How to count excercise when cooking Thanksgiving Day

Please tell me you're joking, I cook for my family every single day, breakfast, lunch, and dinner and I have NEVER counted the calories I burn during that time why would you, you're only hurting yourself

Cooking during holidays can be an all day affair depending on what the spread is and if everything is from scratch just sayin'

Please tell me you're joking, I cook for my family every single day, breakfast, lunch, and dinner and I have NEVER counted the calories I burn during that time why would you, you're only hurting yourself

Cooking during holidays can be an all day affair depending on what the spread is and if everything is from scratch just sayin'

If it takes you all day, I'd recommend you take some of the same classes I suggested to the other person who said it took so long. Do you have any idea how whiny your posts sound?

I do about an hour or so prep the night before. Get up and make the family breakfast, stuff and get the Turkey in the oven, go catch the 2nd half of the local high school football team's game and come home and knock out the rest in a hour or 2. Just in time for the Turkey to be done and the pies to go in. Dinner by 3. No problem and certainly not exercise! lol I work harder at work everyday feeding many more people than on Thanksgiving.

Okay, I get where you're coming from. I regularly spend entire afternoons cooking and baking in my kitchen on weekends. It can be exhausting, but it's as much mental as it is physical. It's like the exhaustion you feel after a long, productive day of work at a desk job. You haven't really been more physically active than usual, but, because you've been singularly focused for several hours, you feel tired.. I cannot think of any home cook, in a typical home kitchen preparing a typical Thanksgiving meal, who should be considering their cooking efforts to be exercise.

cooking isn't exercise...

I'll count the "after I stuff my face" walk I hope to take, unless I pass out.. which is high probability.. and if i get my butt to the gym in the morning i'll count that..

I disagree. ALL activity counts as exercise. Anytime we are off the couch moving, it is exercise. I found that out when I started wearing the FitBit Flex 24/7. You would be surprised how many calories one could burn spending hours cooking a large Thanksgiving dinner. Yep, it's exercise. Find a way to count it.

It's called living, of course you are always burning but part if that is already built into your allotted calories, cooking is not exercise.

I do 20 calories for every set of turkey presses, 10 for pie raises, and 5 for sweet potato curls.

You can't be serious about tracking calories cooking are you?? lol I am a chef and cook every work day for 8 hours for many more people than you will cook for that day and I don't track it as exercise. It's part if daily activity.

It's part of your daily activity. But most people don't cook everyday like they do on Thanksgiving. Form many, it is activity above and beyond the norm.

It's still not track worthy exercise.

Why not? Could not tracking it not drop one below goal? And isn't meeting your calorie goal the point of tracking activity?

so maybe if you aren't getting a full workout cooking on Thanksgiving, maybe you just aren't doing it right.

Or maybe I'm just better at it than you are.

Please tell me you're joking, I cook for my family every single day, breakfast, lunch, and dinner and I have NEVER counted the calories I burn during that time why would you, you're only hurting yourself

Cooking during holidays can be an all day affair depending on what the spread is and if everything is from scratch just sayin'

If it takes you all day, I'd recommend you take some of the same classes I suggested to the other person who said it took so long. Do you have any idea how whiny your posts sound?

I do about an hour or so prep the night before. Get up and make the family breakfast, stuff and get the Turkey in the oven, go catch the 2nd half of the local high school football team's game and come home and knock out the rest in a hour or 2. Just in time for the Turkey to be done and the pies to go in. Dinner by 3. No problem and certainly not exercise! lol I work harder at work everyday feeding many more people than on Thanksgiving.

Do you leave the oven on while you're out?

Yeah. There always someone still home.

I tend to agree with the OP. I cook for two days, cook/bake well into the night, sleep for a bit, wake up early and start cooking again. Some of you may be avid cookers but I get a full workout when preparing Thanksgiving. My meals are not half hearted attempts and I run the full show, so maybe if you aren't getting a full workout cooking on Thanksgiving, maybe you just aren't doing it right.

When I first posted this, I was not talking to the "professional" cooks out there but the run of the mill home cooks who don't usually fix large meals. Yes this is a large undertaking for new cooks & people who don't do it all the time. This is for people who have a hard time staying on track & this could give them some hope that part of the dinner that are doing can also count for some good things. Not everything must be a chore. New people starting out this program need to be offered encouragement for doing a special "project" and not just sitting around watching the games. Not everyone see themselves in a good light when they are cooking for 2 or 3 days getting ready for a holiday. We all need encourgement!

I'm not a professional cook and normally, I only cook for myself since my daughter is basically out of the house and my BF and I eat very differently. I only cook such large meals if I have a party or it's a holiday, so less than once a month.

I still wouldn't count it as exercise.

And if you are that exhausted from cooking, as someone else pointed out, you might want to take a class. I learned from my mother, grandmother, family friends, trial and error through my life. Cooking is not exercise. Neither is washing dishes (even handwashing "every dish in the house."). Folding clothes is not exercise.

I can list a million things people think counts that shouldn't and I bet most people who count those things are struggling. Because they DON'T burn a lot of calories.

They may be tiring and even zap you emotionally, but so does readnig a book or watching certain TV shows or movies. Just because I come away from a movie feeling drained doesn't mean it was exercise. I was sitting down staring at a screen.

The actual physical work that goes into cooking is pretty minimal. The majority of the actual time it takes is from waiting for things to bake. Even kneeding bread doesn't take much time or enegy. I have been making bread from scratch since I was 16 and I have never understood why anyone would waster money on a breadmaker. It just is NOT that difficult.

And if cooking a family dinner makes you feel bad about yourself, then don't do it. I can't quite figure out why someone would feel bad about him or herself because of cooking Thanksgiving dinner. And the answer to that issue is counseling, not people lying to you about how many calories it DOESN'T BURN.

You can't be serious about tracking calories cooking are you?? lol I am a chef and cook every work day for 8 hours for many more people than you will cook for that day and I don't track it as exercise. It's part if daily activity.

It's part of your daily activity. But most people don't cook everyday like they do on Thanksgiving. Form many, it is activity above and beyond the norm.

If you want to delude yourself that cooking of any kind burns enough caliories to bother counting, go right ahead.

Technically, I doubt cooking burns any, but food prep can certainly burn significantly more than sitting at a desk all day. How much depends on the amount of prep. Making pumpkin pie from a whole pumpkin is going to burn more than using canned pumpkinm for example.

I do a pretty htorough job of scraping out the inside of my pumpkin when I carve. I guess I should have counted that as a workout?

I do a pretty htorough job of scraping out the inside of my pumpkin when I carve. I guess I should have counted that as a workout?

Yes! Note to self for next year. < Cindyinpg burned 80 calories carving a pumpkin so she could eat one more mini Kit Kat> :drinker:

I disagree that cooking isn't exercise unless you do a lot of out of the box stuff. Kneading breads and dough, going around the kitchen lifting pans and pots. I am a professional cook too and done it in the military for 5 years (we cooked for a lot of soldiers).

I think getting a Fitbit or a HRM is the way to go.

Well you dont. Cooking isnt considered "exercise" in my opinion.

I disagree. ALL activity counts as exercise. Anytime we are off the couch moving, it is exercise. I found that out when I started wearing the FitBit Flex 24/7. You would be surprised how many calories one could burn spending hours cooking a large Thanksgiving dinner. Yep, it's exercise. Find a way to count it.

^^this^^

When I'm up moving constantly all day its a whole lot more ACTIVITY (not excercise per se) than when I sit at a desk for 8+ hours. May not be "excercise" - but it is also more activity than normal. My fitbit tracks my fluctuations in acitvity per day, so I won't track any "excercise" (even my turkey trot for the YMCA) - but I don't think its fair - and even rude - to imply that this is not a different activity level for some people. If you're on your feet for 12 hours cooking and cleaning you have a whole different TDEE than spending time commuting in a car and sitting at a desk. Serious questions deserve a serious answer.