Question for when Weighing Food isn't an Option

MelWick524

Obviously, in a perfect world, we would all be able to prep our meals in advance 100% of the time, have the money to afford multiple high-quality food scales to bring everywhere with us to be able to weigh every single thing we eat to the gram, and all of our time management skills would be 100% perfect.

Well...only some of us on here live in a perfect world, and I sure don't. Being a full-time working mom & wife trying to juggle a long commute and fit in gym-time 5 days a week and tending to the house and my little one, I have a pretty full plate from the time I wake up until the time I go to sleep.

When people are having weight loss issues on here, a response is always, "Are you weighing everything you eat?"

People sometimes respond with, "I weigh my food when I can..." or "I weigh my food most of the time," etc.

They're then met with the response of something along the lines of, "well, there's your answer." Like...no one in the world has ever lost weight without weighing 100% of their food items to the gram, and you are silly if you didn't already know the answer to your question.

I know it's true though! I've had a lot more success weighing my food as much as I can...but sometimes, it's either "I don't have a food scale with me right now, so it's either guess or just don't eat."

OK, so...I weigh out like 90% of my food when I bring food to work from home (my chef-hubby would flip out if I toted his food scale around, not to mention, I can't really be sitting at work weighing out food all day, it's just not possible for me)...but...like today, for example, I ordered a small grilled buffalo chicken salad w/ raspberry vinaigrette on the side for lunch. When I got it, I had to "eyeball" from experience the amount of veggies and chicken in the salad. I do have a measuring tablespoon in my desk drawer, so I measured out my salad dressing. I created a recipe and logged it in my diary. I have a feeling I really over-estimated, but I usually do, in case the ingredient is wrong in the database.

What does everyone do when they do not have access to a food scale and have to get take-out or have a party at work, etc? Just generally curious...

Ready2Rock206

Same as you. Measure when I can, make my best guess when I can't.

janejellyroll

I don't think of it as an "you must always weigh your food" thing.

But if you're making a post wondering why you aren't losing weight despite hitting X calories . . . well, how do you know if you are hitting those calories or not if you aren't weighing?

If you are losing and sometimes not weighing, then it is no big deal. But when you aren't losing, this could be a big reason why.

I don't weigh when I'm out (I don't weigh out that often). But if I thought I was stalled, I would probably start, just to be sure that I was actually stalled and not eating more calories than I thought.

ironangel250

Just make the best choices you can- when we eat out I usually order some sort of grilled meat on salad with no dressing and ask for vinegar and lemon on the side. At other get togethers I try to stick with things I know such as fruit and veggie stuff and eat smaller portions of things I don't know exact ingredients of. Other times I just save calories for days when I know I can't track accurately and exercise that day as well.

ahoy_m8

I do the same as ironangel--grilled meat on salad without dressing. I'll be off on estimating lettuce, but it's not a high calorie mistake. Yesterday my dad wanted to go to a deli for sandwiches. I've never done this before, but I ate half and took the other half home and weighed it. Even when we're weighing food, it's still all an estimate, some more accurate than others. They're a dozen entries for salmon in the nutritiondata database, and their protein and fat per gram can vary considerably. And not every apple has the same nutritional content per gram as another apple. It's all a best effort guess.

Asher_Ethan

I've read some people just knock their activity level lower and then don't weight their food and it makes up for it. I've never tried this so I can't tell you if it works or not.

girlviernes

I've also eaten half and weighed the rest. I'm pretty good with anthropomorphic measurements, basically estimating how much something is from how it compares to my fist, a deck of cards, thumb, etc. You can actually work on this at home by comparing your anthropomorphic measurements to those of measuring cups/spoons/scale.

kindrabbit

I find the scanner on the mobile app comes in handy. If I'm out and have to grab something in a shop I make sure its got a bar code or that its a product that i can log when i can get online. I very rarely ear out but if i were to eat out it would be an occasion so I wouldn't worry about logging and just enjoy myself

Fuamami

I rarely, rarely weigh my food. I've probably weighed about five different items the whole time I've been logging. I use measuring cups and estimate, and it seems to be working just fine. I also just use the calorie counts for exercise that MFP gives me. So maybe give it a try, and see if you can guesstimate!

TimothyFish

I rarely weigh food. I think some people are unrealistic in their expectations that weighing food will solve all problems.

Booksandbeaches

I haven't ever weighed my food. I'm pretty much within 5 pounds of my goal weight now. When I started at MFP, I just knew I wouldn't weigh my food, so I didn't bother. The friends I have here lost their weight without weighing food. What worked for me? I tried to track accurately what I ate each day. I'm pretty carb sensitive, so I watched the starch. I was prediabetic at one point. Cutting the starch and exercising helped. I'm religious about tracking my exercise. Truth is your body keeps an accurate log of what you ate regardless of whether you weighed it or not.

futuremanda

janejellyroll wrote: »

I don't think of it as an "you must always weigh your food" thing.

But if you're making a post wondering why you aren't losing weight despite hitting X calories . . . well, how do you know if you are hitting those calories or not if you aren't weighing?

If you are losing and sometimes not weighing, then it is no big deal. But when you aren't losing, this could be a big reason why.

I don't weigh when I'm out (I don't weigh out that often). But if I thought I was stalled, I would probably start, just to be sure that I was actually stalled and not eating more calories than I thought.

This. I can rarely weigh anything right now. (This is not my preference. Trying to guess is so much more complicated.) But if my weight loss stopped or slowed, I would know why -- it would likely be due to inaccurate food logs. I *know* my food log can't be right, but I am losing, and I don't have many options to clean it up right now anyway, so for now it is working.

If you never weigh, or have lots of guesstimate entries, that's fine, that's life. But the answer to "I'm not losing weight and I don't know why HELP" would then be "oh, you aren't weighing all your food? Then probably you are not in a deficit, or as big of a deficit as you thought."

It's at least an important starting point -- if you KNOW you've eaten X calories every day for 2 months, and that should definitely result in loss, but did not, then you can look elsewhere (exercise calories or your doctor). But if you just THINK you've hit your target, then... step 1 is to clean that up and *really* hit your target, or verify that you've been hitting it.

So it isn't meant to make you feel bad or like other people are perfect and you are not!

mz_getskinny

I actually don't weigh my food. And never will! I refuse to weigh everything I eat for the rest of my life. It's just not something I am interested in doing! LOL that being said, when in doubt? Overestimate.

arditarose

Considering how often I weigh my food, I have a pretty good idea of how many ounces are in meats when I go out. I take my chicken from the salad bar every day. I assume 3 oz. I had a little scale one day so I deconstructed my salad to weigh out the chicken and I was about spot on. I can eyeball grams of veggies very well too. If I have a strange stall, I'll reassess my salad bar eyeballing skills.

MelWick524

Asher_Ethan wrote: »

I've read some people just knock their activity level lower and then don't weight their food and it makes up for it. I've never tried this so I can't tell you if it works or not.

I do this so we shall see. For example, I always enter 200 calories burned for my group fitness classes like Zumba, piyo, Piloxing & spinning ... Even though I know it's waaaaaay more in reality.

MelWick524

Karen_libert wrote: »

I find the scanner on the mobile app comes in handy. If I'm out and have to grab something in a shop I make sure its got a bar code or that its a product that i can log when i can get online. I very rarely ear out but if i were to eat out it would be an occasion so I wouldn't worry about logging and just enjoy myself

Ahhhhhh why do I always forget about the scanner? Thank you!!!