Calorie Tracking

[gmzl]

I’m so bad at counting calories - I am fine with the physical aspect of wanting to lose weight but i find keeping track of calories especially difficult when just trying to enjoy meals or drinks with friends and getting to be creative In the kitchen without feeling confined to the recipe. Any ideas of how to best counteract this behaviour?

[Hidden]

I don’t calorie count but I keep in mind portion size and kind of have my go to meals that I will eat over the week. I don’t necessarily eat them on certain days but I stick to what I know works. Same for my lunches and breakfasts.

[Username192]

It can be difficult especially when eating out or with friends etc and most certainly annoying when you just want to have fun cooking up a recipe in the kitchen. If you can't weigh and count things all the time, maybe do it once and write down the calorie count for your favourite meals. Keep a note in the note pad on your phone or on paper. You can then just refer to it for a rough calculation when you are roughly counting at the end of the day. You could take a bit of time to research and write down some calories for the foods and drinks you have most so when you are in an eat out situation you can refer to it later rather than worry about it at the time. The calorie checker on the NHS 12 week plan will give you rough calories. One you can't really control when your out is things like oil but remember these type of things all count as well. A teaspoon is 41 so when doing a rough calculation for a steak let's say just add on for oil as well.

I've been quite strict with the counting but have come to realise it can be quite stressful so I've followed the above in situations where it will just cause me unecessary stress to count (and let's face it, it will never be exact) and it has worked for me. You could try just leaving 50 to 100 at the end of the day too. Don't go hungry though by doing this but where possible it can protect you.

[IndigoBlue61]

Hello and welcome to the Weigh Loss Forum gmzl

Whilst some knowledge of calories is helpful for judging portion size, there are other important aspects regarding diet and weight loss . Many of our members have excellent results with a Low Carbohydrate plan, which doesn’t involve calorie counting. A good place to find out more is here healthunlocked.com/lchf-diet

If you haven’t already then please read the Welcome Message in Pinned Posts here healthunlocked.com/nhsweigh... Please read it carefully so you can find all the information you need to find your way around the forum.

As a peer to peer support group we rely totally upon mutual encouragement. Nothing beats joining in, reading posts and replying to others. Our Group Weigh-in and the Daily Diary are probably the best places to start

Best wishes

Indigo 😊

[Maydwell2020]

I look up recipes on BBC good food. They give servings and some have calories on.

[Chappychap Visitor]

You make a really good point, but the hard conclusion I came to was that accurate calorie counting was so difficult that straying "off piste" with a recipe was guaranteed to see me shovel many additional and uncounted calories into my fat face!

Consequently I had to make a choice, having fun playing around with new tastes and flavours, or knuckling down and accurately what i was eating. It was one or the other, because no matter how hard I tried I couldn't do both!

[Eryl Visitor]

I've never tried calorie counting because it's just too much hastle. My bmi is 21, and I've done it all by cutting out carbs. I don't drink fruit juice and restrict myself to one fruit a day. I don't eat anything with added sugar, like ice cream, biscuits and cakes. Never more than a couple of squares of 85% chocolate, and no other sweets. No bread unless I'm out and can't find any other snack.

[RaggedClown]

I don't have the discipline to count calories but the app I use, Slimming with Strangers, does a good job of estimating how many excess (or deficit!) calories you are eating based on how much your weight changes.

After a while, you get very good at just having a feel for when you are eating too much (or the wrong things) without calorie counting. A few years of this tracking led me to naturally drift towards low calorie high fat (LCHF).

slimmingwithstrangers.com/s...

[Lytham 3 stone]

Hello, I'm not very good at counting calories, I end up guesstimating most of the time, luckily I do low carb and don't need to count

Would you like to join us on our weigh in? Here's the link, I hope to see you there!

healthunlocked.com/nhsweigh...

In addition to our weigh in we're also running an Autumn Challenge if you'd like to join that too, here's the link x

healthunlocked.com/nhsweigh...