CalCutter is a new free healthy-eating app.
Credit: Provided
Grandma’s fried chicken recipe may be the best, but you likely know it’s not the healthiest. Now there’s a new app that teaches you how to make healthier tweaks to the recipes you already have.
The New York City Department of Health has just introduced CalCutter, a free mobile app available on the iPhone and Android. It helps cooks both calculate the calorie counts of their meals and also reduce those calorie counts via advice on ingredients and preparation. New York Times best-selling author and chef Rocco DiSpirito will offer counsel on ingredients as part of a partnership with the app.
“Many people want to count calories as a way to avoid gaining weight, but they have no way of knowing how many calories are in restaurant food or even food they prepare themselves,” said Health Commissioner Dr. Thomas Farley. “CalCutter is a free, simple tool to help cooks figure out how many calories their recipes deliver.”
CalCutter has a database of 400 ingredients and their calorie counts, as determined by the U.S. Department of Agriculture. Users choose from the list of ingredients and note the amount they are using in a recipe. CalCutter then calculates the final calorie count and how it fits into a person’s 2,000-calories-a-day diet. Then, the app gives users the option to save a reduced-calorie version of their meal, which they can also email.
You can download the app for your smartphone here or view the web version here.
Today, nearly 60 percent of NYC adults and 40 percent of NYC children are overweight or obese, which can lead to health problems. New Yorkers can access more free information on eating healthy at Facebook.com/EatingHealthyNYC.
