I think the thing is, not all the kernels pop so the entire unpopped value is not necessarily eaten. But they can’t “not count” the unpopped kernels because they ARE food and someone could eat them.
The most correct way to go about it would be to measure how much popped popcorn is actually in the bag after you take it out of the microwave. Then multiply that by “1 cup popped” value. If you are counting calories, use this number as a ballpark going forward, knowing there will be some variation bag to bag.
Or just go for the 7 cup value… the real calories are probably a little less but not enough to matter.
Actually, from your description I’m thinking that the whole bag is 14 cups, not 7 cups. The way I read it is that:[ul]
[li]One serving = 3tbsp unpopped = 37g unpopped = 7 cups popped[/li][li]One bag = two servings = 6tbsp unpopped = 74g unpopped = 14 cups popped[/ul][/li]So to most easily calculate for the entire bag, I’d use the nutrition information for 3tbsp unpopped and multiply by 2.
If you’re not sure how many cups it really is, just pop a bag and then measure it yourself (assuming you have measuring cups). I know that at the movie theatre I usually go to a “regular” popcorn (big, but not gigantic) is about 12-14 cups.
Funny you should post this. I was shopping two nights ago and picked a box of this very popcorn. I looked at the nutritional table on the back, was just as confused as you - so I put it back and bought something else. Why they gotta make it so hard?!
Why are you confused (other than as a result of the confusing answers you’ve been given so far in this thread)? In your OP you said there were 2 columns, one labeled 3 tbs unpopped and one labeled 1 cup popped. You also stated the label said 3 tbs unpopped = 7 cups popped. Therefore it is clear the the numbers in each of the columns should be different, and specifically column 2 should ~= 1/7th of column 1.
I think they intentionally make it a bit unclear because they wish to hide the enormous amount of fat and calories in a bag of this stuff.
By the way, the answer to the OP is look at the first column and multiply by 2 (as stated by Q.E.D.). If you use the second column and multiply by 7, you’ve lost information due to roundoff error (e.g. the fat grams round to zero since there is less than 0.5).
