How many meals per week....

I like to prepare my own meals strictly due to the money factor- and I dislike processed stuff. I'd say I eat out maybe once per week, maybe 2 if life gets really busy.

Generally when eating out I go for something "healthy" like Subway, or a McDonald's chicken salad- tracking those calories is easy because the restaurants post their nutritional information online.

It gets a little tougher when I purchase sushi or freshly prepared foods at grocery stores- in cases like that I either look up something similar, and then use average amounts of similar meals to track the number of calories in the one I'm having. OR, you can try breaking down your meal into its different components- although this is a little more time-consuming, and your food diary ends up being pretty long some days... like mine :-).

There's always room for error though because you never know how much oil and stuff is used in prepped foods- just take a good guess at it :-)

I try to eat at home most days. It is just too hard for me to keep track of calories. Even if it is a frozen meal at home. I am not good enough to track calories from a real restaurant. now if it is Arby's, they have some fast food places logged on here.

BTW, I went to purdue for a while as well! I'm located in N.W. Indiana. where are you?

Jenn

At home (most of the time):

All breakfasts
All Lunches
4 dinners

out:
~3 dinners a week

I don't find it hard to track my 'out' meals because I know ahead of time almost always where I'm going and what choices I will be making. (Is that boring?)

I prepare dinner from scratch most evenings (6/7 times per week)

Breakfast is usually toast / fruit / youghurt so not much preparation but I do that every day (7 times per week)

Lunch is something like chicken salad / soup & wholemeal roll / beans on toast. Occasionally i will have a shop bought pasta salad but I'd say 5 times a week I prepare something myself .

So that's 18 out of 21 meals I have at least a hand in preparing.

I cook lunch (our main meal of the day) for both hubby and me and then, a small lunch-type meal later for myself while he is at work. We only order in or go out to eat once or twice a month. I cook 95% of the time from fresh or fresh-frozen ingredients. We don't eat much processed food. A little dried pasta and the occasional jarred pasta sauce. It gets really old cooking all the time sometimes, but its so much better for us that I really don't mind.

I try to cook 100% of my meals at home. In general I never eat out and occasionally I don't cook a full breakfast or lunch, but I do prepare all of my meals at home. I cook dinner every night. I love to cook, it's really a hobby and a relaxation tool for me, so I enjoy it.

I do better tracking when I eat from home. Eating out kills me. I try not to eat out more than 2 evening a week. Basically it ends up with me eating to maintain the weekends....If that makes sense. If it wasn't for the BF I would eat from home 100% of the time.

out of 21 meals (plus 3 night shift meals so 24 really) I make/prepare all but 2 or 3. We generally eat at DH's grandma's one night, out once or twice over the weekend. Once is generally fast food so that's all in the database. The ones I have a hard time with are buffets or family style restaurants.