Ongoing argument – does hot food contain more calories than cold? If so, is it a significant amount?

I’m not convinced that bread and cheese is a lower calorie option than bread and soup, but I’d be interested to see what others think!

Argument with whom?

Someone who knows about as much about nutrition as I do…

something hot probably has more energy in it than the same thing cold but energy does not equal calories.

Might help if you compare the same food hot and cold

It would depend on the soup and the cheese and portion size
Clearly this thought experiments is not up to the rigours demanded of serious science and you need to sort out your controls ASAP 😉

Yes hot food takes less energy to process than the identical food eaten cold. Your body will lose energy heating the cold food to body temperature once swallowed.

The amount of energy concerned is insignificant compared with the energy content of most foods.

Hah.

Calorie is a measure of energy. So technically yes the hot food does contain more.

However the calorie content of food as reported on food labels is calculated by burning the food (yes really) and seeing how much it heats up some water.

Our bodies don’t actually incinerate the food of course, so it’s all a bit daft anyway, but since we process it chemically then its temperature won’t make much difference. It’ll end up at 37 degrees pretty quickly after eating.

In the strictest possible technical sense, yes hot food does contain more calories than the same food cold IF you are counting chemical and thermal energy (although the thermal energy part is tiny compared to the chemical). But we normally don’t, and it won’t make any difference in your body, so the real answer is no.

but energy does not equal calories.

A calorie is a unit of energy.

donald – Member
Yes hot food takes less energy to process than the identical food eaten cold……

The OP was does the food contain more calories, not which burns more calories to consume/process..

something hot probably has more energy in it than the same thing cold but energy does not equal calories.

well I was wrong. Energy does equal calories.

So I’ll get fatter eating a microwaved Mars bar than a room temperature one?

Something calorie related that I’ve occasionally wondered about… given the human digestive system isn’t 100% efficient does the body actually need say only 1000 calories per day but we need to consume 2000+ to make up for losses? How efficient is our digestive system?

How efficient is our digestive system?

The fact we haven’t evolved to reconsume our own poo probably says there’s not much worth having left in there when it comes out?

I had this discussion with someone.

Bread and butter

or

Bread fried in the same amount of butter

Which is worse?

A piece of bread contains more calories than a piece of toast. The toaster has stolen some and burnt off some of the energy. Incidentally, that’s why you have to put more butter on toast. The toast also gives you some heat, but that’s not the same as digesting it.

Hot/cold food provides precisely the same amount of energy/calories.

Whether or not the temperature of the food provides more calories or even takes more calories to digest is another matter.

So the answer to you OP is no it contains the same.

I remember my old chemistry teacher working out the energy needed to warm his food up from room temperature to blood temperature. He was confused that it seemed to be a greater number of calories than the food actually contained. The problem was solved when he realised that food is measured in kCals rather than cals 🙂

The OP was does the food contain more calories, not which burns more calories to consume/process..

In either case the answer is yes. You have added energy to the food and calories are a measure of energy.