Calorie Counting 101

Kathryn41057

Awesome topic. I'm so glad that I followed up on it

runner475

Here is how I track. Please let me know if I'm doing anything wrong.
So let's say I'm going to make Curry chicken.

I'll weigh in all ingredients in grams raw including Chicken and add it to MFPs Recipe builder. After the curry is cooked I'll weigh in the entire dish in grams (let's say the pot made 1500 grams) and divide it into number of servings (5 servings).

Going forward I'll serve myself 300 grams per serving to get the Calories and macro information.

Am I doing this correctly? Is this how it works when preparing food at home and using MFP's recipe builder?

Vismal, Thanks for the wonderful post. Truly appreciated.

vismal

runner475 wrote: »

Here is how I track. Please let me know if I'm doing anything wrong.
So let's say I'm going to make Curry chicken.

I'll weigh in all ingredients in grams raw including Chicken and add it to MFPs Recipe builder. After the curry is cooked I'll weigh in the entire dish in grams (let's say the pot made 1500 grams) and divide it into number of servings (5 servings).

Going forward I'll serve myself 300 grams per serving to get the Calories and macro information.

Am I doing this correctly? Is this how it works when preparing food at home and using MFP's recipe builder?

Vismal, Thanks for the wonderful post. Truly appreciated.

Yes, what you describe is correct and a good way to track a dish with multiple ingredients.

evvasa

Great post. Thank you for sharing the info!

Wishtobeperf

only comment is that gum in fact does have calories in it..

ali_riemer

Thank you for the information! I appreciated reading this.

vismal

Wishtobeperf wrote: »

only comment is that gum in fact does have calories in it..

It does but it's usually less then 3 per stick. Unless you are going to chew a pack a day every day, I'd not worry about it. I would even be curious to know if that the act of chewing burned the 2-3 calories a typical stick of gum contains...

Fullsterkur_woman

57jenna wrote: »

Lol I have never seen anyone bring a scale to a restaurant and just start weighing everything. I say you just use your common sense to pick something healthy I mean don't go for anything fatty or full of carbs...a lot of restaurants have below 600 meals or whatever and they are good. You don't have to kill yourself over this stuff just don't ever give up on yourself and eventually you'll get to where you want to be

*raises hand* It drove my friends nuts. I would break out my pocket scale, pull my meal apart into its constituent parts, weigh and log each one, and then reassemble. I'm a slow eater compared to those friends anyway, so that just exacerbated the problem. And it triggered some really obsessive, disordered eating behavior. Plus, given the variation in the way things are cooked at restaurants (was it a half-second squirt of oil that they put onto the vegetables, or two seconds?), there's zero point to weighing that obsessively. I didn't get the results I wanted anyway.

If you're being that careful with your logging, cooking your own food and being in control of how it's prepared is probably the most effective choice. But sometimes you just want to roll up your sleeves and get down with a burger and fries from a restaurant. That's where the intelligent estimating and over-estimating come in, plus acceptance that it will affect your results. I only get one life, so I intend to spend it living, not obsessing.

Using the methods detailed in the original post to accurately count food that you prepare will lead to more consistent results, and I find weighing things on my scale far easier/neater than dragging out a bunch of measuring cups and spoons. It's just so much easier when you can do everything on the scale!

bean_jean

The original post was an eye opener for me! I just ordered a food scale. They are reasonably priced-about the cost of a bottle of wine. How nice. Delete a bottle of wine from the monthly budget and add in a food scale. Win win! I've even learned a new vocabulary phrase "tare button".

I'm confident that I can track my food more accurately at home. At the end of the month I'm going to visit friends and be their house guest. I'm worried about how to track the meals they prepare accurately. I will offer to cook a few meals and that will give me some control. I'm especially worried about the Super Bowl party which is the highlight of the trip.

And I never thought about supplements containing calories. It makes sense that they do now that it's been pointed out to me.

Tank_Girl

Currently teaching my dad the very basics about counting calories and weighing food and relearning a lot

Need2Lose_200

levitateme wrote: »

Awesome thread. Everyone posting "Halp, I am not losing weight!?" should be directed here.

I chuckled because that is me. I am doing everything listed in this article, but I may not be eating enough calories for my weight. I'll add a couple hundred a day and see if the scale gets moving in the right direction again!

Papatoad194

Excellent. I learn so much form this site.

vismal

Need2Lose_200 wrote: »

levitateme wrote: »

Awesome thread. Everyone posting "Halp, I am not losing weight!?" should be directed here.

I chuckled because that is me. I am doing everything listed in this article, but I may not be eating enough calories for my weight. I'll add a couple hundred a day and see if the scale gets moving in the right direction again!

This is almost never the answer. The key to losing fat is eating less calories then you burn in a day. Eating more calories per day works against that goal. If you are on super low calories, increasing calories can cause water retention to relax thus giving the appearance of new fat loss. Unfortunately, that's not what's happening. The new weight lost is simply water. If you are eating too little calories, there are a number of good reasons to increase them, losing fat faster isn't one of them.

Lynnpatt19

vismal wrote: »

Calorie Counting 101

With the crazy amount of "I'm eating 1200 calories and I'm not losing weight" or "My weight loss has stalled" threads that get posted every day I decided to copy a calorie counting sticky I wrote for another forum. This is a guide to help ensure as much accuracy as possible when counting calories. It may seem OCD to some but for beginners I feel the more accurate they can be, the better. Before you post about how you can't count calories because of an ED, this thread isn't for you. If you have psychological issues with counting calories, simply don't. This thread is to help those who want to use calorie counting as a means to lose weight. It is based on the fact that if you eat less calories then you burn in a day you will lose weight. If you do not believe in this fact then please just don't post here. This thread is also not about how much you should eat and what you should eat. It is simply about how to accurately track what you do eat. Please keep the reply's to things that deal with calorie counting. If you want to talk about any of the aforementioned things, start a new thread.

Logging foods: In the old days, to calorie count, we had to use paper and pencil. This is why programs like weight watchers became so popular. It essentially dumbed down calorie counting to a point system and made things easier to track. With the advent of software like Myfitnesspal, there is no need for the dumbing down. You can track calories, macro nutrients, micro nutrients, and exercise with very little hassle.

To correctly implement calorie counting you must log everything you consume in a day that contains calories. This includes liquids and/or supplements that contain calories. Some people also log calorie free foods (gum, diet soda, black coffee, etc). Since they do not contain any calories, this is optional. They may however contain something that you want to track (vitamins, minerals, sodium).

Weighing foods: You must weigh your foods! Do not estimate! Weigh everything on a kitchen scale. Preferably a digital scale that weighs in grams. Only liquids should be measured by volume (cups tablespoons, etc). On a package of oatmeal the label will usually say that a serving size is ½ cup. It will also have 40g in parentheses. Use a scale to weigh out 40 grams. You will find that if you dump oats into a ½ cup measuring cup that it won’t always equal 40 grams. This becomes more important with calorically dense food such as peanut butter. 1 tablespoon is usually 100 calories, however one can easily put 2-3 “tablespoons” worth of peanut butter on the end of a normal kitchen spoon. Instead weigh the peanut butter according to how many grams are in a serving. The same goes for scoopers found in supplements. One scoop of whey does not always equal 1 serving. Always weigh your whey! Here are some links to a couple of kitchen scales for purchase:
http://www.amazon.com/EatSmart-Precision-Digital-Kitchen-Silver/dp/B001N07KUE/ref=sr_1_5?ie=UTF8&qid=1391480839&sr=8-5&keywords=eatsmart+scale
http://www.amazon.com/Ozeri-Digital-Multifunction-Kitchen-Elegant/dp/B004164SRA/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1391480816&sr=8-1&keywords=food+scale

[b[Handling foods with no nutritional information[/b]: Sometimes fruits, vegetables, and meats do not come with nutritional information. The USDA has a comprehensive list of nearly all fruits, vegetables, and many different cuts of meats in grams.

http://ndb.nal.usda.gov/ndb/search/list

Using myfitnesspal you can simply search the fruit, vegetable, or meat with “usda” afterwards to obtain the same nutritional information. When weighing meat, ALWAYS WEIGH IT RAW. The nutritional facts are based on the raw weight of meat unless packaging specifically states otherwise. This is true for just about any food you cook. If you are simply searching the database for a food with no nutritional information, be wise at what you pick. Don't pick the one option that is significantly lower in calories then all the others simply because it is. You must also be careful with the bar code scanner. Sometimes the scanner will not give you the correct product. Verify this whenever possible.

Dining out: When dining out, attempt to find nutritional information on the restaurant you are at. Many larger chains have all that information available. Know that this is somewhat of an estimate as they are not weighing things to the gram in the kitchen. They also might be liberal with ingredients like butter and oil which can add up quickly. If the restaurant does not provide nutritional information for their meals, attempt to deconstruct your meal and track it piece by piece. If you want to be 100% accurate you can bring a scale to a restaurant. This not something I do as I don't often eat out, but depending on how accurate you wish to be, it is an option. It's worth considering if you eat out frequently.

Accuracy: Accept the fact that you will never be 100% accurate. The FDA allows for up to a 20% margin of error with nutritional information. You must simply do the best you can possibly do to not let that margin grow any larger by estimating what you have eaten. Along these lines you will find products that claim to be zero calories like mustard, cooking spray, and many others. They actually have somewhere between 0-5 calories per serving. Because of rounding they can claim zero on the label. If you want to be precise, count them as 5 calories a serving. This is increasingly important if you consume these products frequently.

Once you have a solid idea of what your daily/weekly consumption is like, it is easy to manipulate calories to fulfill whatever your goals may be. Before you decide that you need to increase or decrease calories to help accomplish goals, ask yourself “Am I tracking everything correctly?” Are you drinking something with calories and not counting it? Are you weighing everything to the gram? Are you having cheat days/meals that you are not tracking? If you answer yes to any of these then your caloric goals may be correct, you are simply not meeting them. Know that if you eat 1500 calories a day and have a once a week cheat day of 3000 calories you are effectively eating 1714 calories a day. This is why you need to track your cheat days. It's okay to have them but if you track them, you can prevent them from skewing your results.

Tips:Here are some tips that I personally like to use in my own tracking of calories:

When weighing condiments I zero the scale with the container sitting on the scale. I apply the condiments to my food. I then put the container back on the scale. It will read a negative number in grams. That is how much condiment I used. This does not work for aerosols like pam or whip cream.

If my goal is weight loss and am going out to eat at a restaurant with no nutritional information, I reconstruct the meal in myfitnesspal and add 10% to the caloric total. This is in case I underestimated. Research shows humans are notorious at underestimating what they eat. In the rare case I overestimated the calories contained in the meal, I can enjoy a small extra deficit for the day. Even if they do provide nutritional information, this might be worth doing. Again, the chef is going to exercise portion control but he isn't weight his butter or your steak on a food scale and tracking to the gram.

Myfitnesspal lets you enter in your own foods. If something is not in their database you can add it. I get my burritos from Chipotle the same way every time. They have all their nutritional information listed on their website. After I determine the values of my burrito I create the food in MFP and don’t have to bother with it next time. The same goes for Subway.

If you want to weigh liquids, this site will help you based on what liquid you are weighing http://www.convert-me.com/en/convert/cooking/

Final thoughts: Counting calories is in my opinion the best thing one can do to help lose weight. This guide was written to help you be as close to 100% accurate as possible. Some of you might not like the idea of bringing a food scale to a restaurant or weighing condiments. These things aren't musts. If you don’t want to do them then you must accept that you will be less accurate than if you had. If you are a bodybuilder preparing for a competition then you will want to be as accurate as humanly possible. If you are just trying to lose weight with no real deadlines and don’t mind if your diet takes a few weeks longer than planned, feel free to be a little less strict. If you find you are not losing weight despite the fact that your caloric intake is low enough that you should be, then you need to start considering doing things like weighing condiments. Only then can you be truly sure it is time to lower calories. I hope this guide helps you guys. Feel free to add your own tips and ask questions! Again, don't turn this into a debate about anything, that isn't the intention of this thread. Make sure your reply's are about calorie counting!

Lynnpatt19

Great post!

kerramarie

Bump!

joneallen

kerramarie wrote: »

Bump!

Why are you bumping a thread when it's a sticky? LOL

Great topic. I tossed my measuring cups away last year, and did everything solid by the gram and it's helped me out tremendously.

chelsmccann

Agreed! I have started automatically weighing out almost everything as soon as I buy it. Admittedly, I only have to cook for one, but it's nice to pull a ziplock bag of uncooked chicken breast out of the freezer and know it's 170 g. Then pull out a bag of veggies that's already labeled to the ammount I typically eat in a sitting. It has immensely helped with my meal planning, and cut down on morning/evening prep with my packed schedule.

I do the same with homemade sauces - make them, measure them and write down what recipie it is in my mfp app and what size of serving. Then I bag it and freeze it flat so I can store them almost in a file like manner. My fridge and freezer are now organized, I'm not wasting food (and therefore saving money!) and I'm loosing weight. Win/win!