Do you count fruits and veggies?

shilowindy

Hello all!
I’m wondering if I should count my fruits and veggies in with my calories. When I did WW freestyle, we didn’t count fruits and vegetables, only the items they were cooked with or eaten with. I usually have them as a small side or for a snack. I’ve been counting anything I cook them in or eat with them (oil, peanut butter, cheese, etc) But didn’t know if I needed to count the fruits and veggies since I’m not eating a ton of them. Sorry if this isn’t very clear, midnight shift brain doesn’t like to form complete thoughts sometimes lol

Machka9

Absolutely!!

I'm on net 1300 calorie days.

Bananas are about 100 calories.

Mangoes (my favourite fruit) are 135 calories.

If I eat a banana for a morning snack and a mango for an evening snack, that's a reasonably large chunk of my 1300 calories.

seska422

WW and calorie counting are two different systems so you do different things for each.

Every plan, no matter what, boils down to consuming fewer calories than your body uses in order to lose weight.

WW hides calories under points and tries to steer you away from eating certain things by skewing the points for those items higher and toward other things by skewing their points lower. The hope is that your way of eating will leave you at a calorie deficit when you hit their point goals. You can "trick" the system by overeating low/no point foods and still be OK on points but they hope you won't do that.

Calorie counting (whether with MFP or elsewhere) is very straight forward and transparent. Nutrition always matters for overall health but, for weight loss, calories are what count. If you are aiming for a 500 calorie deficit and you eat an uncounted 300 calories of fruits and veggies, that's just reduced your deficit to 200 calories while it still looks like you have a 500 calorie deficit on paper.

When calorie counting, all calories count so record the calories for everything that goes into your mouth.

shilowindy

Thank you for the insight!

fraukazi

The other posters are absolutely right, all foods have calories that contribute to your total in the day. But I don't log small amounts of leafy greens (rocket, spinach, lettuce) in home-made lunch salad.
I don't eat much of them, and those 10 or so cals are easily offset by steps I do around the house/office when I don't carry my phone.
But bananas, apples, grapes, berries, carrots, cucumber, beets etc all go into my log.

admaarie

Yes and no. Some fruits and vegetables are more calorie dense and so I’ll definitely count them (bananas, apples, mangos, pineapple, carrots, etc) then there’s others (mainly vegetables) that I can’t be bothered with unless they’re in larger quantities. But If I’m making a salad and the main two vegetables are iceberg lettuce and spinach, I’ll count those. If I’m throwing in a few bell peppers and onions I’ve added then no, it usually ends up being around 10 grams each and not worth tracking in my opinion. However everyone is different and depends on your goals. I tend to become too obsessive so allowing myself to not track every single thing works for me and my mental state.

Lillymoo01

I eat at least 1 kilogram of fruit and vegetables a day which adds up to a lot of calories in total so of course I count them

earlnabby

Log and count everything that goes in your mouth except water. Some even log their vitamin supplements (although most who do that are logging for micronutrient information more than to count the calories).

sarahlucindac

Like others have said, most definitely log fruits and veggies (and everything else). A lot of fruit tends to be high in calories (ie bananas). Avocados are also very calorie dense.

shilowindy

Thank you all for your help! I think that’s one of the reasons I did so poorly on another program. The coach told us not to bother counting fruits and vegetables because they were free foods in her program and we should eat as much of them as possible and only worry about counting proteins and carbs. I had very little success which is was prompted me to come back to MFP where I had my original success.

glassyo

shilowindy wrote: »

Thank you all for your help! I think that’s one of the reasons I did so poorly on another program. The coach told us not to bother counting fruits and vegetables because they were free foods in her program and we should eat as much of them as possible and only worry about counting proteins and carbs. I had very little success which is was prompted me to come back to MFP where I had my original success.

*cough* a lot of fruits are high carb *cough*

LeGypsyRov

I count everything.

LKArgh

shilowindy wrote: »

Hello all!
I’m wondering if I should count my fruits and veggies in with my calories. When I did WW freestyle, we didn’t count fruits and vegetables, only the items they were cooked with or eaten with. I usually have them as a small side or for a snack. I’ve been counting anything I cook them in or eat with them (oil, peanut butter, cheese, etc) But didn’t know if I needed to count the fruits and veggies since I’m not eating a ton of them. Sorry if this isn’t very clear, midnight shift brain doesn’t like to form complete thoughts sometimes lol

My diet is plant based, so it would be really weird not counting them, since they make up at least half of my daily calories.

aokoye

Fruit? Yes (most of the time - if it's one or two berries then no). Vegetables? Sometimes. I'll count most, if not all, root vegetables, squash, avocado (if I really ate avocado), etc but I won't log/input into the recipe creator things like onion, a single tomato or single bell pepper (in the context of a full recipe), leafy greens, and the like.

jwcanfield

Definitely count fruit calories cause they can add up in a hurry. & starchy veggies. Maybe not so critical for non-starchy vegetables, but it depends on how precise you’re trying to be. Cruciferous, leafy, ... . Of course, that’s where your fiber tends to be so worth noting just to keep track of that.

shilowindy

I appreciate the input! My main goal for now is just to get used to logging food again and making better choices with it.

The_Enginerd

Out of the 2900 calories I ate yesterday, 712, or approximately 25% of my calories, came from fruits and vegetables. So yes...

zerocold961

I count fruits... no vegetables. If I go to Subway I will add up everything but the veggies. I have this set of mine that you can't have too many vegetables. Yes, Tomatoes are vegetables to me; Avocados are not.

CarvedTones

I have over 500 calories of fruit a day fairly often. I have had over 1000 calories a day a few times.

estherdragonbat

I try to track everything, not just for calories, but because, as an ovo-lacto vegetarian, I try to make sure I'm meeting my protein and iron targets for the day. Every gram counts (there was one gram of protein in my blueberries this morning, for example).

That being said, in a social setting, when I'm loading my plate with melon cubes, cherry tomatoes, and baby carrots, I'm less precise about logging them. Sometimes, I'll just log "1 cup cantaloupe cubes", others I won't bother logging at all. (This is part of why I only eat back half my exercise calories: the other half are a cushion against inaccurate logging and it works, especially when the foods I'm most inaccurate on aren't calorie-dense to start with.)

It's been working so far.

My general rule is "Log everything you reasonably can, and don't sweat the rest of it."

kami3006

zerocold961 wrote: »

I count fruits... no vegetables. If I go to Subway I will add up everything but the veggies. I have this set of mine that you can't have too many vegetables. Yes, Tomatoes are vegetables to me; Avocados are not.

If that works for you then great. I had almost 500 calories in vegetables yesterday. I'd say it would be pretty silly of me to not count them. 500 calories over maintenance is not where I want to be.

aokoye

zerocold961 wrote: »

I count fruits... no vegetables. If I go to Subway I will add up everything but the veggies. I have this set of mine that you can't have too many vegetables. Yes, Tomatoes are vegetables to me; Avocados are not.

I mean if we want be accurate, both tomatoes and avocados are botanically fruits.

cwolfman13

shilowindy wrote: »

Hello all!
I’m wondering if I should count my fruits and veggies in with my calories. When I did WW freestyle, we didn’t count fruits and vegetables, only the items they were cooked with or eaten with. I usually have them as a small side or for a snack. I’ve been counting anything I cook them in or eat with them (oil, peanut butter, cheese, etc) But didn’t know if I needed to count the fruits and veggies since I’m not eating a ton of them. Sorry if this isn’t very clear, midnight shift brain doesn’t like to form complete thoughts sometimes lol

WW isn't calorie counting...things like veg and fruit are "free" because they inflate the points of other items. Fruit and veg have calories. When I logged, I did log my fruit and veg though I wasn't as concerned about being completely accurate...like I just had a "garden salad" recipe in my recipe builder...it wasn't perfect, but it was good enough and I wasn't going to spend time weighing every little vegetable that went into my salad.

Slasher09

I count almost all of them. The only times I don’t is when I’m making my egg whites for breakfast..if I throw in 3-5 slices of raw mushroom and a couple pieces of baby spinach....I don’t sweat that as much, or I’ll estimate those because in reality it’s probably 5 calories or less lol. When I get closer to my goal or plateau I’ll probably tighten the reigns a little more on that

psychod787

Yep... I eat 10-14 servings of fruit and veggies. You have to be honest to yourself.

RachellaJ

I count everything that has calories. So everything besides unsweetened hot tea and water. It all has calories and it all adds up.

okiewoman510

Yep, I count everything, including my vitamins and supplements. If I have a mint after a meal out, that gets counted too.

dsboohead

Count anything you put in your mouth....nothing is free but water!
Even veggies have calories.

lemannings

The good news is that if you record exercise, even walking, you are given more calories which cancels out the veggies and maybe even the fruit.

lynn_glenmont

lemannings wrote: »

The good news is that if you record exercise, even walking, you are given more calories which cancels out the veggies and maybe even the fruit.

The bad news is that you've responded to a three-month-old post, so the people you're talking to probably aren't hanging waiting for some good news on the thread.

laurenq1991

I log everything including mints, vitamin D3 supplements, and unsweetened tea. Not because it really makes a difference calorie wise but because it would annoy me to not be as thorough as possible. Plus in some cases it helps me to track other things, like whether I'm taking my supplement every day or if I'm drinking too much caffeine. With fruits and vegetables it's also a good way to keep track of whether you are eating enough of them.