How to count calories

There is a huge variety of calories in any food, based on size, store and how to prepare it.

Even searching for one cup cooked rice on MyFitnessPal had calories everywhere from 200 something to 600 a serving.

The phone app is good because it has user-generated content, which means it reflects real recipes, brands, and food available.

 I'll have to pay a bit more attention.

Chocolate cake

Reward for using the exercise bike:  chocolate cake.

Used cake mix, prepared according to directions but substituted three egg whites for the two eggs it called for.  One tenth of the mix is a piece of cake:  265 calories/10 g fat/0.8 g fiber a piece, except I ate three pieces.

Over two hundred calories for the day, net.  Had a good save at lunch but it was a long day.  I'm going to count it good.

Total count:  one full tummy, chocolate as a reward, 72 g fat, 37 g fiber (which is a lot) and a lot of work done at the computer.

Open-faced chicken and hummus sandwich: 8 g fiber to 2 g fat

Yesterday's lunch:  it was wonderful!

Hummus instead of mayonnaise, one tablespoon with canned chicken on top of an open-faced whole wheat slice.

The creaminess of the hummus is what I like in mayonnaise.  (I like the taste of mayonnaise also, but I didn't miss it.)

Total:  8 g fiber, 2 g fat

Way out of ratio

I'm inputting my foods today into the phone app, MyFitnessPal, and am surprised to find that I've consumed a lot more fat than I realized.  I've been up for a while and the main goal of today is to finish my work and be done for the weekend, I hope.

Tally at lunchtime:  4 g fat left to eat; 14 g fiber left to eat.  My goals are for 27 g fat a day and 25 g fiber.

Solution:  1 1/2 cups of black beans, without cheese, maybe with hot sauce.  Or garbanzo beans in hot sauce.  The black beans will add 1/5 g fat and 15 g fiber.  At least we'll be back in sync.

The goal is not to be hungry.  The goal is to meet the fiber goal each day without killing the fat (and too many calories at the same time.)

Good song on the radio.  Back to work (I work for myself.)

Steamed spinach

One serving:  one cup cooked, 0.5 g fat/4.3 g fiber.
Hmmm.

Bread and gravy

One of my favorite meals growing up was bread and gravy.  Gravy from a pot roast and torn bread in a bowl.

Today, toasted whole wheat bread, torn up (= 3 g fiber) with leftover lentil soup,  Progressive's 1/2 c is 80 cal/1 g fat and 5 g fiber.

Good on a cold day.  I've turned the heat up twice and added a sweater.

Total:  1 g fat and 8 g fiber
Cool!

Husband liked dinner

Easy to make, he had seconds.

1 c red cargo rice

I didn't know that rice had fat in it, but I am finding that some fat helps a lot with higher-fiber foods.  One serving is a 1/4 c (dry, uncooked,) so I had a total of 4 servings times 2 g fiber = 8 g fiber total for the rice for the meal, and 4 x 1.5 g fat = 6 g fat for the rice for the meal.

To one pound hamburger, browned, 1/2 chopped onions, and 1/2 fresh jalepeno, chopped, I added one can of something new, curry gravy, a tomato-based Vietnamese canned sauce (think enchilada sauce but Vietnamese.)  

Sauce 8 g fat/0 fiber.  Hamburger has 200 cal/11 g fat and 0 fiber per 4 oz, so 800 cal/44 g fat/0 fiber for one pound.  Fat could be less, I don't know.  A half cup of onion has 32 cal/0 g fat/1.5 g fiber.  A half a jalepeno has 2 cal/0 fat/.2 g fiber.  (Info from phone app:  MyFitnessPal.)

So totals for meal, which fed three persons:  fiber 9.75 (round up to 10,) fat 58.  Well....

Per person, fiber 3.5 g and fat 19.5.  So the good was the rice and maybe by preparing the hamburger differently, less fat.  Hamburger can be cooked then water added, brought again to a boil and drain the water to get rid of more of the fat.  Little less flavor, but in this meal, the sauce is the flavor.  My goal would be to double the onion, use 90% hamburger.

Actually, I just looked it up:  these are the numbers for 90% cooked hamburger.  And water-rinsed 70% brings the hamburger total up to 51.5 grams per pound.  So my real totals are 4 g fiber / 22 g fat.

Well.  Homemade, low-cost, easy to fix, quick preparation, ingredients on hand.  

I friend of mine substitutes cooked lentils for cooked hamburger.  I could try substituting some, not all.  If it was already cooked and in the freezer, it wouldn't add to my cooking time.  Adding quartered onions like the Chinese restaurants do to their sweet and sour chicken might be O.K.

Anyways, he liked the taste and there we go.  This is hard.