Is there a food suggestion feature?

Katiedid7564

Hey! I am new to MyFitnessPal and love it so far! But I was wondering if there is a feature where foods are suggested to you? For example, today I have 331 calories remaining. I only have 2g fat left, but have 100g of carbs left. I'm also close to hitting my sugar/sodium limit for the day. So it would be helpful if there was a feature that suggested foods I could eat less than 331 calories, but also stays within my nutrient limits as well. Is this already a feature that I just don't know how to use? Or does this not exist? Thanks so much for the help!

AnnPT77

No, MFP doesn't have that feature, as far as I know.

Beyond that, I'd first say that macros don't need to be exactly exact, so no need to stress. Technically, protein and fats contain essential nutrients, things our bodies can't manufacture out of anything else, so if you care about nutrition, it's reasonable to treat protein and fats more as minimums than limits. Carbs are more flexible, because our bodies can manufacture carb-equivalents out of other stuff, loosely speaking.

If weight loss is your key goal, that's directly about calories. Nutrition may have an effect, such as through appetite (so can't stick to calorie goal) or fatigue (so move less, burn fewer calories than expected), but the direct mechanism is calories. Nutrition is important for other reasons, of course.

Therefore, when it comes to nutrients, "pretty good on average over a few days" should be fine, no need to stress. If persistently way low on protein or fats, it would be good to tweak routine eating habits so that pattern disappears, but don't worry, malnutrition onset is very slow, so you can do that gradually: No need to be perfect from day 1.

If you'd like to stay close on macros, there are a bunch of charts like the one below on the web, or the new AI tools in web search might be able to answer questions like that. (I'd verify there theory against other sources, though!)

I'm not necessarily endorsing this particular web site as a whole, don't know much about it, but the chart is an example of a thing you can find in lots of places that might help with a question like this.



Source: https://www.workingagainstgravity.com/articles/17-macro-tracking-tips

Best wishes!