Even the most well planned calorie counting diet is useless unless you actually count your calories. In other
words, you’re going to have to keep a daily chart of how much you eat.
The best way to keep a running total of your caloric intake is to carry a simple paper and pencil with you
everywhere you go. Although, if you have a high end cell phone or PDA, you can always use that to keep track of your numbers as well. The important thing is that you always have some idea of how many calories you’ve eaten.
At the end of each day, you should total your calories as well as which foods were the worst offenders in terms of large amounts of calories. If you are over the daily limit you set for yourself, see if there are any areas where you could have cut out some calories or eaten less. Chances are that there will always be at least one item you could have lived without.
Furthermore, while it may not directly relate to the amount of calories you eat each day, you may also want
to use your calorie chart to determine which foods are healthier for you and which are not. If you drink a soda
and eat an apple each day, and you find that you are exceeding your calorie limit, cut the soda and keep the
apple.
When it all comes down to it, a calorie counting diet may seem like a lot of work at first, but the benefits are
completely worth it. In about a week, counting calories and measuring serving sizes will seem like second nature.
In fact, you’ll probably wonder how you ever lived without it. Taking a few minutes out of your day to keep
a count of your calories will easily add years to your life expectancy and make you feel better and healthier in the process.
While counting calories is the cornerstone of your diet, it does you no good if you are not keeping the serving size in mind. After all, while you may think that a chocolate bar has only 150 calories, the Nutritional Facts label may only be measuring a serving size that’s less than an ounce.
A lot of the food you find at the store will be measured by the slice, by the square, or by some other arbitrary
measurement. Foods like bread, sliced deli meat, cheese and candy are some of the most popular foods that are measured in this way.
For most foods, however, the best way to make sure that you stick with the serving size guidelines is to go to the store and buy a measuring cup. Pour every food you are going to eat in the measuring cup before you take your first bite, and only eat as much as the serving size recommends. You can do this with dried foods like rice or cereal as well as liquids like soda, syrup, jelly, or iced tea.
If you find that the serving size on many of your foods is too small to be measured with a measuring cup, use a
teaspoon or tablespoon. Remember that there are three teaspoons to every tablespoon.
The tricky part comes when you eat foods that are measured by weight. For these foods you may need to
purchase a kitchen scale so that you may weigh your foods before eating them. Alternatively, there are charts
and graphs available online that can convert many of these serving sizes into a more easily used alternative,
such as cups or slices. Remeber always ask you the question; How many calories should I eat
Simply taking the time to measure your portions before you eat will quickly help you lose weight and make it
easier to total your caloric intake.
