Do you allways wheigh your food?

85Cardinals

Everything but eggs, salad, and stuff like tortillas or bread slices. I try to do due diligence without making myself crazy about it, big picture. I'm crazy enough already.

newheavensearth

Oh yeah, and I do not re- weigh prepackaged items. The egg weighing thing is rare, but it can be done.

JoeCWV

Nope, never did. Lost 70 pounds. Your mileage may vary.

crypsyx

i try to simply because on lose grains and oats, using a cup vs the weight of actual grams makes for very different amounts and you end up consuming a lot more calories than you think you do.

ogtmama

JeromeBarry1 wrote: »

I do not take a scale to work. I get the free junk at work. I check that the Nutrition Facts label matches the food database and then trust the law of averages. I don't weigh the powdered ginger I sprinkle on my evening meal. I log it as 1 g. I don't weight the olive oil that I spray into the pan. I do enter a teaspoon of olive oil in my food diary and hope that I'm within 50% of accurate. I don't weigh the NoSalt that I sprinkle on my beans and rice. I don't weigh the juice of 1/4 lemon that I squeeze onto my salmon. I don't weight the ice and water that I add to my protein shake. Once I did, and it was about 6 oz. Everything else, I weigh. I get frustrated with weighing the Ricotta and the salsa. I put the heavy plate on the scale, zero it, and add the 2-3 teaspoons of ricotta. That quickly registers a weight of about 14 g. At an interval of about 2 seconds, the gram weight increases by 1, and for as long as I've waited and watched, it continues to increase by 1 just about every 2 seconds and I've never waited long enough to see it stop. I record the first 14 g weight, zero it again, and add the salsa. That's usually 18 g. And it starts adding 1 g/2 seconds again. I record the first 18g, complain again, and eat. And I don't weigh eggs either.

Why not eggs???

Annahbananas

eveandqsmom wrote: »

Annahbananas wrote: »

Unless it's an egg I always weigh everything

I'll bite. Why not an egg?

For me, it's just a personal preference.

CooCooPuff

eveandqsmom wrote: »

JeromeBarry1 wrote: »

I do not take a scale to work. I get the free junk at work. I check that the Nutrition Facts label matches the food database and then trust the law of averages. I don't weigh the powdered ginger I sprinkle on my evening meal. I log it as 1 g. I don't weight the olive oil that I spray into the pan. I do enter a teaspoon of olive oil in my food diary and hope that I'm within 50% of accurate. I don't weigh the NoSalt that I sprinkle on my beans and rice. I don't weigh the juice of 1/4 lemon that I squeeze onto my salmon. I don't weight the ice and water that I add to my protein shake. Once I did, and it was about 6 oz. Everything else, I weigh. I get frustrated with weighing the Ricotta and the salsa. I put the heavy plate on the scale, zero it, and add the 2-3 teaspoons of ricotta. That quickly registers a weight of about 14 g. At an interval of about 2 seconds, the gram weight increases by 1, and for as long as I've waited and watched, it continues to increase by 1 just about every 2 seconds and I've never waited long enough to see it stop. I record the first 14 g weight, zero it again, and add the salsa. That's usually 18 g. And it starts adding 1 g/2 seconds again. I record the first 18g, complain again, and eat. And I don't weigh eggs either.

Why not eggs???

Their isn't enough weight variance for me to keep weighing the whole egg and the shell. This would probably be different if I raised chickens for eggs or bought them from a more local source.

For grains, even if cups are fine, I prefer to use the scale. Just stick the pot on the scale and tare, less dishes.

I also use teaspoons for spices and such because they don't weigh enough to not be a PITA to weigh.

Purplebunnysarah

I weigh most things that are calorie dense, and eyeball things that aren't. I don't even weigh my Costco avocados. I don't know how they do it, but they are always 90-110 g per half. I log 100g and figure it evens out over time.

goldthistime

I weigh calorie dense foods only. I measure or eyeball the rest. Works well for me.

pebble4321

I weigh a lot of things... but not everything. Sometimes I'm very accurate to the gram, other times I'll take a guess.
I travel a fair bit for work and I'm definitely not taking my scale to the hotel breakfast buffet or dinner with my colleagues, it's really not necessary for me to be accurate to that degree.
The good thing for me about doing it this way is that I weigh things often enough to get reasonably good at estimating when I don't have access to a scale.

Gisel2015

I am also pretty consistent with weighing my food when I cook at home, but mostly because I am keeping track of my macros, specially protein and carbs, and because most of my meals need to go in the recipe builder. But I admit that sometimes I like to keep amounts in my head, rather than using a piece of paper, so at the end I need to estimated because I forgot the original amount. I have been maintaining for almost 6 years and I don't need to be that accurate.

I don't take the food scale out of my kitchen and I don't log anything unless I know I made it or if the restaurant has the nutritional information in their website; and I don't log much when I am on vacation.

I don't eat all my exercise calories so I very often have "extras" for the weekend or special occasions. I like to add, that I don't like to weigh and log my food and I often take a break from doing it.

Shana67

Except for pre-packaged items such as yogurt and the like, I always, always, always weigh the food that I eat at home. Every bite. And it is making a gigantic difference in my weight loss journey.

When I am out, I use MFP to log as closely to what I am eating as possible.

AuroraGeorge8393

When I'm at home I weight around 90-95% of what I eat. Eggs and certain prepackaged items, like yogurt cups, I don't bother to weigh. So far, this hasn't caused problems, but if I ever hit a plateau I'll just get more conscientious about my weighing.

When I'm out I usually just eyeball my portions.

mds438

Thanks. I will try to continue not wheighing, because it really is a motivation-stopper for me.
If I at a point feel like wheighing the food or if I dont loose wheight at all, I will try to use my scale more.
Most of the times I eye-ball the food or measure it in handfulls (mostly veggies) or tablespoons (butter, nuts, dressing, mayo etc)

yirara

I weighed everything, including the food in the canteen whenever I had something new. The reason being that I only had 40 (initially 20) lbs to lose and I wanted to be as precise as possible. Plus I noticed that portion kreep does appear sooner or later. If I took say 50 grams of rice one day (one serving spoon), then it might have crept up to 75 grams (still one serving spoon) a while later. Besides, I don't see the inconvenience part of it: weighing everything, including what I cooked took me about 5 minutes each day. That's hardly an inconvenience.

35dollars

I weighed most of my meals / ingredients for the first week or so when I started losing then estimated based on serving similar portions - I figure that if my weight is going in the right direction, my estimates are good enough and life is just too short to faff with that (though having said that, I might have another round of weighing soon to check I've not drifted too far from my original portion estimates)

Packed or restaurant food - never.

jennypapage

i weigh things all the times except:
1)vacations .i tried it but when you're not doing the cooking it's hard to count calories properly,so i eyeball portions and keep a mental note.
2)if at the end of the day i have calories left and i want a small snack, which i know won't make me surpass my daily allowance, i eat it but don't record it.

JeromeBarry1

eveandqsmom wrote: »

Why not eggs???

I had been neglecting to think of it for several weeks as I prepared my breakfast, then one day I realized I wasn't weighing eggs. The industrial process of sorting eggs into commercial sizes is automated. If an egg is too big to be "medium", it won't be "medium" If it isn't large enough to be "Extra Large", it won't be "Extra Large". If that is the case, it falls into the "Large" range and ends up in my carton. The Large Egg value in the USDA database is the midpoint of the range. I eat enough eggs that I can be comfortably confident that it all averages out near the midpoint of the range.

CurlyCockney

mds438 wrote: »

Thanks. I will try to continue not wheighing, because it really is a motivation-stopper for me.
If I at a point feel like wheighing the food or if I dont loose wheight at all, I will try to use my scale more.
Most of the times I eye-ball the food or measure it in handfulls (mostly veggies) or tablespoons (butter, nuts, dressing, mayo etc)

If that method is working for you then stay with it. You now have the tools (scales and information) to stop those kg 'sticking like glue' when you're ready.

saires_au

I don't weigh very low calories veggies in salads anymore as I'm reasonably good estimating them and when the difference is only a few calories off even for 1/2 the amount again I'm happy to live with that

Docbanana2002

I started out weighing all things that didnt have pre portioned amounts with a label, and learned that I was pretty on target on many things (for example I was okay at guessing whether this is a large banana or medium one, or getting in the ballpark of correct in guessing how much broccoli I was serving up). These items are low enough in calories that a little error here and there was not a huge deal and didn't seem to be in a consistent direction (sometimes I'd slightly overestimate my broccoli size, sometimes underestimate...it evened out over time). So, I usually just guesstimate these things. Prepackaged single serve items (like a small bag of chips) I usually don't bother to weigh, though I mostly eat whole foods so this type of food is not a major part of my diet. If I ate a lot of packaged meals I would probably check the major kinds I ate to see how much error that brand had and if the error is in a consistent direction (if they always are filling the package fuller than the label indicates).

Other things, especially high calorie food, I weigh precisely because I'm a bad estimator of them. Nuts, dried fruit, cereal, oatmeal, pasta, rice, etc are notoriously underestimated.

When eating out, I go by what the restaurant website says if that info is available; if not I guesstimate. I try not to eat out too much bc I don't trust that the info provided by restaurants is accurate--it depends on the specific worker following company serving size standards to the letter and in some places that is going to happen more than others. Also, I prefer to control what goes into my food more...I add a lot less oil and sodium than a typical restaurant.

As far as weighing being more trouble, it really isn't. Get a digital scale that you can keep on the counter, put the food on it. Simple. Or put your plate/bowl on it and zero out, then add food. When I make cereal I just put the bowl on the scale... And then add cereal until the number matches a serving size grams that I want. It takes no more time than sitting the bowl on the counter and pouring until my eyes like the visual size of the serving. When making a PbJ sandwich I put the bread on the scale, zero, then add the peanut butter. Note the number of grams. Zero out, add jelly and note the grams. It is simple. For more complex recipes I use the recipe builder to calculate nutrition for the whole meal, then decide how many servings I want the meal to be and divide by that.

I really recommend that you at least try weighing everything for a short time, to help become more aware of where your estimates are off so you can address it. If you figure out you estimates are mostly on target and only off in a random direction then maybe you don't need to weight those items any more. It also trains your eye to know what a proper serving looks like in those situations where you can't weigh.

niblue

I don't weigh any of my food and don't really think I'm going to as I think I only need a rough idea of my calorie intake. The main components of my weight loss plan are to exercise more and cut out snacking. If that didn't turn into consistent weight loss then would I consider it but given the amount of travelling I do I doubt it'd be practical anyway.

ren3liz

All I have to add here is that you may surprise yourself with a digital scale: I find that 1oz of cheese, 4oz meat, etc actually lands me a larger serving than I was eye-balling pre-scale. Great news!

Those are the types of foods I use it for. It's to make sure I'm getting every single bite I've counted, ha! Otherwise, no. I'm not a very consistent scale user...

KnitSewSpin

I weigh calorie dense foods. I used to weigh everything but now I'm good at eyeballing. I do always weigh cereal though. I usually find I underestimate my servings when I weigh.

Need2Exerc1se

No, I rarely weigh anything I eat.

ogtmama

I don't weigh anything. I do my best to overestimate my CI and underestimate my CO to create a buffer.

When I'm looking up an exercise on the database, I choose the lowest burn and log it for slightly less time than I did it, when I'm logging food from the database, I choose the one with the highest amount of calories.

It's been working for me so far but I definitely see the value of being absolutely certain too.

CrabNebula

I weigh calorie dense items like cheese. I don't really bother for calorie poor items like raw cole slaw mix.

85Cardinals

No way am I wheighing whey.

cnbbnc

I would say overall I weigh about 80% of what I eat.

If I'm eating out I either go by online nutritional info or I take my best guess at numbers. It isn't that often that I eat out and I refuse to make myself nuts over one meal.

At home...I don't weigh prepackaged stuff like protein bars, snack pack cookies/crackers, eggs, yogurt cups, bread, the milk in my coffee.... (What would I do with the sliver of protein bar/bread that's over the limit? Throw it away or save a single bite? No!!!) I do weigh most fruit/veggies/meat/condiments/cereal/chips out of a large bag.

This is all I can handle doing without making myself crazy. I figure if I'm weighing/logging most things consistently than I'm doing fine. I lost 40lbs and I've been maintaining for 6mos doing the same.

kgirlhart

I weigh most of my food. I don't weigh anything when I eat out or at someone else's house. I always weigh fruits and vegetables because it is just easier. I weigh meats most of the time. Occasionally I don't if I get a couple of cuts from my butcher because he weighed them and I trust him. I weigh some prepackaged things and some I don't weigh. I never weigh yogurt, but I always weigh oatmeal. Usually I'll weigh some prepackaged foods a few times and if they are usually right then I don't bother, but if they are usually off I always weight them. I don't weigh eggs when I buy them at the grocery store. I figure that it averages out. I do weigh them when I buy them locally because the are often varied sizes.

I think that it is possible to lose weight without weighing. But if you really want to know how many calories you are taking in the best thing to do is weigh your food. If you don't want to weigh it then that is fine. But if you get stuck and seem to be doing everything right and are not losing weight then it is almost certain that you are eating more than you think so you really should weigh in those instances. People will come on here asking for help because they are eating 1200 calories and not losing weight. Most people will tell them they need to be weighing their food. There will always be those who say they never weigh, they think it is obsessive and unnecessary. And that may be true for them, but if you are not losing as expected then you need to make sure you are eating the amount of calories you think you are and the best way to do that is to use a food scale.