In the U.S. the nutritional info. on a food item has the number of calories per serving in it. In the U.S. it is written as a plain number, but anywhere else the number of calories will have a "k" before the number and are called "K-Calories." What is a K-Calorie, and why aren't calories stated the same way in the U.S.?

Flynn_17

A K-Calorie is a Kilocalorie. Mar 23 06, 3:19 PM

xfacilitatorx

According to this, there is no difference between the two. A distinction is being made by the "k". In nutrition a calorie is 1000 Chemistry/Physics calories. The "k" is signifying "1000 chemistry calories" or more plainly "1 nutrition calorie". It does nothing but confuse persons like you and I who do not know ther is no difference. Nutrition: Nutritionists measure the energy content of food in "calories" (usually capitalized and abbreviated as Cal or sometimes C), where each food calorie represents 4,186 joules. This is equivalent to 1000 of the calories used in chemistry, and thus the food Calorie would more accurately be called a kilocalorie. However, in chemistry calories have been deprecated as a scientific unit of measure in favour of joules, and therefore in common modern usage the word "calorie" usually refers to a food calorie. http://www.reference.com/browse/wiki/Calorie http://www.reference.com/browse/wiki/Calorie Mar 23 06, 5:04 PM