Do you eat your exercise calories back?

You need to be eating some of those calories back which sounds like you are doing. You dont necessarily need to eat all of them. You still want to have a deficit at the end of the day to lose weight. 3500 cal burned in a week = 1lb weight loss.

I eat every last delicious one. MmmmmMMmm. Exercise calories are the best!!!!

It's not counter productive at all. Your deficit is already built in to your base calories here, and by eating them back you are fueling your body to be able to kick *kitten* in your workouts on a regular basis. If you try to go hard and don't eat enough, eventually you won't be able to perform and your workouts will suffer, and THAT is counterproductive.

To me, not eating back exercise calories would be the same as eating 300-500 fewer calories on the days I don't workout. I sometimes don't eat back my exercise calories just as I sometimes have calories left over on the days I don't workout. The point is, I'm trying to stay at a 500 calorie deficit each day, whether or not I exercise, and I usually am close to that.

I always eat my exercised calories back. I just make sure I am 'replacing' the calories I've burnt off with complex carbs and protein. That way the calories are more likley to be used as fuel for energy and not stored as fat.

I don't always do it, but most of the time I try to.

if I want to lose, I certainly can't eat those earned calories - that's the whole idea! In order to just maintain I have to exercise, exercise and then exercise some more!