Counting Calories in Fruits and Veggies?

Use a food scale. I am a little more lax on counting non-starchy vegetables, sometimes I'll just estimate how much I've used or instead of listing each kind of vegetable in a salad I'll just list the main 2 or 3.

I weigh all my fruits and veggies. I do over 500 grams of them on a good day, so I count them for sure.

If you want a really good estimate, you have to weigh and measure everything you eat, so it depends on how accurate an estimate you desire.

It's a huge pain in the butt sometimes. I enjoy being able to get a cherry out of the fridge and eat it. I'll do it maybe nine times a day. If I'm not logging, I can get it out, enjoy it, toss the trash.

I want to log those cherries, I have to get a paper towel, get the cherry, go to the scale, put the paper towel on it, turn it on, put the cherry on, read and jot down the weight, eat the cherry, go back to the scale, weigh the pit and stem, deduct those from the total cherry weight, jot that number down, throw out the paper towel and cherry bits, then record that number.

I'll spend 2-3x as much time in all the logging-related work than I will just having the cherry.

I'm sort of reaching a point where I'm going to either stop logging or just estimate for low-cal things I like to have a single piece of throughout the day (grapes, cherries, etc.)

crfeen wrote: »

My main question is for those of you who strictly count calories, do you worry so much about the calories in fruits and veggies? It’s really hard to get an accurate estimate. Some people say the calories don’t count at all in fruits or veggies. Some say, count the fruit calories but not the veggie and some say count both.

If you are going to count, might as well count everything, IMO, so you can properly compare one day to another. If you were eating lots of fruits and veggies and having trouble fitting in your calorie limit, I'd rather increase the calorie limit and have the correct information about the calories I was eating than pretend the fruits and vegetables didn't count. (I'd also not ever limit fruits and veggies to fit my limit, but if I was eating tons of fruits and at 1200 I suppose it might come up. I'd advise instead do 1300 calories but say a minimum of 150 is reserved for fruits and veggies, perhaps.)

It's not at all hard to get a reasonably accurate count (as good as with other foods). I weigh my fruits and veggies when cooking, when I chop them or put them on my plate. If anything, the ones that are really low calorie (like greens) can be estimated easily enough (I sometimes just say 1 cup if that seems about right).

Among other things, I use the log as a way to make sure I'm getting adequate nutrition and to compare one day to another to see why perhaps I struggled more or less, so including everything when possible is important to me. (If I ate out and it's a hassle I might not, but then later I know why I didn't log. Routinely leaving out an important component of my meals would be different.)

If you have an eating disorder history and don't want to weigh your food, you might be better off following a different method than calorie counting.

For example, intuitive eating using the food plate as a guide for how to structure your meals (essentially, 1/2 fruits and veggies, 1/4 protein, 1/4 starchy foods like grains, potato, with a small amount of fat/oil). You could aim for balance at each meal or across the day (for example, make lunch or dinner a salad or veggie soup).

girlviernes wrote: »

If you have an eating disorder history and don't want to weigh your food, you might be better off following a different method than calorie counting.

This. It seems like counting would be as potentially triggering as logging, especially if you are focusing on a pretty restrictive goal. But that's between you and your doctor, who I hope is fully informed.

I continue to think, however, that for the tool to be used properly it makes more sense to include everything you eat, not just the foods that you think have lots of calories or aren't so good for you. One reason I like to log veggies and fruits (and all kinds of other healthy foods) is that it prevents me from focusing on eating less being always better and more on getting a good range of foods and eating an overall nutritious diet.

YMMV, of course.

crfeen wrote: »

Any ideas/suggestions? What do you guys think? And if you believe I should count all the calories, how do you believe is the most accurate way of doing this?

A calorie is a calorie. If you are keeping track of calories then I would count the calories from everything you actually eat and drink.
The most accurate way is to weigh or measure your food and diligently log.
If you don't want to weigh and measure everything all the time then maybe really study what portion sizes of different foods look like and practice measuring at home for awhile so you are better at estimating.

crfeen wrote: »

Hey everyone!

I’ve been eating 1200 cal/day with plenty of protein. I talked to my doctor and confirmed that this is an OK amount of calories for me. I know there is a lot of controversy on that topic. My main question is for those of you who strictly count calories, do you worry so much about the calories in fruits and veggies? It’s really hard to get an accurate estimate. Some people say the calories don’t count at all in fruits or veggies. Some say, count the fruit calories but not the veggie and some say count both.

Any ideas/suggestions? What do you guys think? And if you believe I should count all the calories, how do you believe is the most accurate way of doing this?

Thanks guys!!

Weigh your fruit. Plenty of accurate USDA entries in the database. Very important to count all calories from all sources.

All calories do count...but really, this depends largely on how accurate you care to be. I don't get all bent out of shape if I don't know exactly how many grams of cucumber I'm having to arrive at some more exacting number that might be a couple calories different from what I estimate.

I have a few hundred calories per day in fruit and veg, so when i was logging, I definitely counted them, even if it was more of a rough estimate.

I tend to take the attitude that close is good enough. I'll measure something to get an idea of how much a serving size is, but then I'll eyeball it or measure it with my hand from then on. So, I'll log fruit (100 calories in a banana is pretty significant), but I'm not going to worry if I'm 10 calories off one way or another. I never eat back all the calories MapMyRide reports that I burned, so I figure it will balance out in the end.