1+1=3? Making sense of WW Points

I get e-mails periodically from friends and family asking me about recipes and WW Points values. Here is my friend's conundrum that sparked today's post:

"Ok, so I made some chili like stuff—the only things with points in it were corn and pinto beans. I used a cup of each. Figuring if I divide into 4 servings, it would be .5 point for each element—1 point per serving.

BUT...When I plug these into the recipe builder with other free veggies like
spinach-it comes out to 2 pts a serving instead of 1.

It seems like Weight Watchers thinks that once beans and corn are mixed with spinach they gain calories?”

So here is the skinny on plugging your entries into your daily Points calculator versus building recipes in the online Weight Watchers tool:

Think about the entire recipe's formula that the Point system takes into consideration (e.g. overall calories, calories from fiber, and calories from fat). Sometimes food that is just on the edge of only being 1 WW Point is compounded by another food that is almost 2 WW Points. When put with another food on the verge of being another point higher, the single item's fraction of a point that allowed WW to round down to 1 point must be rounded up instead. Stick with me, I'll give you an example:

1.4 could be rounded down to 1, if you are rounding to a whole number. When you add 1.4 and 1.4, you get 2.8, which then must be rounded to 3 instead of 2 to the nearest whole number.

And here is the other weird thing—if you put "recipes" (like even a turkey sandwich) in your daily points counter as separate components instead of in your recipe builder as a compound, you would miss a lot of fractions of points over time.

Is it enough to matter? Probably not going to make a huge difference if you don't go overboard. I counted points the other way through my daily points counter for almost a year before I realized I was kind of cheating the system. I've managed to lose weight successfully anyway.

I discovered it when I was putting a curry together in my daily points counter and then wanted to save it as a recipe with some instructions instead of a "meal." It went from a 2 point "meal" to a 4 point "recipe." It was just a ton of fibrous veggies and legumes, but their fractions added up to a noticeable difference.

I would warn of consistently doing this over time, as it may keep you from losing weight at an optimal rate.

My sister mentioned to me once she felt she hit a plateau because she was eating too many zero-Point foods. Two servings of zero-Point soup has 2 WW points...not zero. It is easy to get in WW mode and forget that calories add up no matter how you spin it. 1/4 cup of many types of fruits and most vegetables is zero Points, but it is worth it to add them up in the recipe builder for sure when you make an enormous salad out of them. And when you decide on a zero-Point snack, just stick to one or two per day, and space them out throughout the day.

Your math lesson for today: 1+1 might equal 3!