Hi Everyone!
I found this on the Hungry Girl website and just wanted to share. Have a great day! Jan

Hi Hungry Girl,

I love your cocktail book, Happy Hour, but I'm confused when it comes to the Weight Watchers PointsPlus® values. When I plug the recipe stats for one of the drink recipes into my Weight Watchers calculator, I get a much lower PointsPlus® value than what's listed on your site. The values according to my calculator seem too low for alcoholic drinks -- some have a value of just 0 or 1. What gives?

Beverage Baffled

Hi BB,


Here's the deal. To determine the PointsPlus® value of a recipe, the WW calculator uses fat, carbs, fiber, and protein -- but the calories from alcohol aren't factored in. So if you plug the stats for a cocktail recipe into your PointsPlus® calculator, the value will not be accurate. To figure out the real value of a cocktail recipe, you need to start with Weight Watchers' determined value for the alcohol itself (typically a PointsPlus® value of 4 per 1.5-oz. shot). After that, calculate the recipe's value based only on the non-alcoholic ingredients. Then, add those values together. Sound complicated? Don't worry; we've done all the work for you! The values listed in the Happy Hour section of our book site take all of this info into account. Cocktail recipes in other HG books as well as past HG emails have also been updated with the specially calculated values.

Bottom line? Using the calculator to determine PointsPlus® values for cocktail recipes won't work. But you can find accurate values for all the recipes in Hungry Girl Happy Hour by clicking here. Now go make some cocktails (if you're of the legal drinking age and won't be driving, of course)!