Informed Eating

In one of the blogs I follow, I read where a new Philadelphia law that requires restaurants with over 15 locations to post calorie content on their menus took effect.

The particular author was, well lets just say not pleased about it. Personally I think its a fantastic idea! If you are trying to loose weight and you know how much you are putting in. Even if you aren't trying to loose but you know that you don't want to ingest more than 1800 calories in a day. You can't very well eat whatever you want can you?

Lets take a walk through a typical day of a newly informed eater. They are going to be AWARE of what they eat.

You eat a bowl of ready made oatmeal for breakfast. The packet style OK? its 160 calories right? That's good that's healthy. You stop off at Starbucks and you pick up a Mocha Frappuccino® Blended Coffee (my personal favorite) a gastly 380 calories so lets leave off the whipped cream! After all you are INFORMED well that's so much better at 260 calories. What are we up to now? 420 cals and you aren't even at work yet.

Well that's still not to bad right? You still have 1,380 cals to spend! So you walk into work with a smile on your face a healthy breakfast and you are feeling pretty proud of yourself sticking to your new diet and new lifestyle of an informed eater.

You packed a can of Chicken and Stars soup for your lunch only 70 calories! OH wait that's for 1/2 a can and you ate the whole thing. 140 cals. Still not bad you now have 1240 to use for dinner. hummmm Dinner?

OH its Friday night isn't that pizza night? Well you packed your lunch ate a healthy breakfast, and left off that whipped cream (good thing you had that on the menu...)

OK so we are going to go to pizza hut and we will get a healthy pizza.
Pizza I love this stuff. I could eat it every night of the week. TODAY is the FIRST TIME I have ever seen the cals of a pizza. I can really polish off the pizza, maybe 4 slices....

I don't like pan (its too greasy) so lets go with MED hand tossed, Steve loves the Supreme (260/slice) I was thinking plain to cut some calories (220/slice) but veggie lovers comes in at 200/slice! so lets eat 4 slices of veggie lovers that is 800 calories to go with your netflix.... HUMMM what does that leave us with? 160 cals left. that's GOOD! lets pop some popcorn! microwave popcorn regular butter 160 cals/ serving but they don't say how many serving in a bag, its 2tbs unpopped corn... how do we figure this out? you can only eat maybe a 1/2 cup? maybe a whole cup?

This day came in at 1520 cals. 300 cals lower than I anticipated (actually i thought it was gonna go out of the park!)

How bad could it have been? well without making a hog of yourself...

1. Oatmeal 160
   
2. Mocha Frappuccino® with whipped cream 380
3. chicken and stars 140
   
4. Glazed donut at work 200
5. Med DD coffee when you got done with work cream and sugar 90
6. That supreme pizza? 4 slices 1,040
7. popcorn movie theater butter 170 cals only 10 more per serving not bad that grand total is 2180! 680 over
   

If that medium pizza was a pan? 2300 ~ 800 calories over and PLEASE don't ask how much more if you ate 5 slices or I might cry! thats information I just don't want to know....

What have I learned?

well I think the converter I used to tell me how many calories I consume in a day to maintain my weight is wrong. So I started looking for some. And indeed I found one here.... It isn't a direct science but it gives you a place to start.

I also learned if I am ever get to the bottom of this weight issue, I need a food journal every day every bite. somewhere I can write it down and make myself accountable for it. Honestly I think i do alright with what my calories but lets see shall we? I found a website that helps with it but I haven't looked it over yet. I'll do that soon. like tonight!

I also learned I LIKE the idea of having that information right there on the menu! look at the calories I saved by being INFORMED! OH and just for giggles check out the calories on that menu! That is a BREAKFAST menu. can you imagine being 1490 calories in at BREAKFAST?!?!?! YEP we need this in our menus!!!