Food at work events

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Moeski24
Moeski24 Posts: 2 Member
in Food and Nutrition
My job has a lot of events with catered food. How do some of you handle working at a job where there is unlimited access to food some days? It's food I can't find in my fitness pal sometimes lol.

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  • tat2cookie
    tat2cookie Posts: 1,899 Member
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    I try to make it work. I try to find the closest thing I can find and log it.
  • Sabine_Stroehm
    Sabine_Stroehm Posts: 19,263 Member
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    I do what I normally do.
  • Kitnthecat
    Kitnthecat Posts: 2,060 Member
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    I skip it altogether usually. It was free nacho day today, didn't want it at all.
  • RoxieDawn
    RoxieDawn Posts: 15,488 Member
    edited May 2015
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    I know how much a portion of this and a portion of that really is...you have to do what you can and once you eat you can't take it back..so i just make the best choice.

    You know when you are about to make a wrong choice. ;) I have been eating now for 46 years.
  • jddnw
    jddnw Posts: 319 Member
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    I eat what I want and record in my diary that had poached salmon, wild rice, and kale.
  • Virkati
    Virkati Posts: 679 Member
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    I work at a church/school. There is food coming thru the door EVERY. SINGLE. DAY. So I totally know what you're going thru. My best advice is to pre-plan your day. Bring your own food, already portioned out so all you have to do is just eat it, or heat and eat. Believe that saying "No thank you" is not an insult to the person who made the food, is offering you the food, or to the food itself. It's simply not part of your plan for the day. People equate food with feelings and relationships. Food is fuel for the body. It's not your best friend, it won't make you feel better, it won't take the feelings away. Once you are on board with that, it will get a lot easier to just keep saying no thank you. If there is something that comes along that you'd really like to have, eat it, log it, move on. You can eat whatever you want, but you will have to figure out what items you're willing to pay the "calorie price" for.
  • RodaRose
    RodaRose Posts: 9,562 Member
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    Plan for them. Eat some of the work food, knowing that you will have a small supper to account for the work food.
    If you can, choose the low calorie options: look for fruit and veggies. Skip the bread and desserts and anything with oil (salad dressings), or mayo (potato salad) or fried.
    Actually, if they were serving fried food or stuff slathered with mayo, I would skip the "event" entirely because unless you are working out a lot, it is hard to fit fried or mayo laden food into the budget for the day.
  • dopeysmelly
    dopeysmelly Posts: 1,390 Member
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    I basically don't eat it. I take my own lunch and I can guarantee it's much better than the greasy pizza/loaded BBQ/unpleasant commercial cookies etc. provided. Sometimes it's awkward, but I don't much care what others think at this stage. There was an event on Friday which I didn't know about and I think I was the only one not eating the provided food (I'd eaten my lunch earlier, and despite suggestions to "just try a bit extra" there was no way I was going to eat food for the sake of it). I just grabbed a diet soda. Sure, I got a lot of looks, but everyone can see I've lost a lot of weight which means my methods have been proven to work, so incidentally no one comments usually.

    Either way, it's MUCH easier if you come to a decision in your own mind what your plan for work-food is. Then all you have to do is stick with it every time, and it'll become a habit with no effort involved.
  • sailsgoboom
    sailsgoboom Posts: 10 Member
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    If it's a finger foods type of spread, my best advice is to put everything you plan to eat on your plate at once so that you can adequately gauge amounts. If I just keep snacking a little here and there, I end up eating way more. :-) But yeah, what other people said-- load up on available veggies/fruits, avoid creamy sauces or oils etc.
  • mistikal13
    mistikal13 Posts: 1,457 Member
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    We rarely get food at work, but if we do I'll eat a little if it's something that I really want. Otherwise, I always pack my lunch.
  • Apud85
    Apud85 Posts: 74 Member
    edited May 2015
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    Every once in a while people will put sweets and other goodies in our break room, so I try to tell myself that if it's still there by the afternoon, I'll have some. But usually by then, everything is gone, so that's an easy decision!
  • cat_lady77
    cat_lady77 Posts: 203 Member
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    Maybe bring your own food/snacks so it's not so tempting? Or avoid the break room lol. My last job had a customer who would actually bring us Dunkin Donuts like once a week & it was horrible. If I didn't have something else to eat, I'd be scarfing donuts around 3pm. Now I have a coworker who brings pizza all the time, so I try to bring food or go to Subway or something. It's hard!!!
  • abetterluke
    abetterluke Posts: 625 Member
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    I have a similar issue at work. It really just depends. I try to make healthy choices if they are available. If they aren't I either don't eat or I try to make an educated guess on calories and then log it as "Generic" (Yes I'm aware this probably isn't even close to accurate which is why I try to estimate on the high side). Luckily it's not a daily or even weekly thing usually. Maybe twice a month.

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