How to track your food & Alcohol

Most of the things you eat should be weighed on your food scale to assure accuracy. For weight loss, we like to put our clients in a moderate caloric deficit to achieve steady weight loss and break the cycle of yo-yo dieting. A starving client is more likely to want to “cheat” or snack. For our bulking clients, let’s make sure you are getting the calories you need and not short-changing yourselves. This is all achieved using exact mass and not guestimates!

Cut vegetables can be logged volumetrically (ie using cups). However oils, nuts, nut butters, most proteins and things like oats, rice, and other grains should be weighed on your scale.

Cooked proteins should be logged as such. Most protein loses water weight during the cooking process. Search out USDA entries whenever possible. Make sure you are logging the cut of meat you’re using, noting if bones or skin are involved. Make sure ground meats are logged with the appropriate fat percentage (ie 93% lean ground turkey, for example).

Cooked grains should also be logged as cooked. The nutrition information on the label for rice, quinoa, and oats is based on a dry mass weight. These items gain water weight in the cooking process so be sure you are logging appropriately.

Please account for all cooking fats and oils.

Whole foods like vegetables, fruit, most proteins, and grains should not be logged by brand. They are all the same. On the Cronometer app, you will get a more complete picture of your micronutrients if you log the items.

That said, if you are using a specific brand of something more processed (like a specific brand of turkey sausage) use that brand or UPC to log the item.

Alcohol is its own specific macro. If you are our client, Use the search term “Shebnation client” to find a variety of spirits and alcoholic drinks. Please weigh out your alcohol and log any mixer that might contain macros (ie simple syrups, tonic water, soda pop). Seltzer or soda water has 0 macros and does not need to be logged. If you cannot find the spirit you are in search of, or are not an active client, find the caloric value of your drink, divide by 4, and log the result to carbohydrates. For example, if your drink has 100 calories, divide 100 by 4 to get 25, and log as 25 grams of carbs. This comes up often with various craft beers and sparkling waters/seltzers like Truly or White Claw.