Been IF for a little over a year now, and things starting going great where I was losing 1-2 lbs a week, but I have currently stagnated where I am neither gaining or losing weight. I assume that it’s because I stopped keeping track of calories but that’s due to me no longer eating at my schools cafe where all foods had calories I could find. I am now solely eating at home where I make everything for myself. What is they best way to keep track of calories for food I make at home?
Get an app. I use the Fitbit app to keep track. I also have a kitchen scale, so I can keep as accurate of a count as possible. Honestly, with a kithen scale, you could use a pen and paper if that is your preferred way.
I know most people go for an app and it’s great if it works for them, but I’ll voice a less common approach.
To me, apps seem way inaccurate and the few times I’ve tried using them, I got too frustrated trying to input the right ingredients and inputting whole meals didn’t make sense because it’s pretty much impossible that a meal is prepared the exact same for everyone always.
So, what I started doing as a result of my frustration was to create my own spreadsheet. I have a whole list of all the ingredients I have in my kitchen, with their calories, as well as a list of the meals I usually eat. Yes, I had to do a lot of work on it, but now it’s soooo seamless and accurate. Calorie counting is inaccurate by default, but this is the best method I’ve found to really track all the right things.
For my meals, I just have to add up the ingredients’ calories, which are already right there in the spreadsheet. So coming up with a new recipe and calculating the calories for it takes very little time.
As of how I got the calories per ingredient in the first place, Google. You can search “apple calories” and it’ll give it to you, and you can select if it’s 1 apple, 100 gr or some other measurement, which is really fantastic. Same with almost all ingredients. I do have to do some digging sometimes for ingredients that aren’t as obvious, but the information is there on the internet and once I find it it lives in my spreadsheet for future use (I make sure to note how much of that ingredient is the equivalent to the mentioned calories, otherwise it’d be a mess).
For anything packaged (though I mainly eat whole foods), I have a One Drive folder with pictures of their label so I can always reference the nutritional content and calories as well, but these also live on the spreadsheet and it’s convenient because there’s no Googling needed.
If an app works for you it’d save you a ton of time for sure, but if you want something you have more control over and are willing to put work on it initially for a huge ongoing reward afterwards, a spreadsheet is a good way to go. For reference, I started this in early 2021 and never looked back.
I use myfitnesspa’s website and cellphone app, its good. I like to build my meals on it for the day ahead so that I could stay on track and have a plan. It allows me to see where I could increase or decrease.