I just dont understand calorie counting..

EternalJourney

How do you count calories unless you know everything you are cooking ahead of time , and then weigh and count the calories of everything in it from spices to the food itself. And how can you make a meal plan ahead of time if you don't know how many calories a meal will come out to. And if you make meals and count calories as you go along how do you know you wont be below or over.

It just seems so confusing to me. Everyone seems to understand it flawlessly but me!

megsmom2

Just keep track of what goes into a recipe, and then figure out how much of it is a serving. When in doubt, estimate a little high. Most common ingredients are in the database, or there are other online sources for that. Use a scale and measuring cups. It is a bit of a procedure until you get used to it, I agree. Save commonly used meals in your food diary tab, so you don't have to start over each time.

MissFit0101

Use the recipe calculator to figure out how many calories per serving in meals you prepare at home. The best thing you can do is pre-plan and pre-log your food.

sweetybird09

I do not do it flawlessly actually and from what I can see its not going to be an exact calorie count, you do the best you can, as far as knowing what a cooked meal will be, I look that up from MFP database, and do it that way, I do not try and figure it all out ingredient by ingredient, you will drive your self crazy with all that.

I think there are times you are over somewhat and under somewhat, so it balances out in the long run.

Try and take it in little steps, it sounds like all of this is over whelming you and actually it can be at first.

I am sure there will be some great ideas, I have read some of the most wonderful answers from MFP members...Hope some of this helped

Take care

quixoteQ

It becomes second-nature when you get used to it. But you're right: it is best to know the recipe and all the measurements for the ingredients ahead of time. Write out the recipe the night before, input the totals into your diary the night before, and then get a little scale to measure everything as you cook. It sounds like a pain, but if you are familiar with the recipe, there really isn't a huge problem and using MFP you can enter entire recipes into your meal diary with a click of a button.

There is an extra step involved, of course, if you are preparing a meal for several people. In these cases you will have to add certain ingredients separately to each dish if you want to be accurate (sprinkling 1/4 cup of cheese to each dish, weighing out 6 ounces of chicken then adding to each dish, etc.).

cannonsky

I pre plan my foods and calculate recipes ahead of itme

MissFit0101

I do not do it flawlessly actually and from what I can see its not going to be an exact calorie count, you do the best you can, as far as knowing what a cooked meal will be, I look that up from MFP database, and do it that way, I do not try and figure it all out ingredient by ingredient, you will drive your self crazy with all that.

I think there are times you are over somewhat and under somewhat, so it balances out in the long run.

Try and take it in little steps, it sounds like all of this is over whelming you and actually it can be at first.

I am sure there will be some great ideas, I have read some of the most wonderful answers from MFP members...Hope some of this helped

Take care

I enter every ingredient and it really does not take me very long. Once the recipe is entered I no longer have to enter all the ingredients again. It will always be in my recipes and the next time I have it, I will just go add it from there. Using a generic database entry for entire meals can be off by several hundred calories or more. I would not suggest doing that. Great if it's worked for you so far, but it's far from accurate.

michelleepotter

I found the whole idea really daunting at first, because how could I know if it was ok to eat X right now, if I didn't know what I was going to eat later? I was especially confused about how to balance macros. What if I got to the end of the day, and I only had 200 calories left, and I wasn't supposed to eat any more fat, but I needed a ton of protein???

There are a couple of things you can do about this. First off, I took the total number of calories I am supposed to eat per day, and divided by 4. That's three meals, with the 4th being snacks. For me, that's 1500/4 = 375. So I try to eat about 375 at every meal. Not necessarily EXACTLY 375, but close. Then I can also have about 375 calories worth of snacks.

Once you figure out a few meals that you like that are about the right number of calories, keep eating the same things. The less you have to think about what you are going to eat, the easier it is. You might have two or three different breakfasts that you like and are the right number of calories, and just rotate between those. Honestly, I eat the same thing for breakfast, lunch, and snacks pretty much every day (except for going out on the weekends). Then I always have the same calories left for dinner, so it's easy to plan.

Also, realize that you don't have to get EXACTLY that number of calories every day. It's approximate. Sometimes I'm a little under, sometimes a little over. Nothing wrong with that.

I honestly don't pay THAT much attention to macros. I started out by just always trying to maximize the positives in my food (the more vitamins, protein, calcium, and iron the better!) The other day I adjusted my carbs-fat-protein ratios on here to what is recommended by The New Rules of Weight Lifting For Women, and found that was already pretty much how I was eating without even trying. Again, it doesn't have to be exact, just close.

michelleepotter

Oh, and yes, I do measure everything and put in every ingredient into a recipe on MFP when I cook. You only have to do this once for each recipe, so it's not that bad. I'm just learning to cook, so when I find a recipe I want to try, I add it to Ziplist (http://www.ziplist.com -- a website for collecting recipes and making grocery lists). Then, I wait until the first time I make it in case I decide to make any changes (like today I used dried basil instead of fresh, and I measured how much juice I got from juicing 5 lemons like the recipe says), and then I input the result into MFP. Then, next time I make the same dinner, it's already in my recipes, so I can get an accurate estimate with no work!