Food diary dilemma - too few calories?

FeelingLessChubby

Here's a dilemma I have with the food diary - if I make any kind of food other than pre-made, it throws the diary way off.

Today - breakfast was exactly right, two microwaved eggs, salmon, one slice of bread, plus a cup of tea.

Then my friend made what I call an "assembly lunch" - that is put everything she had in the fridge on the table and told us to help ourselves.

I had exactly the stuff I listed - I took a chapatti, added one teaspoon of hummous, put in two slices of cucumber, two slices of tomato, two slices of ham, some salad, and one slice of cheese. Ended up being a huge wrap and I really enjoyed it. Then when I was done I ate another slice of ham and the rest of tomato plus more salad with a tiny bit of vinegar.

Then I came home, and I had a quarter M&S roasted chicken breast and a bag of boiled veg, no butter, no oil, plus some tzatziki.

I feel fine and full and not hungry in the least.

WHY am I under by 186 calories? Is the diary wrong, or should I eat more? I have a real trouble putting things in the diary when they're not brand name specified.

I don't want to eat under the calories, because it also has its drawbacks, health-wise.

What do you do when you have meals like this - a bit of this, a bit of that, and not knowing the brand names? And should I put this down to the food dairy, assuming I probably did eat more calories than it calculated, or should I have something else tonight (like a grapefruit or something?)

Annie83uk

i have the same problem if i go by a recipe i know how many calories, but if i try making sandwiches for lunch or cereals for breakfast then i struggle, i try and make up the calories though, as long as you are sure of your calories and you put in the exact brands of the food you had at your friends then you should probably eat something else

majope

The one thing that looks questionable to me about your lunch is the chapati--if this made a "huge wrap" it might have been more than 33 calories. Others in the database are much higher. But if it's right, and you're within a few hundred calories and feel fine, you can try not eating the calories back and see how you feel tomorrow. If I short myself too many calories, I'll be incredibly hungry the next morning and set myself up for a day where I'm miserable and never feel like I catch up. But a smaller deficit doesn't affect me the same way. You might just have to learn your own limits. I would watch out for patterns, though. A single day where you're short isn't usually a problem, but if you undereat all the time, you will eventually have problems.

If I have something that isn't brand name or easy to look up, I try to compare it to something I'm more familiar with--in this case, maybe a different sort of flatbread that's about the same size as what I ate--and find an entry that has a similar calorie count to that.

_Zardoz_

Remember even printed calories on packets can be wrong by 10 %. It sounds to me as if your obsessing a lot about hitting the exact figure. The calories amount in reality is a guide because it can only be a guess as long as you're not grossly under or over I wouldn't get too hung up on it. If your consistently going under by a few hundred try introducing a snack in some when else in the day. Maybe some fruit or if you don't fancy food you could go for fruit juice or Smoothie

FeelingLessChubby

Ah, I'll clarify the "huge wrap" - I mean in was really full and big all around when filled, so it was huge because of the filling

I wouldn't say I'm obsessing about the exact figure, but this is the end of my third week with the food diary and I'm learning a lot every day about what to eat and not to eat, so it's important to me at the moment to know what I'm doing, so I can maintain the progress.