brookcove
Posted : 10/16/2008 10:27:28 PM
In popular parlance, a kcal is the same as a calorie. It actually isn't - a calorie is the amount of energy that it takes to heat a ml of water to boiling. It takes a thousand of those to make what we call a calorie (what you'd call a "nutritional calorie";). Leave it to Americans to mix up something as straightforward as the metric system - lol! But that's why it's confusing.
If you look on a bag of dog food, you'll see kcals listed rather than calories.