Food calories vs Exercise calories - healthy balance

So my meal plan allowes for 1200 calories a day. I workout fairly hard some days burning up to 700-800 calories. When I log in my workouts I am automatically alloted extra food calories. Should I not eat those extra calories and just stick to the 1200 calories? or will my body retain fat because I am not eating enough? My average has been about 1400-1600 calories/day including the exercise.

Any thoughts would be appreacited.

-Sara

you should eat them, if you're following MFP's design at least. But always remember, MFP works off of generic formula's, you'll probably need to tweak and re-evaluate as you go.

You should eat those calories that you burn but in a healthy way.

I have followed this formula from another website and had great results. It more accurately figures out how many calories you should consume.
First figure out your BMR:
655 + (4.35 x your weight lbs) + (4.7 x Height in inches) – (4.7 x age years) = Basal Metabolic Rate

Determine your activity level:

1.1 Sedentary -- You have a desk job or do some other kind of work that requires sitting down for most of the day.

1.2 Light -- You're on your feet and walking around for half the day or more. O

1.3 Moderate -- You're on the move pretty much all day, with a few limited periods of being sedentary.

1.4 High -- You're constantly on the move and your job entails significant amounts of manual labor.

Now insert those numbers into this equation:

BMR x Activity level + 500 (planned daily calorie burn through exercise)=Your total energy expenditure

Once you know that number you can figure out your ideal daily calorie intake to lose two pounds a week. To lose two pounds a week you need a deficit of 1000 calories a day. Sounds confusing and takes a little math work but this is what it looks like using my numbers:

655 + (4.35 x 155 lbs) + (4.7 x 66 in) – (4.7 x 30 years) =1498

1498 x 1.2 + 500=2298

2298-1000=1298

My ideal calorie intake is 1298 daily, working out and burning 500 calories a day I will lose two pounds a week. If you burn more than 500 it can be "extra credit" and the weight will come off faster or if you feel starving you can consume those calories.

Hope that helps!
~Sara