MFP Encourages "Convenience" Nutrition

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Replies

  • rocketblaster
    rocketblaster Posts: 50 Member
    I have been cooking about 95% of my foods since starting MFP, I use the recipe builder and sometimes simply enter a random bunch of ingredients that go into a curry, stir fry or other meal that I'm making - but I AM always impressed by how easy it is to use the bar code scanner :) I just find that I have a big appetite and homemade food allows me to have tons of veggies and other bulking foods and stay within my calories. When I eat pkg'd stuff I get hungry faster.
  • ILiftHeavyAcrylics
    ILiftHeavyAcrylics Posts: 27,732 Member
    I find the opposite to be true. Finding out how many calories are in many of the foods I used to eat led to me learning how to cook a lot more things from scratch so that I can control the ingredients.


    I also disagree that "convenience" foods are bad, though.
  • besaro
    besaro Posts: 1,858 Member
    hasnt affected me either, if anything, its made me want to fix from scratch so i really DO know what im eating. I actually think using the recipe creator (while i have some complaints about some of its features) is pretty efing convenient.
  • WakkoW
    WakkoW Posts: 567 Member
    No.

    The food in the database without the * by it is from the USDA database. You just have to know the correct words to search with. For produce search with the word "raw" like "Banana raw". For meat you need to search either "raw" or cooked depending on when you weight it. For example "Chicken thigh cooked". The USDA entries usually have at least one volume entry and one weight entry, often it has lot of options like sliced, whole, grams, lbs, etc.

    I actually find those MFP entries much more convenient because they offer so many different measurements. No need to go to my conversion app if I weighed in ounces only to find an entry in grams or vice versa.

    I agree. I hate double checking the user entered items and love the choices the fresh options offer. So many of the user entries are in serving sizes or cups rather than grams.
  • gangsterfurious
    gangsterfurious Posts: 56
    No, I mean honestly how long does it take to look things up?
  • bcf7683
    bcf7683 Posts: 1,653 Member
    cow-with-barcode.jpg

    Win! :drinker:
  • LiftAllThePizzas
    LiftAllThePizzas Posts: 17,857 Member
    Does anyone else fell like this site lends itself to prepackaged foods and/or commercial dining? It's easier to get nutritional information from those sources but you're really doing a disservice to your health!
    I agree. They should provide people who come to my house and see what I'm cooking and calculate the nutritional info for me.
  • elyelyse
    elyelyse Posts: 1,454 Member
    I think at first, perhaps. Then we start to see the difference in nutrition (and portion size!) between fresh and "processed" food and slowly make changes. I think once you start to look at the numbers on a regular basis, you learn that, wow, I can actually eat more food if I prepare it myself! Of course I buy things like pita bread, granola snacks, crackers, yogurt, etc which could be considered processed, but when I read "convenience nutrition" I think of things like lean cuisine frozen meals.
  • Rays_Wife
    Rays_Wife Posts: 1,173 Member
    It is what you make of it *shrug*
  • _Zardoz_
    _Zardoz_ Posts: 3,987 Member
    Does anyone else fell like this site lends itself to prepackaged foods and/or commercial dining? It's easier to get nutritional information from those sources but you're really doing a disservice to your health!
    Er no. So what your saying that if people can't use the tool MFP has provided to create their own recipes and enter their own food it's MFPs fault? That I must say is one of the silliest things I've read on MFP in a long while and that's an achievement considering some of the nonsense that gets posted.
  • AsaThorsWoman
    AsaThorsWoman Posts: 2,303 Member
    Does anyone else fell like this site lends itself to prepackaged foods and/or commercial dining? It's easier to get nutritional information from those sources but you're really doing a disservice to your health!

    Unfortunately non packaged food doesn't usually come with a barcode.

    Keep in mind, the vast majority of food in the database is user entered. MFP has quite an extensive list of non packaged foods, although I do admit the search function is terrible. Once you learn how they are listed, its much easier. Hint, they are the same the ones listed at http://nutritiondata.self.com/, if you search the same term, you'll come up with it. They are listed without an * in this database. Even just using the word "raw" helps to find this products.

    I also don't believe that packaged food is necessarily doing a disservice to your health.

    Here's an interesting link. I'll keep it and review it.
  • MrJThomasEsq
    MrJThomasEsq Posts: 144 Member
    Is it MFP's fault, or is it the USDA's fault for not requiring nutrition info printed on all produce?

    USDA does require nutrition information on Meat and Poultry products (which is where their jurisdiction is). The FDA is responsible for labeling Non-meat foods which would include produce.

    However produce is pretty easy to look up if you know the name of the fruit or vegetable. If you don't know what it is you might be better off not eating it.
  • MysteriousMerlin
    MysteriousMerlin Posts: 2,270 Member
    I think everyone's health is a very individual topic, and I'm not qualified to make statements about what is and is not a disservice to one's health--at least in this regard.

    I find hard to believe that anyone would feel that they have both the background and data to justify a such a claim for anyone here, let alone everyone.

    Applause! Applause! *stadium noise* *cheers*

    I totally read this in Tim's voice :blushing:
  • AsaThorsWoman
    AsaThorsWoman Posts: 2,303 Member
    I think it boils down to a universal truth that was real long before MFP.


    In the same way it's easier to open a package than chop, grind, blend, saute and simmer, it's easier to scan a bar code than use the recipe tool.

    :yawn:
  • SugaryLynx
    SugaryLynx Posts: 2,640 Member
    15ph3dj.gif

    Wait.

    Is it because weighing and measuring your food in combination with finding accurate database information is hard or the fact that this site is a free resource for finding out information on what you put in your face? I don't get it.
  • 19TaraLynn84
    19TaraLynn84 Posts: 739 Member
    Does anyone else fell like this site lends itself to prepackaged foods and/or commercial dining? It's easier to get nutritional information from those sources but you're really doing a disservice to your health!

    And that's what this whole weight loss thing is really about, isn't it? Doing what's easy.

    MFP doesn't encourage me to do anything. It's a tool. How you use the tool is up to you.

    Silly to quote the main topic. Of course that's what you're replying to.

    The main topic itself is silly. Of course it's easier to enter pre-packaged food. That doesn't mean the site is encouraging its members to eat these convenience foods. If you're willing to put in the extra time and effort to prepare everything you eat, the few minutes it takes to search and enter the ingredients shouldn't be a problem.
  • GiveMeCoffee
    GiveMeCoffee Posts: 3,556 Member
    MFP is a tool to use and you get out of it exactly what you put into it, if you are too lazy to weigh and log your food accurately who's fault is that? It takes me about 5 minutes to log my food for the day maybe 10 if I'm multitasking. Took me longer to backspace my snarky response to this than entering my food
  • timetravelforfitness
    timetravelforfitness Posts: 242 Member
    ... Now if only the recipe builder would let me change ingredient quantities or copy recipes to alter (I cook similar things a lot), then I would be a very happy cook indeed.

    That would be the most amazing thing! I hardly ever follow a recipe when I cook. (Which will happen once I get out of this "survival" mode and start cooking our meals again.) And that is the only problem I ever had, switching eggs for bananas, adding pumpkin, other substitutions. That's the only time I ever get annoyed with entering on MFP, though, as others have said, it really is just the nature of tracking calories.
  • DamePiglet
    DamePiglet Posts: 3,730 Member
    I like convenience foods. They are convenient.
  • jonnythan
    jonnythan Posts: 10,161 Member
    Reality encourages convenience nutrition.
  • WendyTerry420
    WendyTerry420 Posts: 13,274 Member
    I like convenience foods. They are convenient.
    Reality encourages convenience nutrition.


    harry-and-hermione-high-5.gif
  • ValerieMartini2Olives
    ValerieMartini2Olives Posts: 3,024 Member
    I don't find it hard at all to log fruit and veg.
  • MrJThomasEsq
    MrJThomasEsq Posts: 144 Member
    I don't find it hard at all to log fruit and veg.

    I find that I make better logs when I have enough fruits and vegetable (and sufficient water).
  • DamePiglet
    DamePiglet Posts: 3,730 Member
    I don't find it hard at all to log fruit and veg.

    I find that I make better logs when I have enough fruits and vegetable (and sufficient water).

    :laugh: :laugh: :laugh:
  • Tobi1013
    Tobi1013 Posts: 732 Member
    I pre-apologize for what is probably a mischaracterization of the topic on my part, but...

    My intuition just tells me this is kind of just another I-don't-like-tracking-it's-all-about-quality-not-quantity threads, just in a slightly different disguise.

    We just might have a winner here, folks!!
  • Ang108
    Ang108 Posts: 1,711 Member
    Does anyone else fell like this site lends itself to prepackaged foods and/or commercial dining? It's easier to get nutritional information from those sources but you're really doing a disservice to your health!

    I think MFP is what you make it. I started 360 days ago and have never eaten anything that just could be scanned with a bar code, plus I do not live in the US and log a-typical stuff and still never had any problems.
    I think we all need to take responsibility. If for example there is any disservice done to your health it is done by you and not MFP:
  • LiftAllThePizzas
    LiftAllThePizzas Posts: 17,857 Member
    It's the nature of convenient foods to be, well, more convenient.

    Mind. Blown.

    45822-Keanu-Bill-and-Ted-whoa-gif-Yr7D.gif
  • jofjltncb6
    jofjltncb6 Posts: 34,415 Member
    OP had been here for almost THREE YEARS...made this incendiary post, and then deactivated.

    Was this just some kind of final hurrah on her way out the door?



    If so, well done, OP...well done. :drinker:
  • jofjltncb6
    jofjltncb6 Posts: 34,415 Member
    Does anyone else fell like this site lends itself to prepackaged foods and/or commercial dining? It's easier to get nutritional information from those sources but you're really doing a disservice to your health!

    And that's what this whole weight loss thing is really about, isn't it? Doing what's easy.

    MFP doesn't encourage me to do anything. It's a tool. How you use the tool is up to you.

    Silly to quote the main topic. Of course that's what you're replying to.

    LOL

    Someone makes a post where in closing they say, "How you use the tool is up to you."

    OP criticizes post for quoting OP essentially saying that they're using the forum tool incorrectly.


    :laugh:


    Don't ever change, MFP.


    Don't. Ever. Change.
  • jofjltncb6
    jofjltncb6 Posts: 34,415 Member
    *looks at grapefruit she's having for a snack*

    Well. I suppose it was convenient. Just had to peel it, weigh it, and head out to the porch to nom.

    WAYT DOE.
    DID U WEIGHT DA GRAPEFROOT B4 YOU PEELT IT OR JUX DA PART UNDR DA PEAL?

    Irrelevant.

    It was a grapefruit, not sweet potatoes...

    ...er, I mean, SWEAT PERTATERZ.

    Totally different approach.

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