How do you count calories for homemade food?

platonic_penguin · 4 months

I use this tool on Nutrition Data. You enter in all the ingredients and amounts, as well as the yield and it creates a nutrition label for you. I love it!

G0PACKG0 · 4 months

Wines are often a safe choice, liquor + diet soda or soda water (not tonic water, it's almost as calorie heavy as soda). Beer, unfortunately, is one of the worst choices, unless you go with a lite (gross). Since I love beer, I just plan for it like I would if I knew I were going to a party or out to dinner, eat lowcal for the day, leave a budget for a few beers.

jeremyosborne81 · 4 months

Oh absolutely, it's important to find what works best for you and your body, for your diet and exercise routine. I just get a little peeved with how this community shoves keto down everyone's throats as the end all be all to weight loss. It works well for someone who needs a plan or diet to follow, but it's not at all realistic for the rest of your life.

jeremyosborne81 · 4 months

I'm going to play devil's advocate. I went low-carb for, basically, half of the year. I lost 40lbs doing so. I had no pasta, bread, potatoes, rice, etc. Nothing. It wasn't hard, it just made meals get kind of boring/repetitive.

Come early fall, I got serious about long distance running and biking. I realized my low-carb diet was impeding my performance, and began eating complex carbs (oats, sweet potatoes, whole grains, etc). I've lost an additional 40lbs since introducing them back into my diet.

So, my point being, while cutting carbs is a super easy way to cut out calories, quickly (a great example being a cheeseburger is around 500cals with the bun, about 320 without), it isn't the ONLY way to do it. Your body does need that nutrient for muscle building and energy, so perhaps a focus on balance is best.

LoseViaC25K · 4 months

Aren't they delicious? I love cabbage chips too, which are a lot sturdier than kale, so you can actually use them for hummus or salsa!

LoseViaC25K · 4 months

Vegetables are low-cal and filling. Fruits can be, too. Personally, I like using leafy greens for "chips", kale and cabbage being two of my favorites. Cabbage chips and carrots go really well with hummus.

Yogurt, cottage cheese, lowfat cheese (lowfat cheese has less calories, but I would recommend just eating portion sizes of full fat cheese because it's higher in protein), serving sizes of raw nuts (nuts are filling and packed with great stuff for your body, just be careful to only eat about a handful because the calories add up fast).

MiggsSyl · 5 months

Your friend's attitude about food is awesome and exactly the one I keep. She is also the same height as me and has lost about the same amount of weight, so we are twinsies :D

rollypollyollie · 5 months

One word: EAT. You need to eat to lose weight. Without food, your metabolism slows down to store energy.

Get a normal sleep schedule. A solid 7-8 hours of sleep, every night.

You can't do a million crunches and situps to make belly fat go away, unfortunately. Your body takes it from wherever, typically first to come on is last to come off, and belly is almost always last.

tl;dr: Eat. And eat right.

Dreadnougat · 5 months

Extremely inspiring! You look awesome, and probably feel so much better. High-five for such great work :)

hawkinator · 5 months

I eat the whole egg, it's only an additional 50cals per egg, almost doubles the protein (crucial for muscle building) and is where most of the nutrients (vitamins/minerals) are in the egg. Certainly, if you looking to cut calories, omitting the yolk would cut it down, I just choose not to.

tl;dr: up to you!

melodist365 · 5 months

Well, I do suggest eating something before you run. It will help with recovery time and you're less likely to lose lean mass. Your performance is likely to improve too (I know mine did when I started eating before runs). Here's some more on the topic.

Just a suggestion!

melodist365 · 5 months

Are you eating before your run at all?

superdillin · 5 months

Eating in the morning absolutely important to all kids of aspects of your body, it boosts energy levels and has been said to "set the tone" of the day's meals. I used to skip breakfast, I "felt nauseated" when I would eat it. I started with small, simple stuff: fruits, wheat toast, a small amount of oatmeal and just kept building until I had a balaced 300-450cal breakfast, every day.

That being said, who said you have to eat "breakfast foods"? You're an adult, I'm assuming, so eat what you want. Sometimes my breakfasts are 3oz chicken breast over a salad or a tuna fish sandwich on dark bread. Sometimes it's eggs and bacon. No rules about it being strictly what's served on a breakfast menu in a restaurant ;)

sometimesfunny · 5 months

I feel like treadmill running is some kind of existential symbolism: running but going nowhere. Buuut this is coming from a fellow outdoor runner.

Tyrus31 · 5 months

You should get used to them, honestly. They're going to be happening much more frequently now ;)

SnapeWho · 5 months

canned tuna. raw nuts (almonds and walnuts in particular). cheese. deli meats.

look for low-carb/high-fiber wraps, good alternatives to sandwiches and just as portable.

I'm not anti-carb, so I go for complex carbs with high fiber over simple (whole grains, veggies, oats).

Tyrus31 · 5 months

Hellooooo handsome.

Stratsvante · 5 months

Don't worry, you'll still have a heart attack at 52.

hawkinator · 5 months

Honey, maple syrup or I will mash up fruit into it (berries usually, sometimes bananas). I am just careful to measure out any kind of sweetness I add to it. Also, stirring in extracts or cinnamon usually "tricks" me into thinking it's sweeter.

hungryhungrykitty · 5 months

First things first - do not use or treat food as anything other than fuel for your body. It's not a reward or celebratory tool, it comes out as poop. This doesn't mean you can't ENJOY food, but you need to rid yourself of emotional eating and only eat when you are hungry. Replace it with anything else, exercise is the obvious choice, but even a hobby (learn to knit/crochet/embroider - keeps hands busy and it's easy to lose track of time) would be great. Plus, you will feel much better with a new scarf or completing a 5k than eating eating some cake.

Learn to say no to take-away food and offer to make dinner instead. Cook together, walk together, join a gym together. If you enjoy eating together, you will surely enjoy all of those things together - and you'll be around for longer to continue enjoying them together for a long time :)

donfrenchiano · 5 months

Could you pre-cook during the day or on a weekend (or whenever your off-days are)? Make up a big batch or soup or chili or some marinated chicken breasts, etc. Freeze in portion-sized meals and take them as you would a tv dinner.

lovelynotes · 5 months

1 - Everything is a choice. You choose to work out. You choose to make smart food decisions. You choose to have a beer. You choose to eat a brownie. You choose to take a rest day. You have the power to choose any of that, it's all in your head. Realize it, it's a powerful tool.

2 - View it as necessary. Particularly, I view exercise as I do laundry or brushing my teeth or showering; I may not always love and want to do it, but suck it up princess, you have to.

3 - This isn't a sprint, there's no time limit, and there's no end. You want to lose 40lbs, awesome, totally doable! But it's not going to happen overnight or even within a week. There are going to be weeks where you lose 4 or 5lbs and there will be weeks where you lose nothing. When you get to your goal, you don't get to say FUCK IT and eat whatever you want. You're changing your life, forever and for the better.

Most importantly? You CAN do it. Tell yourself this every time you want to throw in the towel.

hawkinator · 5 months

For protein: hard-boiled eggs, portion sizes (so 1oz) of cheese, pre-cooked chicken breast, split into 3oz pieces. Greek yogurt, I buy plain and flavor it myself to avoid really high sugar content.

For fiber/carbs: fruit and/or vegetables. Some great portable ones: celery, cucumber, apples, plums, berries, carrot sticks.

For carbs: oatmeal. If you can make the time, steel cut oats. They don't take much longer to cook and is REALLY filling. Hi-fiber, whole grain breads with nut butter.

Carbs are not scary. They're necessary energy boosters, stick with complex ones and you will be a-okay.

Also consider bringing something to snack on between breakfast and lunch? Raw nuts or a trail mix would be great for that.

anaziah · 5 months

Buy produce in season, and locally (if you can) OR buy frozen fruits/veggies. They keep for a while and are often better tasting than produce in the grocery store (fruits, especially).

Buy meat in bulk when it's on sale. If I notice, for example, chicken breast is on sale, I will buy a bunch of it, separate it at home, and freeze it.

Make lots of meals double, triple batched, especially soups/chilis. Again, portion out everything and freeze. Meals for days/weeks.

Plan out meals based around what is on sale when you are buying and use JUST that. Stick to it.

Skip eating out as much as possible. Obviously, you won't be able to avoid it forever, and probably don't want to, but it's much more budget and diet friendly to make food for you rather than buy it.

For what is "truly healthy", it's hard to say. There are articles proving and disproving so many theories about food that I just eat naturally. No processed foods, and as much as I can make for myself as possible. I like knowing EXACTLY what is going into my body. And, for the record, I eat the whole egg, I eat butter, I eat white and red meats, I eat fruit as well as vegetables, I eat carbs. I focus on balance, and am in perfect health.

lovelynotes · 5 months

For strength training, if you are starting back at square one, Strong Lifts would be a good place to start.

It sounds like you also want to start some kind of cardio. There are tons of options, I prefer running and biking, but you have to find something YOU like. For running, C25K is an amazing program to build endurance and set realistic goals. For biking, I just went and bought a bike and do it outside, because I HAAAATE stationary equipment. Even something as simple as a 30 minute walk every day will make a world of difference.

If you're just thinking weight loss, change what you eat. Create a calorie deficit of anywhere to 500-1000cals/day. Losing weight is pretty much entirely diet in that it is WAY easier to watch what you eat than work off calories. Exercise will just let you have a little more wiggle room in what/how much you eat.

Good luck! You sound like you are ready to dedicate yourself to losing the weight, that is the first step :)

lovelynotes

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