What would work best?

I saw a nutritionist and she told me eating your exercise calories completely defeats the purposes. She suggested maybe eating up too 100 of the cals or so.

Try eating them. If you are losing and eat them. Keep doing it. If you eat them for a few weeks and don't lose, then decrease it a bit. The program is designed for you to lose while eating your exercise calories. But ultimately, you have to find what works for you. I'd be unsatisified, and demotivated if I tried to eat 1200 gross every day. So I aim for 1200 net. And I'm consistenly losing.

Well herein is one of those he says she says... but you need calories to burn when you exercise and if you are in a deficit you will crash. You need to take in protein calories to rebuild the muscle you tear down during your exercise routine. On average I consume more calories on the days I work out that on the days I don't. I wouldn't say that if you burn 600 calories working out that you need to eat 600 calories but you need something to put back what you expelled. I would say the workout is more for toning and building muscle from where there was none and then the muscle will burn the calories even when you are at rest. Muscle including lean muscle burns calories, and all the charts I have seen for calculating caloric intake do not take into account muscle when figuring your weight and how much you want to lose.

Michael

P.S. This is just my .02 from what I have myself researched. Your mileage may vary...