City Launches CalCutter App For Home Cooks

NEW YORK (CBSNewYork/AP) - New York City's Health Department has introduced an app that will help cooks cut the calories in the meals they are preparing.

The free mobile app announced Wednesday is called CalCutter. It will let cooks enter the ingredients of a recipe and it will calculate the number of calories per serving.

CalCutter includes a list of more than 400 ingredients with their calorie counts as determined by the USDA.

LINK: Download The App

The app will suggest alternative ingredients that are lower in calories, like swapping egg whites in place of whole eggs.

The Health Department is working with chef Rocco DiSpirito to incorporate ingredient swaps into 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 in a statement. "CalCutter is a free, simple online to do list app tool to help cooks figure out how many calories their recipes deliver. We encourage both restaurant cooks and home cooks to use this tool and prepare food with calorie counts that fit into a healthy diet."

New York City has required chain restaurants to post calorie counts since 2008.

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