twinkle]

Yeah, it's not a big deal to me, I just thought the article was interesting. I'd carry on eating them even if the nutritional info on the packets truly represents the amount of calories that will be absorbed - at the moment I've got 2.5 oz soaking ready to take to work tomorrow, and I'll probably eat most of those throughout the day :)

[Back-Space]

I think it would be nice to know how much of the nutrients get moved over when you turn them into milk. I use the almonds mostly for the calcium seeing as 1 cup is about 30% of my calcium for the day. The calories are made up from the fat, carbs, and protein that's in something. Calories just show how much energy's in it. I think fat is 7 calories a gram and protein is 4 or 5 and carbs are... 7?

[twinkle]

Fat is 9 per gram, I think. I know alcohol is 7 ;) Carbs and protein are both 4.

[Back-Space]

That's it :p So I just ignore calories and see how much of every particular thing there is.