Calories in home made salad

bbryant573

How do you know how many calories that you've eaten when you make your own meals?

Like last night I made up a big bowl of salad - I used iceberg lettuce, 2 whole green peppers and used 1 whole cucumber .... and I browned up some hamburger meat and put in some taco season package so I could have like tacos or taco salad -

For lunch I had a salad which I put in a 3 qt bowl - and I googled the calories of each item 8 calories for lettuce, 30 calories for green pepper and 8 calories for the cucumber that was in my salad - so how would you calculate that? Add them all together...

I think I need to start measure what I eat...

Thank you for all your advice.
Brandi

kls13la

When I make a salad, I add each ingredient separately, and it adds them all up. I also weigh/measure each ingredient.

mcarter99

There are a few ways. Log each item individually just like you would any other foods. Or go into the recipe tab and create it as a recipe. This is good for if it made multiple servings. Or if you eat that salad often, save it as a "Meal" after you've logged it.

Yes, it helps a lot to measure and weigh. Logging homemade foods gets easier. And once you've made it as a recipe, it's there for you for next time!

impyimpyaj

Make a recipe. Put in all the ingredients you used, and then when it says "number of servings" tell it how many servings you'll get of however much you want to eat. So if you'll make 4 bowls full, tell it 4 servings. Then you can put it in your diary from your recipes section.

cookie1148

I enter them into MFP food diary and it does the work for you. And I measure/weigh everything. Sometimes I even put them in BEFORE I've actually eaten them....then I can delete or cut back on something if it's going to be too many calories.

DGHayden

Make a recipe. Put in all the ingredients you used, and then when it says "number of servings" tell it how many servings you'll get of however much you want to eat. So if you'll make 4 bowls full, tell it 4 servings. Then you can put it in your diary from your recipes section.

^^^This. I do this for a lot of things that i eat regularly that i make myself. Makes it really easy to log my meals.

Captain_Tightpants

Make a big bowl, figuring out the cals of every ingredient so you know what's in the whole bowl. Then I just portion it out into x-amount of tupperwares or ziplocs. Divide cals in big bowl by how many portions you created, then every time you grab a bag, you'll know exactly how many cals to log.

KarenAnnne

Whats great about this data base is its so complete that you just need to plug in the items and it prompts you to put in how much. MFP is far superior then some other sites for being user friendly. Example: I will type in Zuchinni and it will show me a list of how I want to enter it. They have so many choices, I guarantee you will be able to find one that fits your needs. Good Luck

mjsunshine16

I log each thing. Since I don't usually have the same portions all the time I don't put salads in my recipes but If i make something for lunch or dinner int eh crock pot etc I will make its own recipe because I know how much I eat of it consistantly

treetop57

Lettuce, cukes, cabbage, onions, green beans, carrots, and other non-oily non-sweet salad ingredients have so few calories that I don't sweat them. I log the same salad every day even though those types of ingredients vary depending on what I have in the house. Even if I'm off by 100%, it's a matter of 30 odd calories, 1.5% of my daily intake and negligible considering the US FDA's requirement that food labels be accurate +/- 20%.

Dressing, croutons, cheese, ground beef, avocados, meat, fruit, and other oily or sweet ingredients do have appreciable calories so I log them separately from my standard "Dole - Classic Romaine - Romaine Lettuce, Carrots & Red Cabbage, 4.5 oz. (85 g/about 1-1/2 cups)."

KeriW626

I measure and weigh everything, which is gonna annoy some people i visit this summer, their issue not mine.
Ok so i measure everything, then i list each thing in my diary, then i do quick calories, save in my meals. this way hubby can get to it and copy it. If I put it in recipes he cannot.

Salads. I made a really nice salad (so I thought) I logged everything, the salad which I had made for myself. came out to over 1k calories. I am not really a salad person, so I just ate .25 serving. the rest ended up in the trash, what a waste. This was a salad my grandmother used to make. I prefer to make a fresh veggie relish tray. everything accounted for (logged) then eat what I want. I dont need heavy or any dressing this way.

I hope this helps, I feel like i just sprewed my issues. lol Good luck,
Commit to be Fit, Keri

Goal_Line

Maybe I'm lazy, but I've gotten to the point I guess on the veggies and greens...sometimes I don't even log them. But I pay close attention to dressing, protean, fat and all other carbs (grains, fruit etc).

LottieLou13

I weigh each ingredient out, make a new recipe and add each ingredient/the amount of each then enter the number of servings that meal gives. Then enter into my diary how many servings of it I had

bbryant573

What I basically did is I chopped up the whole iceberg lettuce, 2 whole green peppers (small) and 1 whole cucumbers... I put all of it in a big bowl - and I am dishing out 1 cup with 2 tbs of Zesty Italian dressing with one ounce of cheese... that can't be too bad can it?

treetop57

Assuming that the vegetables make enough for six servings, they total about 24 calories.

Calories - 24
Carbs - 5
Fat - 0
Protein - 1
Sodium - 12

The dressing (Albertson's Zesty Italian) has three times that many calories:

Calories - 80
Carbs - 3
Fat - 8
Protein - 0
Sodium - 290

And the cheese (Cheddar - Cheese, 1 oz) has four times the vegetables:

Calories - 110
Carbs - 0
Fat - 9
Protein - 7
Sodium - 176

I stand by what I said originally: It's not worth my time to be exact with lettuce, green peppers, and cucumbers. It is worth my time to be exact with cheese and salad dressing.

impyimpyaj

Why not add the ingredients into the recipe builder and find out for sure?

mcarter99

I agree that for calorie tracking, the veggies are fine to skip and I often do, too. But if people want to monitor their veggie intake or fiber or something, they probably want them in there. Or if their diary is open. :laugh:

treetop57

Why not add the ingredients into the recipe builder and find out for sure?

Speaking purely for myself, because it's not worth the time. I make a slightly different salad every day and I only keep track of the big drivers in terms of calories, fat, carbs, or protein, things like dressing, cheese, croutons. I do log the lettuce and such, but with the same entry every day ("Dole - Classic Romaine - Romaine Lettuce, Carrots & Red Cabbage, 4.5 oz. (85 g/about 1-1/2 cups)"), even if I add the stray green bean, green pepper, or cucumber, substitute lettuce other than romaine, and leave out the carrots or red cabbage.

Sure I could spend five minutes weighing and entering every leaf of lettuce, stalk of celery, and morsel of carrot. But experience tells me that they add up to less than the margin of error on other ingredients. So I spend those 5 minutes working for world peace!

lmarshel

I agree that for calorie tracking, the veggies are fine to skip and I often do, too. But if people want to monitor their veggie intake or fiber or something, they probably want them in there. Or if their diary is open. :laugh:

LOL If you're eating a salad with mostly iceberg lettuce and cucumbers, cals are probably negligible. But if you start adding other types of veggies, it can add up quickly. One roma tomato is 35 calories. One cup of broccoli is 40 calories. I guess it depends on how many veggies you eat. Often, my veggies for dinner is over 100 calories. And that's without any added fat, dressing, dips, etc. I personally try to log everything, whether the calories are negligible or not. A handful of doritos is probably under 50 calories, but I'll still log them if I eat them.

treetop57

I usually do log tomatoes in addition to my standard "lettuce, cabbage, and carrots." But probably not broccoli. Sure a cup of broccoli is 40 calories, but so is a tablespoon of sunflower seeds. The calorie dense sunflower seeds are worth my time to log exactly and accurately. With the calorie spare broccoli, the need for accuracy is much much less.