For most people, tracking everything you eat can be daunting. Who wants to bother with that? Unfortunately, it’s the best way to start your weight-loss journey. You need to know your current state before planning to reach your ideal state. Data is vital to that understanding. The good news is there are free tools to simplify tracking your calories daily.
Why Track Your Food?
The best way to explain why logging your food helps you lose weight is to consider an analogy. What if you wanted to get your spending under control? What is the first thing you would likely do? If you answered track your expenses, you would be right! You would keep track of everything you bought, possibly categorizing those purchases. This would help you see where your money is going and locate the extraneous expenses you could curtail.
Food tracking is similar in that you keep a log of everything you eat, including the time of day or meal, total calories, and macronutrients (protein, carbohydrates, and fats). This will help you see how much you are eating and the quality of that food. Many people who have tried this exercise are surprised to learn that what they thought they were eating was not what they were eating. Armed with this new knowledge, you can make an informed plan to reach your weight-loss goal.
How to Track Your Food
The best way is to download an app to your phone. Your phone is likely always with you, so it will be easy to quickly add your food to the app each time you eat. You don’t need an app; pen and paper will do. But the benefit of using technology is that it will automatically calculate the nutrients in your food, so you don’t have to look everything up. My two favorite apps are Cronometer and MyFitnessPal. Both have free and premium versions. It’s possible to add your recipes, too. At first, don’t worry about setting your targets or goals in the app. It will prompt you to do that, but we’re not ready yet!
To add your food, you can scan the bar code on the packaging or use the search field to find the food. Ideally, you aren’t eating too many foods with bar codes anyway! Make sure you include everything. For example, if you have a cup of coffee in the morning with cream and sugar, add the cream and sugar, too. If you use olive oil to stir fry your dinner, add the olive oil. It all counts! Try not to worry about the results of your tracking. Just do it. You can review it all at the end of two weeks.
How Long Should You Track?
I have my clients track for at least two weeks. This gives a solid baseline from which to work. During this time, don’t change how you usually eat. You want an accurate picture of where you are to make informed decisions on what needs to change. Be honest!
The most challenging part of tracking is remembering to track! If you forget, add alarms to your phone to remind you. Set them around the times that you usually eat. If you have trouble locating a particular food in the database of the app you’ve chosen, that’s OK! Try searching it on Google and adding the food manually if you need to. This might happen if you eat out at a restaurant or choose a brand that hasn’t been added to the app yet. Make sure you track all the beverages you drink, too. Beer, wine, soda, or liquor all have calories.
At the end of your two weeks, you can see the average daily calories, including the macronutrient breakdown, so you can quickly identify where to focus your weight-loss efforts. By the way, you can use this system to gain weight or even concentrate on eating healthier. Tracking helps you reach your nutrition goals, whatever they may be.
Continue to track beyond your two weeks to ensure you meet your newly set goals. Over time, you won’t have to track anymore because you will have figured out what works for you. At that point, you may wish to log your food once in a while to ensure you are still on track and meeting your daily calorie and nutrition goals.