Eating out most of the time can I still lose weight?

HerbertNenenger

You don't really have to cook to eat your own food from home. What about sandwiches, hardboiled eggs, cans of soup? These are all things that can be low cal/healthy and you can also track their calories. What about the freezer section of your rmarket? They have microwaveable meals that are cheap, easy, quick and track-able. What about bananas, apples, yogurt? There are so many things that you don't have to cook that you can just grab and go, and TRACK.
If you really really want this to work, you're going to really need to track your calories, at least in the beginning. I commute to my full time job through downtown traffic, have a young child, a houseful of animals, and daily workouts, and I somehow find the time. You can certainly at least try. Nobody said you had to cook a rack of lamb or beef wellington every night !

MeanderingMammal

If yiu honestly think that a fast food and eat-out diet is healthy then all the best to you but I for one will never feel comfortable posting to encourage it.

Healthy and best are very arbitrary and depend on wider lifestyle choices, rather than just food intake.

Weight loss is perfectly achievable as long as one makes informed choices about calroie intake.

Sports performance is more challenging but it's still achievable.

SnuggleSmacks

It's not an ideal situation, but that doesn't mean it can't be done. You will need an initial investment of time, but you pretty much only have to do this once:

Sit down with a computer and look up the nutritional info on all of the places you normally would eat. If no nutritional info is available, stop eating there or take your chances with guessing. Make a list of the places you plan to eat, along with the healthy dishes they serve, and the calorie/macro counts. If you think you're going to splurge once in a while on dessert or some favorite dish, make sure you include those items so you won't have to look them up again later. Stick with that list. You'll need to update it every so often as new places open or seasonal menus change, but for the most part, once you have your list, you're done. Just stick with that list.

cwolfman13

Yes you can, but I found it far more difficult. It is more difficult to estimate calories in that restaurants are allowed quite a bit of leeway from what they post for nutritional content to what is actually in the meal...further, if you're like me, you enjoy local establishments with much higher quality foods than the commercialized institutionalized franchised foods...thus, nutritional info is not available. To boot, serving sizes are roughly 2-3 times the recommended...you could pack half of your meal away for later, but I always had difficulty with that. I had a lot more success when I started cooking more and preparing my own foods. I've saved a lot of $$$ along the way as well.

I've been maintaining for a year and this habit has continued...I only eat out maybe two or three times per month.

SonicDeathMonkey80

You don't really have to cook to eat your own food from home. What about sandwiches, hardboiled eggs, cans of soup? These are all things that can be low cal/healthy and you can also track their calories. What about the freezer section of your rmarket? They have microwaveable meals that are cheap, easy, quick and track-able.
If you really really want this to work, you're going to really need to track your calories, at least in the beginning. I commute to my full time job through downtown traffic, have a young child, a houseful of animals, and daily workouts, and I somehow find the time. You can certainly at least try. Nobody said you had to cook a rack of lamb or beef wellington every night !

Reminds me of Jamie Oliver's Food Revolution... the kids didn't like his food, so the parents packed lunches for the kids. They tossed Lunchables, chips, and candy in there, since anything packed at home is healthy too (maybe healthy with love?). I'd rather have fast food than Lunchables and frozen meals. When I ate those, I always had to add extra protein and veggies because they just weren't filling enough for the calories. By that time, the convenience factor was gone.

kaaaaylee

You cook twice a week. Just cook a ton of chicken and vegetables and have them for days. Literally, I cook almost all my meals on Sundays for the week.

You'll save some serious $$ too, to invest in smaller clothes

Leonidas_meets_Spartacus

I lost lot of weight traveling for work every week. Keep it simple, its no big deal losing weight eating out.

Nice2BFitAgain

If you aren't opposed to making those crockpot meals you can cook 6 meals worth of food while you are at work and freeze the batches in grab and go containers, reheat when needed. I load my crockpot in the evening before I go to bed, takes 10 minutes TOPS and keep it covered in the fridge overnight, take it out in the morning, add the liquid required (if any) and pop it in on low before I leave. It's ready in 8 hours. Lovely. Do this a couple of days during the week and you have 18 meals made right there.

ETA: Lots of great ideas:
http://www.slenderkitchen.com/healthy-crock-pot-recipes/
http://www.mostlyhomemademom.com/2013/01/30-healthy-crockpot-recipes.html
http://www.fitnessmagazine.com/recipes/quick-recipes/dinner/seven-easy-slow-cooker-recipes/

HerbertNenenger

You don't really have to cook to eat your own food from home. What about sandwiches, hardboiled eggs, cans of soup? These are all things that can be low cal/healthy and you can also track their calories. What about the freezer section of your rmarket? They have microwaveable meals that are cheap, easy, quick and track-able.
If you really really want this to work, you're going to really need to track your calories, at least in the beginning. I commute to my full time job through downtown traffic, have a young child, a houseful of animals, and daily workouts, and I somehow find the time. You can certainly at least try. Nobody said you had to cook a rack of lamb or beef wellington every night !

Reminds me of Jamie Oliver's Food Revolution... the kids didn't like his food, so the parents packed lunches for the kids. They tossed Lunchables, chips, and candy in there, since anything packed at home is healthy too (maybe healthy with love?). I'd rather have fast food than Lunchables and frozen meals. When I ate those, I always had to add extra protein and veggies because they just weren't filling enough for the calories. By that time, the convenience factor was gone.

Didn't mention Lunchables, or chips, or candy, or anything of the sort, neither would I eat that, or tell anyone else to eat that........ Today I have Veggie Lites Chili Cornbread bowl at 200 calories for lunch. My diary is open so you don't judge what I say before you see what I am referring to - I eat lots of very healthy pre-packaged foods, non-gmo, organic stuff. And I also mentioned yogurt and fruit, too, but you must not have seen that.

jonnythan

ohai

SonicDeathMonkey80

You don't really have to cook to eat your own food from home. What about sandwiches, hardboiled eggs, cans of soup? These are all things that can be low cal/healthy and you can also track their calories. What about the freezer section of your rmarket? They have microwaveable meals that are cheap, easy, quick and track-able.
If you really really want this to work, you're going to really need to track your calories, at least in the beginning. I commute to my full time job through downtown traffic, have a young child, a houseful of animals, and daily workouts, and I somehow find the time. You can certainly at least try. Nobody said you had to cook a rack of lamb or beef wellington every night !

Reminds me of Jamie Oliver's Food Revolution... the kids didn't like his food, so the parents packed lunches for the kids. They tossed Lunchables, chips, and candy in there, since anything packed at home is healthy too (maybe healthy with love?). I'd rather have fast food than Lunchables and frozen meals. When I ate those, I always had to add extra protein and veggies because they just weren't filling enough for the calories. By that time, the convenience factor was gone.

Didn't mention Lunchables, or chips, or candy, or anything of the sort, neither would I eat that, or tell anyone else to eat that........ Today I have Veggie Lites Chili Cornbread bowl at 200 calories for lunch. My diary is open so you don't judge what I say before you see what I am referring to - I eat lots of very healthy pre-packaged foods, non-gmo, organic stuff. And I also mentioned yogurt and fruit, too, but you must not have seen that.

I wasn't speaking to your diary specifically, but rather choosing microwave meals over dining out (an analogy). Wasn't judging you. I used to eat them too. A lot.

smittybuilt19

Potentially, but will require a shed load of willpower. If you go somewhere where there is no nutritional information available you cannot be sure exactly what youre eating. Takeaway of any kind isn't great as most are cooked in a load of oil with added salt and sugar.

If you're able to cook twice a week, make enough food to last the week. Cook 3 or 4 meals and freeze them.

Everyone is 'too busy' but make the time

Cooking 3 or 4 meals takes a shed load of willpower. Create a calorie deficit..you will lose weight...choose the foods you want whether cooked at home or heated at Taco Bell.

smittybuilt19

Sorry but Im in agreement with most of the negatives.
I work LONG hours every week, mostly night shifts travelling between 7 different hotels.
Quite often working 7 days with very small breaks.

I still manage to prepare my food and go to the gym on a daily basis..

Willpower is all that matters...

(You're not gonna get many people replying encouraging a fast food and eat-out diet. It would be counter productive and against site TOS to encourage an unhealthy diet)

fast food and eat out diets are not counter productive and against ToS ...if it were there would be a lot of us in trouble all the time.

It is against the ToS to encourage VLCD...and who says you can't eat healthy eating out...

Chicken and a salad is healthy...ie DQ chicken strips and side salad, or grilled chicken salad or wendy's tuscan grilled chicken with a salad...

ETA: there was a teacher who ate at McDonalds everyday and I believe for every meal, exercised and lost weight over 30 days along with bettering his health markers through blood work...

But what about teh chemicals?

KeepGoingKylene

I dont cook, so i just have easy things. It really is all about how many calories you eat, so technically yes you can lose by eating out, but as others have said you should at least choose places with nutrition information.
I for example have foods that takes no time. Muffins for breakfast (store bought), microwave dinners for lunch, cereal for dinner, stuff like that. Then i just have snack bags of carrots, apples, bananas as snacks. All stuff that doesnt require any time at all. So maybe try that?

smittybuilt19

You don't really have to cook to eat your own food from home. What about sandwiches, hardboiled eggs, cans of soup? These are all things that can be low cal/healthy and you can also track their calories. What about the freezer section of your rmarket? They have microwaveable meals that are cheap, easy, quick and track-able.
If you really really want this to work, you're going to really need to track your calories, at least in the beginning. I commute to my full time job through downtown traffic, have a young child, a houseful of animals, and daily workouts, and I somehow find the time. You can certainly at least try. Nobody said you had to cook a rack of lamb or beef wellington every night !

Reminds me of Jamie Oliver's Food Revolution... the kids didn't like his food, so the parents packed lunches for the kids. They tossed Lunchables, chips, and candy in there, since anything packed at home is healthy too (maybe healthy with love?). I'd rather have fast food than Lunchables and frozen meals. When I ate those, I always had to add extra protein and veggies because they just weren't filling enough for the calories. By that time, the convenience factor was gone.

Didn't mention Lunchables, or chips, or candy, or anything of the sort, neither would I eat that, or tell anyone else to eat that........ Today I have Veggie Lites Chili Cornbread bowl at 200 calories for lunch. My diary is open so you don't judge what I say before you see what I am referring to - I eat lots of very healthy pre-packaged foods, non-gmo, organic stuff. And I also mentioned yogurt and fruit, too, but you must not have seen that.

lol calm yourself

tryett

The answer is yes. I have done it before. I even used to keep a spreadsheet of doable lunch options at the places I frequented. It is doable but can be more expensive. Plus you need to make sure the nutritional information is available. If I eat out now I plan in advance what I am going to order. Even salads in some places can have tons of calories.

LoosingMyLast15

I am taking everyone's advice on board and will definitely try the pulled meat and beans advice! Do any of you have recommendations of meals that are quick to prepare that i could microwave at work? I do make a lot of sandwiches for lunch so maybe i could try eating more of those with brown bread and lean meats?

to answer your question about what meals you can do that will microwave quickly the first thing that came to mind was mexican chicken. chicken breast, mexican seasoning (if you don't have to worry about sodium), chicken stock (or water), salsa, beans, peppers if you like them. cook in a crock pot. shred chicken when done, package into individual containers that you can freeze. leave in fridge at first job to thaw cook in microwave at second job.

StaciMarie1974

Yes you can lose weight even if you're not making home-cooked meals.

Some of us are busy. Some of us choose what to do with 'free' time.

I work an office job Mon-Fri, 8am-5pm. Commute is about an hour each way. One night a week I go straight from work to school - class for ~6 hours. I also have one online class, no required sessions on campus save an occasional test. I work a 2nd job on Fridays (6pm-10pm) and Sundays (noon-8pm). Tue-Thur I'm home with my kids or running them places. Such as my 8th grader has a band concert tonight. Saturday is my one day off. Eye doctor appointments, taking the dogs to the vet, various other household 'errands'. I exercise and/or study during my lunch hours and evening hours as I can. I make an effort to cook some, but often pick up food. Its just easier.

I don't know what chains you have available to you. Many places in the US now have some reasonable options available. Last night I picked up a salad w/ chicken & bacon from Wendy's. Tonight I'll have a salad from Zaxby's (the Hubby & kids will probably have chicken strips & fries) as I'll need to get food, get home, eat, then go to said band concert. Sometimes Subway. Sometimes pizza. Even pizza can fit into a reasonable calorie plan. Saturday & Sunday mornings, Hubby & I usually eat at Waffle House. Closest we get these days to 'us' time. Though starting next week he is also off on Saturdays so we're going to try and do active things as a family as much as possible.

Feel free to scan my diary. You'll see I eat out alot. I've lost nearly 30 pounds since Christmas.