Are you tracking food perfectly?

Gallowmere1984 wrote: »

pinuplove wrote: »

No one here is tracking food perfectly. I suspect some people get a lot closer than others (looking at you Gallowmere ) but perfect isn't possible. I personally aim for 'good enough to keep me on track with my goals' which seems to be working. I still have meals out, work events, meals my husband prepared that I didn't hover over his shoulder weighing everything, family potlucks, etc. Life doesn't stand still because I'm trying to lose weight, and I wouldn't want it to.

Nothing really standstill about it for me. It's just part of my daily routine. I am bulking now and still do it. I wake up at 1:30, spend a couple of hours prepping food and typing my lift programming into my phone notepad, out the door by 5:00, lifting by 5:30, at work by 7:00, in bed around 5:30.

Most people have their "me time" after work. I have mine in the very early morning, when I don't have to worry about the rest of the world trying to *kitten* it up.

Didn't mean to imply you don't have a life! Our lives, goals, and priorities are very different. I'll happily keep up my sloppy-logging until it no longer works for me, then I'll cry tears of bitter irony and tighten things up lol.

pinuplove wrote: »

Gallowmere1984 wrote: »

pinuplove wrote: »

No one here is tracking food perfectly. I suspect some people get a lot closer than others (looking at you Gallowmere ) but perfect isn't possible. I personally aim for 'good enough to keep me on track with my goals' which seems to be working. I still have meals out, work events, meals my husband prepared that I didn't hover over his shoulder weighing everything, family potlucks, etc. Life doesn't stand still because I'm trying to lose weight, and I wouldn't want it to.

Nothing really standstill about it for me. It's just part of my daily routine. I am bulking now and still do it. I wake up at 1:30, spend a couple of hours prepping food and typing my lift programming into my phone notepad, out the door by 5:00, lifting by 5:30, at work by 7:00, in bed around 5:30.

Most people have their "me time" after work. I have mine in the very early morning, when I don't have to worry about the rest of the world trying to *kitten* it up.

Didn't mean to imply you don't have a life! Our lives, goals, and priorities are very different. I'll happily keep up my sloppy-logging until it no longer works for me, then I'll cry tears of bitter irony and tighten things up lol.

Hehe. You sound an aweful lot like me.

As long as I'm losing weight (or happy maintaining as is the case right now), I'll keep up with my sloppy-logging. I tend to be as accurate as I need to be for my goals.

I have to say I do not always weigh my food. I try to be as accurate as possible

......and protein

I do it basically like you, OP, when I am logging carefully (when maintaining I typically do not log). I guess and round up restaurant choices or, when that feels overwhelming and based on my experience over quite a while now, I might just pick a round number that seems reasonable to high for what I got. I do think awareness and not going nuts at restaurants (watching portion size and choosing sensibly what you order, being aware of high cal items that you could eat without thinking about it, like many appetizers, desserts, and bread on the table) is a big enough change and that you don't need to be totally perfect. I lost on schedule almost the whole time I was losing (about a year) and ate out 1-2 times a week in restaurants with no calorie counts and am glad I didn't give that up or stress about it.

slm14 wrote: »

Do you all track your food measuring every item? How do you manage when eating out?
When I am preparing my own food I measure and try to do accurate portions. Currently I'm rounding and doing my best educated guesses when eating out. I think at least bringing awareness to my eating, even if it's not the exact calorie and macro count, can be helpful. Thoughts? What has been most successful for tracking without becoming obsessive for some of you all?
Thanks. (I'm also super open to new MFP friends if anyone needs more buddies, just request).

I think it helps to be a bit pedantic in the beginning, when you are learning portion control and how to properly estimate. I really had no idea how much PB I was adding to my bread, etc.

Best guesses is very appropriate, just lean on the high side in terms of your portions. All this becomes more important when you find you are not losing at the predicted rate of loss for your deficit.

Do you all track your food measuring every item?

No I do not, I estimate, take averages (every mandarine or carrot is just logged as a medium one) pick something similar in data base etc

How do you manage when eating out?
I guestimate, pick something similar in data base or failing all that, do quick add calories

As poster above mentioned, my aim is not to track as accurately as possible - my aim is to track well enough to meet my weight goal targets.
What poster above referred to as sloppy logging and what I myself have described before on here as lazy logging.

I log everything and weigh most of it, even the packaged food and the condiments. If it's not in the database in grams, then I take info from the label, do the math, and add it to the db. I've found that sliced bread is over by as much as 25% per slice from the label. Same with frozen patties and frozen filleted meats/fish, sometimes as much as 30%. Even TV dinners, off by about 15% sometimes. Just about anything, over. If I have toast, I weigh the bread after it's toasted. What I miss is licking the spoon or my finger, but those "tastes" can add up.

I try, especially with the things I can control. Of course, eating out is a challenge in this regard.

I expect with all my logging that I'm probably only within 10% (give or take) of the actual calorie/macro values. This isn't just due to any inaccuracies *I* bring to the process -- there are inaccurate database entries, FDA label count allowed variances, differences in agricultural products and more.

As long as my bathroom scale keeps going in the right direction (down 20 lbs so far this year since Jan 1), I'm content with this level of accuracy. I log what I can, as best as I can, and don't fret about extra decimal points.