On the fifth day of Christmas my Dietitian said to me..
Watch your drinks!
We can sometimes think our weight changes simply because of what we eat however some of the drinks available now are just as high in calories as any of the fast food meals.
The problem is because they slide down so easily and we don’t need to chew we can forget about them counting as calories. If you consider the kilojoules requirement for an average person to maintain their weight is 7800kj/day then some of these drinks represent about 1/6 of the daily intake- most often you will also be eating at the same time as drinking and possibly having more than one drink.
| Drink | Calories | Kilojoules |
| Boost low fat smoothie | 293 | 1215 |
| 330ml bottle of coke | 142 | 594 |
| 1 stubbie/can heavy beer | 135 | 570 |
| 1 can low carb beer | 113 | 469 |
| 160ml red wine | 109 | 456 |
| 160ml white wine | 109 | 454 |
| 160ml Sparkling wine | 119 | 496 |
| McDonald’s Frappe Caramel latte – regular | 318 | 1330 |
| McDonalds Strawberry smoothie- regular | 263 | 1100 |
Values from: www.calorieking.com.au
Alcohol recommendations:
Just as a refresher the safe level of drinking is considered to be 1-2 standard drinks per day.
One standard drink is:
• One stubbie/can (375ml) of light beer
• One pot (285ml) heavy beer
• 100ml of wine/sparkling wine
• 60ml of fortified wine eg port
• 30ml shot of spirits
The standard drink measure is important as often if we are pouring drinks at home the serve size of alcohol we put can be larger than the standard serve.
Enjoy…in moderation!
Lisa APD
