While “zero” usually means “nothing,” at WeightWatchers®, ZeroPoint® foods are everything! If you’ve got questions about ZeroPoint fruit, you’re in the right place.
Are all fruits a ZeroPoint food?
Not necessarily. A fruit is a ZeroPoint food if it’s:
- Fresh or frozen without added sugars or fat
- Canned in water
- Canned in sugar-free syrup
A fruit is not a ZeroPoint food if it’s:
- Dried
- Blended into a smoothie
- Juiced
Wait, what about avocados and coconuts? They’re fruit!
While they are technically types of fruit, avocado and coconut contain more calories and fat than other types of fruit, so it’s important to track them.
If fruit is a ZeroPoint food, why does it have a Points value when I blend it into a smoothie?
Whole fruit is a ZeroPoint food, but once it becomes part of a smoothie, the experience of “eating” it changes. Research shows that liquids don’t promote the same feeling of fullness and satisfaction that solid foods do. When you drink something, you’re not actually chewing it, which can affect the signals between your belly and brain. Plus you can wind up putting a lot more fruit in a smoothie than you’d ever eat in one sitting without necessarily getting the same amount of fiber. In short, drinking a smoothie or juice doesn’t make or keep you full the way eating that fruit might.
Does it matter if the fruit’s cooked?
Nope. But if it’s cooked with any ingredients that do have Points values (e.g., honey or butter), you’ll want to track those ingredients. If you track a WeightWatchers’ recipe that includes fruit and it’s one of your ZeroPoint foods, the app will automatically subtract it from the Points value of the recipe for you.
Any other sweet tips?
Use the natural sugars and moisture in fruit to replace added sugars and saturated fats in desserts and baked goods. We love bananas as the base of a vegan “nice” cream and these flourless pancakes, and we use unsweetened applesauce to sweeten these no-sugar-added blueberry muffins and to cut the amount of butter and sugar in these apple bars.
Some of our fave fruity recipes
Related links
ZeroPoint Food Cheat Sheet: Non-starchy Veggies
Sherry Rujikarn is the food director at WeightWatchers®, where she oversees cookbooks and recipe content. She has spent her career developing and testing recipes, identifying and exploring food trends, and teaching home cooks about all things food-related.