The lazy dieter
hhmb8k
Posts: 49
I wanted to throw this out there... It may be a bit like chum in the water for some, but maybe food for thought to others.
I love to cook. It's fun. I haven't earned any Michelin stars yet, but I like the the food I cook. I can, and often do, cook food healthier and fresher than any processed meal or fast food.
HOWEVER, when I want to be lazy and drop weight, I switch to almost 100% processed food.
Why?
Because I can buy a load of Lean Cuisine frozen dinners (or some equivalent example of the same idea) and a bunch of flavored bottled water and keep track of all the nutrition and calorie information with a quick swipe of the barcode on the outside of the box with my smartphone.
No guesswork. No weighing. No measuring. No calculations. No muss. No fuss.
Does anybody else switch to processed food from healthy, fresh homecooked meals in order to loose weight or am I even weirder than I thought? Any thoughts on this tactic?
I love to cook. It's fun. I haven't earned any Michelin stars yet, but I like the the food I cook. I can, and often do, cook food healthier and fresher than any processed meal or fast food.
HOWEVER, when I want to be lazy and drop weight, I switch to almost 100% processed food.
Why?
Because I can buy a load of Lean Cuisine frozen dinners (or some equivalent example of the same idea) and a bunch of flavored bottled water and keep track of all the nutrition and calorie information with a quick swipe of the barcode on the outside of the box with my smartphone.
No guesswork. No weighing. No measuring. No calculations. No muss. No fuss.
Does anybody else switch to processed food from healthy, fresh homecooked meals in order to loose weight or am I even weirder than I thought? Any thoughts on this tactic?
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That sounds like a bad plan. Packaged food has a lot of sodium and preservative crap. I mean, maybe a lean cuisine for dinner is okay as long as breakfast and lunch are more wholesome. That shouldn't be hard, eh?0
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It's easier, but the pre-measured calories may not be worth the reduced nutritional value for you; you're not just shedding body weight, you're (hopefully!) building a healthier body for yourself, one that's likely got a lower body fat percentage but doesn't cost you muscle along the way.0
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I do get lazy too, but usually that means I'm eating the same thing over and over, which makes for easier logging.0
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It's definitely much easier to just scan that barcode.0
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whateverfloats wrote: »That sounds like a bad plan. Packaged food has a lot of sodium and preservative crap. I mean, maybe a lean cuisine for dinner is okay as long as breakfast and lunch are more wholesome. That shouldn't be hard, eh?
It does sound like a bad plan, doesn't it? I actually agree with you there.
But, in practice, it seems to work better than it sounds. All the fat, cholesterol, sodium, potassium, carbs, protein, etc are tallied up much much more accurately by scanning a barcode than guessing how much olive oil was absorbed and how much was left behind in the pan, for example.
I use the myfitnesspal app on my smartphone to monitor my current intake and daily limits.0 -
I wanted to throw this out there... It may be a bit like chum in the water for some, but maybe food for thought to others.
I love to cook. It's fun. I haven't earned any Michelin stars yet, but I like the the food I cook. I can, and often do, cook food healthier and fresher than any processed meal or fast food.
HOWEVER, when I want to be lazy and drop weight, I switch to almost 100% processed food.
Why?
Because I can buy a load of Lean Cuisine frozen dinners (or some equivalent example of the same idea) and a bunch of flavored bottled water and keep track of all the nutrition and calorie information with a quick swipe of the barcode on the outside of the box with my smartphone.
No guesswork. No weighing. No measuring. No calculations. No muss. No fuss.
Does anybody else switch to processed food from healthy, fresh homecooked meals in order to loose weight or am I even weirder than I thought? Any thoughts on this tactic?
Being lazy and building a goal physique don't really go hand in hand. It's like wanting to get rich without working for it.
Contents of the packaging isn't necessarily accurate btw. More often than not, there is actually more food than what is labeled, so that can set you up for some false expectations.
In any event, you'd still lose weight if you were in a caloric deficit. You might be lacking in micronutrients, fiber, and some other areas though. You'll probably end up spending a lot more money than cooking your own food as well.
Why not create a sustainable habit so you won't have to continuously cycle through losing weight over and over?0 -
This is why I batch cook and freeze single portions of several different main dishes. Then I can go through spells of being lazy and still be eating good food made with real food ingredients.
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LolBroScience wrote: »I wanted to throw this out there... It may be a bit like chum in the water for some, but maybe food for thought to others.
I love to cook. It's fun. I haven't earned any Michelin stars yet, but I like the the food I cook. I can, and often do, cook food healthier and fresher than any processed meal or fast food.
HOWEVER, when I want to be lazy and drop weight, I switch to almost 100% processed food.
Why?
Because I can buy a load of Lean Cuisine frozen dinners (or some equivalent example of the same idea) and a bunch of flavored bottled water and keep track of all the nutrition and calorie information with a quick swipe of the barcode on the outside of the box with my smartphone.
No guesswork. No weighing. No measuring. No calculations. No muss. No fuss.
Does anybody else switch to processed food from healthy, fresh homecooked meals in order to loose weight or am I even weirder than I thought? Any thoughts on this tactic?
Being lazy and building a goal physique don't really go hand in hand. It's like wanting to get rich without working for it.
Contents of the packaging isn't necessarily accurate btw. More often than not, there is actually more food than that is labeled, so that can set you up for some false expectations.
In any event, you'd still lose weight if you were in a caloric deficit. You might be lacking in micronutrients, fiber, and some other areas though. You'll probably end up spending a lot more money than cooking your own food as well.
Why not create a sustainable habit so you won't have to continuously cycle through losing weight over and over?
^ ^ ^ My thoughts exactly.
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LolBroScience wrote: »
Being lazy and building a goal physique don't really go hand in hand.
It's like wanting to get rich without working for it.
No doubt there is some wisdom in that sentiment. The only thing that nags me about how it isn't the right thing to do, is that it works so well.
Uhm, sort of like when you look into how the richest people in the country made their money... worked hard for it or inherited it? LOL
Anyway, I get your point and I don't disagree with the sentiment.0 -
SherryTeach wrote: »This is why I batch cook and freeze single portions of several different main dishes. Then I can go through spells of being lazy and still be eating good food made with real food ingredients.
This is something closer to what I think I'm fishing for--tips and tricks to make it easier for me to eat the stuff that I cook (that I actually prefer over processed food anyway) but still keep track of the calories and nutrition.
Do you guess at the calories and portion sizes and other nutritional information or use a website or an app or is it just experience with what you're doing that let's you keep track of your intake?
I get overwhelmed by trying to keep track of the ingredients that I'm adding when I cook since I don't measure anything. Do you tally things up individually as you add them (e.g. dash of salt, tablespoon of olive oil, pinch of sugar, chunk of butter, etc) or just use a generic example by Googling the nutritional components of a home cooked roasted chicken with steamed veggies on the internet and hope they cooked it the same way you did?
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I can see where you're coming from. Personally, I use my love for cooking to get creative, make yummy meals, put them in the recipe builder and portion them out and freeze them for good, homecooked meals I can easily track.
But on days where I don't bring my lunch, I will pass up a more interesting sounding and arguably less processed bought lunch for something with the nutritional info on the menu. Takes the stress out.
As for tracking home cooking, I have an electronic scale and put a bowl on it and just measure as I go. Make a little note, then put it into the recipe builder afterwards.0 -
I lost about 90 lbs eating mostly processed food. I don't track my sodium but I drink about a gallon of water a day & my bloodwork shows low sodium levels.
The word "lazy" is pejorative. I'd rather say that I helped myself be successful by "keeping it simple". When you are making a major life change that is supposed to last a decade or more, it certainly helps to pare it down to a minimal set of things to do and keep track of. It's like the old doctor's advice to a smoker/drinker -- don't try to quit both at once.
I feel bad for people who start off by putting a lot of constraints on their program. Some say from now on I'm going to "eat clean", others say they will eat only locally grown, others "low carb", "low sodium", etc. Not to say that any of these are "wrong"... but what a lot of extra work!
It was hard enough, for me, to keep track of calories alone. I had to learn to buy lean meats and light condiments, read labels, figure portion sizes, add more veggies, re-prioritize fitness over flavor, fight mindless and midnight grazing, fit in exercise, and on and on.
It was definitely not easy and so I won't call myself lazy for finding convenient ways -- food in bags and cans and boxes -- to make it work.
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I had a friend 15 years ago who lost 50 pounds only eating Healthy Choice. She was a salesperson who drove 12 hours a day. She would take intermittent breaks and do 10 minute walks all day long.
I am not advocating processed foods at all, but I do believe in "to each their own", sometimes convenience foods make sense. I personally don't eat them but I can understand why some people based on their lifestyle are drawn to them. Bringing a food scale and measuring cups everywhere you go doesn't work for me and for most people. Most of my meals during the week are consumed outside the home.
To the poster of this thread, if you can also include fresh organic fruit and salads (veggies) with these meals, a green fresh salad, it would help.
I wish you all the best.
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patriciapowerswilliamson wrote: »
To the poster of this thread, if you can also include fresh organic fruit and salads (veggies) with these meals, a green fresh salad, it would help.
I wish you all the best.
Thanks.
...and you're absolutely correct. If I did only eat a Healthy Choice frozen meal for breakfast, lunch, and dinner it would only average out to about 900 cal a day. So, plenty of room to add some fruits and veggies. But then you re-open that can of worms about how you track your intake for the stuff that doesn't have a barcode slapped on it.
I am starting to get the sneaking suspicion that all those guys and gals that only eat fresh, non-processed home cooked food, really don't bother with keeping track of calories or nutritional content at all (or at best they are completely guessing most of the time).
I kinda get the sense that they are really just ballparking it. Like guessing that their caloric intake for the day was roughly somewhere between 1,500 and 1,800 calories (uhm, give or take about 1,000 calories in error one way or the other).
I can't prove that is the case, just a sneaking suspicion.
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patriciapowerswilliamson wrote: »
To the poster of this thread, if you can also include fresh organic fruit and salads (veggies) with these meals, a green fresh salad, it would help.
I wish you all the best.
Thanks.
...and you're absolutely correct. If I did only eat a Healthy Choice frozen meal for breakfast, lunch, and dinner it would only average out to about 900 cal a day. So, plenty of room to add some fruits and veggies. But then you re-open that can of worms about how you track your intake for the stuff that doesn't have a barcode slapped on it.
I am starting to get the sneaking suspicion that all those guys and gals that only eat fresh, non-processed home cooked food, really don't bother with keeping track of calories or nutritional content at all (or at best they are completely guessing most of the time).
I kinda get the sense that they are really just ballparking it. Like guessing that their caloric intake for the day was roughly somewhere between 1,500 and 1,800 calories (uhm, give or take about 1,000 calories in error one way or the other).
I can't prove that is the case, just a sneaking suspicion.
Nope. When I make something, every ingredient is weighed and tracked, and then the portions are measured before I eat them. It just takes *drumroll*... not being lazy.
Using a food scale along with USDA or equivalent confirmed nutritional info (the same your frozen food companies use to put the labels on their food), it's just as accurate as a packet. They don't have scientists testing every product, they just weigh up the ingredients and do the maths, just like us home cookers. There's no magic in nutritional labels on processed food.
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Alatariel75 wrote: »
Nope. When I make something, every ingredient is weighed and tracked, and then the portions are measured before I eat them. It just takes *drumroll*... not being lazy.
Using a food scale along with USDA or equivalent confirmed nutritional info (the same your frozen food companies use to put the labels on their food), it's just as accurate as a packet. They don't have scientists testing every product, they just weigh up the ingredients and do the maths, just like us home cookers. There's no magic in nutritional labels on processed food.
I believe you...
in theory.
In practice, I think we cook very differently. Either that or I stand by what I said about the wildly inaccurate guesstimates most people use.
Do you ever add a dash of salt to the pot (and never forget to add that to the tally of total sodium)? What about when you season your food before you cook it by sprinkling salt and pepper over the meat and 40-50% of the seasoning never sticks to the food at all?
Example: A pinch of salt is roughly 360 mg of sodium according to Google.
That is about 3 times MORE than the total sodium in my entire healthy choice meal I had for dinner. Miss one pinch of salt and you are now wildly inaccurate in your nutritional calculations.
Example: A tablespoon of generic Olive Oil has 120 calories and roughly 22% of your daily fat according to Google.
If you use "several" tablespoons of Olive Oil to coat the bottom of your pan to sear a chicken breast, do you include the total amount of Olive oil used, even if most of it stays behind in the pan and not on the chicken breast? Or do you have NASA grade scales accurate to a millionth of an ounce and weigh the pan before cooking and after cooking making adjustments for temperature and pressure changes in the room to calculate how much oil (or butter or margarine or whatever) is left behind and then deduct that from the amount put into the pan to determine the amount on the food...
OK, OK, I'm being silly.
It's getting late and I don't want to get too serious.
But the way I like to cook, I use seasoning and condiments, etc. All silliness aside, I don't think I can cook that way and have an accurate measurement of sodium content (for example) let alone total calories. So, healthy cooking means cooking without salt and olive oil or using condiments, right? Is everything cooked Sou Vide in a warm water bath without seasonings so you can use the USDA values provided online for a generic chicken breast?
Please prove me wrong and dispel my fears or teach me a better way to do it. Actually that is what this is all about. I'm not trying to argue or throw around wild accusations of sloppy dietary miscalculations to sully your culinary reputation. I'm just really trying to figure out a better way to do it than the way I'm doing it now. Tips and advice are not only welcome, that's what I'm asking for.
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See, you're never going to be spot on. But neither is the food that comes in the packets with the labels. The regulations governing nutritional labels allow for the amounts to be averaged across vast amounts of product produced, and rounded up or down reasonably significantly depending on where you are.
Not to mention there there is no system in place for random "spot checks" of food productions to ensure their nutritional labels are correct. The labelling practices are almost entierly self-governed and it's only with great difficulty that a consumer would ever be able to tell (or even begin to suspect) that the labels are incorrect.
Sure, there's room for error in home cooking. But with the equivalent room for error in processed foods (not to mention the inherant unreliability of the measurement of calories in any given food as a whole), I really don't feel any more confident with trusting a label on a food than I do adding it all up for myself at home.0 -
I love to cook, and yes I am a lazy dieter but pre packaged foods is not an option for me, gets expensive when you are feeding two people, So my lazt alternative is to stock up on pre-cut chicken breast at samsclub and eat it with salad beans and rice or potato 4-5 times a week. I also realize that the less excited my taste buds get the easier it tis for me to stick to a healthier calorie appropriate meal. When I am alternating/rotating meats and sides etc I tend to over eat
Maybe I am just greedy. 0 -
Does anybody else switch to processed food from healthy, fresh homecooked meals in order to loose weight or am I even weirder than I thought? Any thoughts on this tactic?
Yep!!! On those days when my husband won't be home until late at night, I go right for the Lean Cuisine potstickers!
No mess, no fuss, no weighing, just pop it in the microwave and grab hold of the remote control for the first time in weeks, haha.
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Whatever fits. We often hear if it fits your calories/macros banded about this website. But I also strongly believe in whatever fits your life. Sure we're all here to make better choices and to improve our lifestyle but for me, when I'm cooking from scratch daily and I'm exhausted from work, I make bad choices (i.e. I can't be arsed to cook shall we have a take away). When I'm eating prepackaged 'pop-in-the-oven' food then I'm less likely to have a take away. Lesser of two evils. I have successfully lost 33.5lbs in 185 days by eating more prepackaged foods, because it fits my lifestyle. Yes it's expensive (but then so is 2-3 takeaways a week). Yes I may not be getting all the nutrients my body needs, but it is better than the alternative (all those takeaways). Do what works for you. Do what you can find manageable for the rest of your life.
It can be compared to the exercise we do. I personally hate running, I find it tedious. Now if that was the only exercise available I'd do it for a couple of weeks, give up, and return to a very sedentary lifestyle. But because I have access to a pool I'm swimming or doing aquacise 5 days a week. It works for me. May not work for everyone else, but I don't care about them/you. I'm doing this for me. Like I said - whatever fits.0 -
if you like to cook, pick a day a week to cook a few meals with lots of servings. freeze them in serving sizes, figure the calories once, and just track em when you eat em.
or eat processed food.
personally though i am not able to lose weight if i dont eat what i like. i like food too much for that.0 -
Alatariel75 wrote: »
Nope. When I make something, every ingredient is weighed and tracked, and then the portions are measured before I eat them. It just takes *drumroll*... not being lazy.
Using a food scale along with USDA or equivalent confirmed nutritional info (the same your frozen food companies use to put the labels on their food), it's just as accurate as a packet. They don't have scientists testing every product, they just weigh up the ingredients and do the maths, just like us home cookers. There's no magic in nutritional labels on processed food.
I believe you...
in theory.
In practice, I think we cook very differently. Either that or I stand by what I said about the wildly inaccurate guesstimates most people use.
Do you ever add a dash of salt to the pot (and never forget to add that to the tally of total sodium)? What about when you season your food before you cook it by sprinkling salt and pepper over the meat and 40-50% of the seasoning never sticks to the food at all?
Example: A pinch of salt is roughly 360 mg of sodium according to Google.
That is about 3 times MORE than the total sodium in my entire healthy choice meal I had for dinner. Miss one pinch of salt and you are now wildly inaccurate in your nutritional calculations.
Example: A tablespoon of generic Olive Oil has 120 calories and roughly 22% of your daily fat according to Google.
If you use "several" tablespoons of Olive Oil to coat the bottom of your pan to sear a chicken breast, do you include the total amount of Olive oil used, even if most of it stays behind in the pan and not on the chicken breast? Or do you have NASA grade scales accurate to a millionth of an ounce and weigh the pan before cooking and after cooking making adjustments for temperature and pressure changes in the room to calculate how much oil (or butter or margarine or whatever) is left behind and then deduct that from the amount put into the pan to determine the amount on the food...
OK, OK, I'm being silly.
It's getting late and I don't want to get too serious.
But the way I like to cook, I use seasoning and condiments, etc. All silliness aside, I don't think I can cook that way and have an accurate measurement of sodium content (for example) let alone total calories. So, healthy cooking means cooking without salt and olive oil or using condiments, right? Is everything cooked Sou Vide in a warm water bath without seasonings so you can use the USDA values provided online for a generic chicken breast?
Please prove me wrong and dispel my fears or teach me a better way to do it. Actually that is what this is all about. I'm not trying to argue or throw around wild accusations of sloppy dietary miscalculations to sully your culinary reputation. I'm just really trying to figure out a better way to do it than the way I'm doing it now. Tips and advice are not only welcome, that's what I'm asking for.
I don't care about tracking sodium so that is not an issue, but what I do with olive oil is include the total amount added, and don't worry about what sticks to the pan. That way my calorie count is on the high side. I also don't try to eat 1200 calories a day so if my estimates are high then all the better for me (I am severely obese so can easily stand to lose 2 lb per week and 1200/day is what MFP puts me at for that rate).
For cooking a recipe the ideal procedure-
Everything would be plopped on the scale before going in the pan and I just jot down the weight for later recording.
-Meat weighed raw
-Oil would get weighed too (it just easier to use grams than volume measurements for me)
- every ingredient weighed separately raw whenever possible
- don't worry about spices that have no/virtually no cals, which means raw garlic is weighed, a dash of oregano is not
I now have the total calories in the whole dish.
The thing then gets cooked. Then you weigh the whole cooked dish then portion out however many portions in equal amounts and divide total calories by that number. If you are using good database entries MFP tracks the macros for you.
I then freeze the portions. Write on them the total calories in each so you don't have to remember.
Sure when you go to add to database you have to select your "recipe" and how many portions you had, but after the initial labor that's barely harder than scanning a barcode.
Yes of course the initial work is more than just scanning a code, but it's not that hard.
And yes of course some portions may have a little more meat or potato or whatever so each portion wont be exactly the same calories, but over time as you eat them all it will even out to be accurate in your tracking.
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Alatariel75 wrote: »
Nope. When I make something, every ingredient is weighed and tracked, and then the portions are measured before I eat them. It just takes *drumroll*... not being lazy.
Using a food scale along with USDA or equivalent confirmed nutritional info (the same your frozen food companies use to put the labels on their food), it's just as accurate as a packet. They don't have scientists testing every product, they just weigh up the ingredients and do the maths, just like us home cookers. There's no magic in nutritional labels on processed food.
I believe you...
in theory.
In practice, I think we cook very differently. Either that or I stand by what I said about the wildly inaccurate guesstimates most people use.
Do you ever add a dash of salt to the pot (and never forget to add that to the tally of total sodium)? What about when you season your food before you cook it by sprinkling salt and pepper over the meat and 40-50% of the seasoning never sticks to the food at all?
Example: A pinch of salt is roughly 360 mg of sodium according to Google.
That is about 3 times MORE than the total sodium in my entire healthy choice meal I had for dinner. Miss one pinch of salt and you are now wildly inaccurate in your nutritional calculations.
Example: A tablespoon of generic Olive Oil has 120 calories and roughly 22% of your daily fat according to Google.
If you use "several" tablespoons of Olive Oil to coat the bottom of your pan to sear a chicken breast, do you include the total amount of Olive oil used, even if most of it stays behind in the pan and not on the chicken breast? Or do you have NASA grade scales accurate to a millionth of an ounce and weigh the pan before cooking and after cooking making adjustments for temperature and pressure changes in the room to calculate how much oil (or butter or margarine or whatever) is left behind and then deduct that from the amount put into the pan to determine the amount on the food...
OK, OK, I'm being silly.
It's getting late and I don't want to get too serious.
But the way I like to cook, I use seasoning and condiments, etc. All silliness aside, I don't think I can cook that way and have an accurate measurement of sodium content (for example) let alone total calories. So, healthy cooking means cooking without salt and olive oil or using condiments, right? Is everything cooked Sou Vide in a warm water bath without seasonings so you can use the USDA values provided online for a generic chicken breast?
Please prove me wrong and dispel my fears or teach me a better way to do it. Actually that is what this is all about. I'm not trying to argue or throw around wild accusations of sloppy dietary miscalculations to sully your culinary reputation. I'm just really trying to figure out a better way to do it than the way I'm doing it now. Tips and advice are not only welcome, that's what I'm asking for.
Just because you can't do something, doesn't make it impossible. There's no guesstimating in my cooking, I weigh everything.
I don't use several tablespoons of olive oil to cook chicken, because I don't need several tablespoons of olive oil to cook chicken. I measure out the amount I need, and use that. There's very little left in the pan, so I don't need to worry about that any more than I need to worry about what's left in any other pan when I've finished cooking. Most things don't need oil adding to them at all, adding several tablespoons of olive oil to a recipe is completely unheard of in my kitchen.
I weigh and measure everything except for water and salt (I don't track sodium). No guesstimating, no adding an extra, unweighed, pinch of something. Every single thing that goes into those recipes is weighed and logged.
When I've finished cooking, I weigh the final product and decide how many portions that is. Then I write on it how many grams are in a serving, and write that on/split it into single servings. Once the recipe has been put into the recipe builder, it's no harder to log than convenience foods.
It's not hard, I usually spend a couple of hours a week cooking and then all I need to do during the week is log a serving when I eat it. Those couple of hours are so worth it to be able to eat food I enjoy rather than revolting ready meals.0 -
when i started out in 2014 i switched to box foods....lost the weight. I love home cooked foods though. So i started cookingk a few times a week.0
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oh jeez no. Why. Fine if you like that food (no shame if you do), but sounds like you don"t and easier to just log your own food and eat more and be more satisfied. But, you do what you like.
FYI 8 oz of tuna grilled + 6 oz green beans steamed + 142 g salad + a Sichuan sauce of chili, soy, homemade hot oil, shanxxi vinegar is 492 cal. Same/less than a microwave 10 oz lean cuisine.
Again, if you like that and eat it and are satisfied, then who am I to judge and why are you even asking what to do?
Take the time and log if you really want to do this and make it a lifestyle - really how many meals do you really rotate? Or do frozen means because , lazy (unless you like them, in that case what's the question about).0 -
LolBroScience wrote: »Being lazy and building a goal physique don't really go hand in hand. It's like wanting to get rich without working for it.
Contents of the packaging isn't necessarily accurate btw. More often than not, there is actually more food than what is labeled, so that can set you up for some false expectations.
In any event, you'd still lose weight if you were in a caloric deficit. You might be lacking in micronutrients, fiber, and some other areas though. You'll probably end up spending a lot more money than cooking your own food as well.
Why not create a sustainable habit so you won't have to continuously cycle through losing weight over and over?
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Yes i think you are weird. I was shocked to read what you do when you want to lose weight. why in heaven's name?
You don't need to count calories you just need to eat less and you can monitor this by keeping a food diary and weigh yourself preferably daily and i can tell you it takes much less time than counting calories.
When i am not dieting i.e. before i started, i just ate junk and had no inclination to cook. As a dieter i enjoy preparing my food again and am rarely tempted to buy anything processed because i know its not healthy enough and is less satisfying than home cooked food.
If you put on weight when you cook, maybe you just need to change the way you cook or what you cook?0 -
LolBroScience wrote: »
Being lazy and building a goal physique don't really go hand in hand.
It's like wanting to get rich without working for it.
No doubt there is some wisdom in that sentiment. The only thing that nags me about how it isn't the right thing to do, is that it works so well.
Uhm, sort of like when you look into how the richest people in the country made their money... worked hard for it or inherited it? LOL
Anyway, I get your point and I don't disagree with the sentiment.
OP - sounds like you have your mind made up. Good luck to you and I look forward to your "help, I am skinny fat" thread ….
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LolBroScience wrote: »I wanted to throw this out there... It may be a bit like chum in the water for some, but maybe food for thought to others.
I love to cook. It's fun. I haven't earned any Michelin stars yet, but I like the the food I cook. I can, and often do, cook food healthier and fresher than any processed meal or fast food.
HOWEVER, when I want to be lazy and drop weight, I switch to almost 100% processed food.
Why?
Because I can buy a load of Lean Cuisine frozen dinners (or some equivalent example of the same idea) and a bunch of flavored bottled water and keep track of all the nutrition and calorie information with a quick swipe of the barcode on the outside of the box with my smartphone.
No guesswork. No weighing. No measuring. No calculations. No muss. No fuss.
Does anybody else switch to processed food from healthy, fresh homecooked meals in order to loose weight or am I even weirder than I thought? Any thoughts on this tactic?
Being lazy and building a goal physique don't really go hand in hand. It's like wanting to get rich without working for it.
Contents of the packaging isn't necessarily accurate btw. More often than not, there is actually more food than what is labeled, so that can set you up for some false expectations.
In any event, you'd still lose weight if you were in a caloric deficit. You might be lacking in micronutrients, fiber, and some other areas though. You'll probably end up spending a lot more money than cooking your own food as well.
Why not create a sustainable habit so you won't have to continuously cycle through losing weight over and over?
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oh jeez no. Why. Fine if you like that food (no shame if you do), but sounds like you don"t and easier to just log your own food and eat more and be more satisfied. But, you do what you like.
FYI 8 oz of tuna grilled + 6 oz green beans steamed + 142 g salad + a Sichuan sauce of chili, soy, homemade hot oil, shanxxi vinegar is 492 cal. Same/less than a microwave 10 oz lean cuisine.
Again, if you like that and eat it and are satisfied, then who am I to judge and why are you even asking what to do?
Take the time and log if you really want to do this and make it a lifestyle - really how many meals do you really rotate? Or do frozen means because , lazy (unless you like them, in that case what's the question about).
its called laziness…welcome to the new america. …0
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