Make me feel better- bad day

Sounds like you took care of everything. If my "bad day" was only being over by 250 I'd be pretty pleased with myself.

skinnyforhi wrote: »

Yeah, this was kind of a dumb question. It's hard to figure out what might be in food when there's no nutrition data. If you get protein/veggies/rice or something like that, it's fairly easy to guess. I have no idea how to deconstruct a quesadilla from a food truck. At least it was delicious.

How to deconstruct a quesadilla from a food truck:

1) Search MFP for a supermarket brand packaged tortilla and choose an appropriate size (probably go with "burrito size" vs. "quesadilla size" because real-world-food-truck tortillas are bigger than supermarket tortillas).
2) Find a supermarket brand packaged cheese and choose an appropriate serving size. I'm guessing that your quesadilla probably had upwards of at least 3oz of cheese on it. (You could actually go to the supermarket and look at the individually wrapped servings of X oz of cheese to get a visual for yourself.)
3) Select any appropriate additions to the quesadilla (Did it have chicken? Guess the number of ounces and find an appropriate entry. Did it have peppers, onions or other veggies? Guess the amounts and find appropriate entries.)
4) For good measure, add at least 1 tbsp of butter or oil to your estimate, which they would have used for greasing the grill.
5) Don't forget the condiments. Did it have guacamole? Did it have sour cream? Did it have salsa? (Find appropriate supermarket equivalents.)

Is all of this tedious and soul killing? Yes, perhaps. But it will get you as close as you can to an estimate of the calorie hit for a real-world-food-truck quesadilla.

Alternatives:
1) Find an MFP entry that someone else has made for a restaurant or food truck quesadilla. Treat it with suspicion. It is probably almost always a lower calorie estimate than it should be.
2) Get in the habit of asking if the food truck or restaurant you are patronizing actually has nutrition data. You would be surprised how many actually do. (But, don't treat it as gospel. It's probably almost always more calorific than they say it is.)
3) Even if the restaurant or food truck doesn't have a nutrition menu, you can say. "Hey, I'm just keeping track. Can you tell me approximately how many ounces of cheese/chicken/X you put in your quesadilla?" You may think that they won't know. But, yes, they probably know. It's a business. Ingredients cost money. They often have pre-measured, or at least pre-determined amounts of ingredients that go into each item they cook. You may feel weird at first asking these questions, but get used to it. It's not that embarrassing, and it probably isn't the first time that they've been asked this question. People all over or more conscious of what and how much they are eating.

Of course, you can just say "Eff it. I'm not doing all that."

And, of course, you can also remain in the dark about how many calories you are ingesting.

And you can continue to wonder why you aren't losing weight when you are "counting calories" and "watching what you eat".

Don't let 250 calories stress you out, it is really nothing...Especially if it is a once in a while thing. just move on. I went 600 calories over my planned day yesterday - I logged it (more or less, cause I don't know exactly how much it was) and will NOT go through a process as described above - it is food, it is one day, it is done. Move on....

astrampe wrote: »

it is one day, it is done. Move on....

This is good advice.

What happens on any one particular day has little impact on the overall scheme of things.

However, what happens repeatedly, day in and day out, what happens most of the time, has a huge impact on the overall scheme of things.

When someone's "it's one day" attitude becomes the way they approach logging every day, then that has a detrimental effect on their progress.

The food diary is nothing more than a tool to help you monitor the "calories in" part of the "calories in/calories out" equation. If you are going to log your food, then try to be as accurate as you can. Log everything you eat, even if it means teasing out the details of a food-truck-quesadilla.

trinairby wrote: »

With little objective data, I'd say forget it and move on. Today is a new day.

I agree with this. Whatever the calorie count it's over and done. Look forward.

OP you are 5'6 and 135lbs you are already at a healthy weight. Based on other posts, I actually think your issue is not weight related, but food related.

ObsidianMist wrote: »

why are you guessing at your calories?

Sometimes you have to.