New to Fitbit and really confused.

Definitely buy a new food scale. Get a digital scale. You'll love it. Then you can be really accurate when you weigh your foods. If you want to eat exactly half a serving of something that is 28 grams a serving, or even 1/4th, you need a digital scale. I eat 13 grams of julienned sun-dried tomatoes on my salads all the time, or 7 grams of croutons. Almonds are 28 grams a serving and I often eat 1/2 or 1/4 serving. Same with lots of snack items.

WalkingAlong wrote: »

aylajane wrote: »

WalkingAlong wrote: »

CorydonCutie wrote: »

How do you weigh dressing? How much does a Tablespoon weigh?

I personally don't weigh liquids and I don't think it's a necessity. You can't cram salad dressing in a tablespoon.

Weighing can help keep you honest and improve your estimates but if you're good with visuals and honest and especially if you spot check yourself with the scale from time to time, you can do fine with little food weighing.

No but actually not all tablespoons are created equal? Some have a line inside them to indicate where to stop, others go all the way to the edge. Most salad dressing is thicker than a true liquid. Maybe something like oil would be ok, but ranch or whatever can "bulge" in the middle. Since you weigh everything else, you might as well to this one too - bonus is that you dont have to dirty the measuring tools. Set your salad on the scale, zero it out and add dressing til you hit the right grams.

Well, that's my point... you don't need to weigh everything. I estimate my salad dressing portion. You can drive yourself (and the people you eat with) nuts micromanaging your diet or estimate your portions and see what happens. If you don't lose, eat less.

Everyone definitely has their own way of what works for them! My thought is "Why bother measuring anything if I am not going to be accurate?" I.e. if I only micromanage a portion of my intake, then eyeball or estimate the rest - I could easily wipe out my deficit (or surplus) with the estimating. When you get to the "end", accuracy is extremely important if you have a small deficit or surplus goal. But if you have more to lose, I agree its not as important! Of course, if you find you are not losing, you may have "scope creep" where your estimates are getting a little larger over time etc.

I was extremely accurate for most of my "journey". I did it for so long, I barely need to measure anything since I tend to always eat the same things and have been weighing them for years. But I still weigh them every now and then for a reality check.

And in reality, weighing most of my salad and then getting out a measuring spoon for the dressing would take me LONGER than just weighing it since I already had it on the scale. I find it way faster to use the scale and lots less dishes.

Good luck!