Eating Out!

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brandysharae
brandysharae Posts: 1
in Food and Nutrition
So my schedule does not always allow me to cook and eat at home , My day starts at 4:30 am and ends sometimes around 10:30 at night. I always bring fruit, granola bars, nuts etc. with me to munch on but as far as my first two meals they are usually bought from somewhere but never anything horrible. I may get oatmeal from McDonald's or wheat toast and egg whites from waffle house and usually for lunch I will eat subway or a salad from somewhere, never anything fried or full of grease. I always eat dinner at home and I drink nothing but water. Sometimes I wonder if this will hinder my weight loss because all I ever hear is do not eat fast food or don't eat out while dieting, cook your food etc. What do you guys think?

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  • alesia9
    alesia9 Posts: 19
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    Some of my days sound just like this and I also travel a lot for work so I've had to plan ahead. Try to plan ahead by knowing where you can get the healthier choices from. Portion control is key when talking about weight loss. I will say that oatmeal from McD isn't the best since they load theirs with sugar even though its the brown sugar option.
  • Lizzy622
    Lizzy622 Posts: 3,705 Member
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    I eat out quite a bit also. You seem to have a handle on it. The worst part is the salt. I can tell I have eaten out too much because i get bloated and retain water due to the amount of salt restaurants use. Keep drinking lots of water to flush the salt away.
  • jacksonpt
    jacksonpt Posts: 10,413 Member
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    From an overall health standpoint, what you eat matters.

    Speaking strictly about weight loss, it's the amount of food that matters, not the "quality" of the food.
  • JenAndSome
    JenAndSome Posts: 1,893 Member
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    I would think the quality of what you are eating is more important than the label of the place you are getting your food from. If you are getting salads from McDonalds and eating A crap ton of french fries, delicious greasy burgers and gallons of soda made at home, which do you think is more likely to affect your weight?
  • cwolfman13
    cwolfman13 Posts: 41,867 Member
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    Whether you eat at McDonalds or at home is completely irrelevant to weight loss. You don't gain or lose weight because you did or did not eat a certain thing or certain restaurant or whatever.

    You gain weight when you consume more energy (calories) than your body requires...your body stores that energy for later in the form of fat. You lose weight when you consume less energy (calories) than your body requires...this causes your body to make up the difference by dipping into stored energy...aka your body fat. Your choice of restaurant has nothing to do with anything.

    People generally recommend eating out less because restaurant meals tend to be calorie bombs....a typical restaurant serving is usually around 2x the recommended serving size...they also use a lot of oils and what not to make everything taste really good...the combination of all of the above results in an on average meal that is more calorie dense than something you might prepare at home. So basically it's easier to adhere to a calorie deficit when you're preparing your own meals...but that's really the only reason.

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