Whole Life Health Nutrition Report
Although I said that you need about calories, it is not realistic or healthy to hit that exact calorie target (or macro target) every day, nor is it even necessary! The amount of energy you need each day varies, how you eat isn’t going to be the same day-to-day, and food labelling has a margin of error. To achieve your goals, you should strive for progress, not perfection.
Eating within a range of to calories per day will give you a consistent enough starting point for you to see if your intake is working. If you then need to make adjustments, you’ll be able to make changes that are relative to your current intake. This is the best way to use calorie calculations, establish a baseline, track results and then make adjustments.
Tracking
So your next step is to start tracking how much you eat. Knowing more about your food intake and your eating decisions makes you more self-aware, and can be a useful tool to help you make better, more informed choices. Looking at your meal log is a way to reflect on your eating habits and see what is working for you, where you have areas to improve, and what changes you need to make.
One way to track your food is to measure your portions (and use an app or calculator to log your intake), the other way is to use hand portions.
Measuring
One way to track your food is to use an app or calculator to log your intake and measure your portions. If you want to use your smartphone to track your intake, I recommend using either Cronometer, MyFitnessPal, Fat Secret, or Fitbit as these tools are easy to use and integrate directly with my coaching app. Other tracking apps include Lose It, MyPlate, LifeSum, Spark People, and SELF Nutrition Data. If you prefer using the traditional pen and paper method, a small notepad works well.
Here are some top tips on how to record your intake...
Record Everything
Record everything that you eat and drink. Where possible, record it immediately, as it's nearly impossible to remember what or how much you ate with any accuracy after the event.
Avoid Guesswork
Try to be as accurate as possible when recording foods. People tend to underestimate their food portions, which makes it very easy to overconsume foods (especially if they are calorie-dense).
Keep Notes
Keep notes, such as the time of day, how hungry you were, the situation you were in, who you were with, what your emotional state was, etc. Making notes can help you spot patterns.
Invest in a Scale
Cups can be accurate for measuring liquids and powder. For all other foods, if you want the most accuracy, use a kitchen scale to weigh your ingredients to the nearest gram.
Use Barcodes
If you are using an app to track your nutrition, scan barcodes to find the correct product quickly. Always check the values match up with the label in case there have been any changes.
Take a Photo
Of course, there will be times when you can’t log your meal right away. In these situations, take a photo of your meal then log it when you can. Photos can also be useful for assessing portion sizes.
If you are eating at a restaurant or having a take-out, always overestimate your portions. Nutrition information determined by restaurants is not always accurate. In general, the more complex an item, the greater the nutrition discrepancy may be.
Accuracy Limitations
As I have already said, when recording food, you are aiming to be mostly consistent, not perfect.
Record everything, be as accurate as you can...but don't get caught up in trying to get your calories or macro values to exactly match your targets. Use the data to see overall average trends and patterns of how your nutrition impacts your goals.
Why? Because, when it comes to tracking calories and nutrition, no system is completely accurate. And tracking isn't, for most people, a long-term strategy!
Calorie Information
The values stated on food labels use average figures to give consumers a good indication of what the 'typical' nutrient content is for each product. Foods are biological materials, so they exhibit variations in composition from one sample to another.
Manufacturers are given a legal margin of error (usually 20%). For packaged items, a product could contain many different ingredients, so there will be variations from one package to another.
The calorie counts on nutrition labels measure how much energy the food contains, not how much energy you can get from it. Fibrous foods such as celery and flax take more energy to digest, so you'd absorb less energy from a 100-calorie serving of celery than a 100-calorie serving of crisps.
Absorption/Metabolism
Even if the data was completely accurate, there are then factors that affect how different people and even the same person might absorb those calories differently at different times. Variations in enzyme levels, gut bacteria and even time of day, mean that the ability to extract energy from food is a little different.
Also, many factors can affect how many calories we burn each day (such as weight, activity levels, body composition, sleep deprivation, and menstrual cycle hormonal changes). For example, if you were less active than normal, you would need fewer calories.
What's Missing?
The elephant in the room...
Nutrient density and nutrient quality. Food cannot just be reduced to numbers, they only provide one starting point. I highly recommend another starting point being that you opt for whole foods that humans have evolved alongside to make sure you're also well fuelled with micro-nutrients. For now, a great way to honour this is to really focus on the protein and the veg parts of the equation. The rest can follow in time!
How I Can Help
There is a big difference between knowing what you should be eating and knowing how to actually implement it...and that's where I can help. I'm an expert and can help you to achieve your goals and develop healthy habits - all in a way that is enjoyable, sustainable, and fits your lifestyle (which usually doesn't include measuring calories...)
If you would like to discuss your nutrition report and wider lifestyle, you can book a FREE 30-minute consultation. I can answer any questions you may have, talk about the goals you want to achieve, and recommend some action steps to help you to move forward.
Want More?
Now that you know how you can track food by measuring your portions, the final part of your nutrition report will cover the hand portion method.
As I said, to avoid overwhelm and give you time to absorb the information provided, I have split this report into three parts (and I will email you a link to the next part tomorrow)
...but, if you are the type of person who prefers to binge-watch episodes back to back, then here is part 3!