Swole.me is a completely free automated diet planner that creates meals according to your goal calorie intake and how many meals you’d like to eat per day. [more inside]
posted by netbros on Jan 30, 2012 - 51 comments

Energetic consequences of thermal and nonthermal food processing. Or, as discussed by Discover Magazine, Why Calorie Counts Are Wrong: Cooked Food Provides a Lot More Energy. (N.B. second link references a video of house mice eating a baby albatross alive.)
posted by d. z. wang on Dec 8, 2011 - 36 comments

You Don't Want Fries With That. A new Harvard School of Public Health Study claims that even if calorie counts are the same per serving, eating servings of french fries or potatoes causes more weight gain over time than servings of nuts and yogurt. "Although calories remain crucial, some foods clearly cause people to put on more weight than others, perhaps because of their chemical makeup and how our bodies process them." [more inside]
posted by Ike_Arumba on Jun 25, 2011 - 118 comments

A dude eats nothing but Christmas candy for a week.
posted by gman on Dec 26, 2010 - 66 comments

The health care bill requires chains with 20 or more restaurants to post calorie counts on their menus, as is already the law in New York and Philadelphia. A study published last fall suggested that the labels didn't change the eating behavior of low-income New Yorkers. A recent study at Yale, conducted under laboratory conditions, found the opposite. Corby Kummer at the Atlantic says calorie labeling works -- once you understand the point is to change the behavior, not of the consumer, but of the vendor. Will calorie labels lead the way to a healthier America, or a part-skim socialist dystopia? Or is the call of the Thickburger just too strong for mere numbers to dispel?
posted by escabeche on Mar 24, 2010 - 119 comments

The Neuroscience of McGriddles: Evolutionary biology offers hypotheses about why we enjoy eating. "When you eat at McDonald's, a big part of the pleasure comes from the fact that the food is sustenance, fuel, energy. Even mediocre food is a little rewarding."
posted by silby on Jul 23, 2009 - 82 comments

11 hours, 29 minutes ... That's how long you'd have to play your instrument, if you were a 180lb musician, to work off the calories in a 12-inch Pizza Hut Super Supreme Pizza, (Regular Crust). Foodsel offers a wealth of information about the foods we eat, organized by group, manufacturer or nutrient, with visuals about the exercise needed to work off the calories, and the amount of fat and energy in 7500 different foods. [more inside]
posted by Dave Faris on Mar 5, 2008 - 52 comments

Create-a-meal [note: flash] ... comes in mcdonalds, subway, barbeque, and pizza hut flavors.
posted by crunchland on Nov 22, 2003 - 17 comments

What would you do to live to 150? (more inside)
posted by daver on Jun 3, 2002 - 112 comments