Comment by gurchik

The database gives 716 calories for 1 cup uncooked rice. So, 537 calories for 3/4 cup. It was a mistake to say 375 was half of 537, my intention was to point out that it's not close.

https://fdc.nal.usda.gov/fdc-app.html#/food-details/168881/n...

I don't have access to GPT-4 but your results are interesting. I don't understand why it's trying to approximate the yield of the uncooked rice after cooking before giving a calorie estimate. From my testing it doesn't do this for other ingredients like raw chicken.

It seems to be more accurate when giving calorie estimates for a list of ingredients instead of a single ingredient. For example, in a recipe that includes "boneless skinless chicken thighs (1 lb, raw)" ChatGPT gives "about 880 calories" as the answer. But in a new prompt if you ask it only about the chicken and nothing else, it gives "between 1100 and 1300 calories." The USDA database shows 144 calories per 100 grams, so 653 calories per pound. The first answer by ChatGPT is much more accurate.

I have no idea why this is the case, and I bet this would be easy for a researcher to demonstrate if true. Alas, I don't have API access.