After many years of looking over dozens of food journals every week, I’ve seen all the different ways you can mess up tracking. It’s not always going to be perfect, and that’s ok. That’s not a reason not to do it! Whenever we learn anything we are going to make mistakes along the way. But by continuing despite the errors, we improve. I’m here to help by teaching you some of the main mistakes to avoid.
Mistake 1: You enter your food a day or two later. Trust me… you did not remember every single thing you ate! You probably remembered the more prominent foods at each meal, but not every detail. And the details matter.
Mistake 2: Rice, burgers, and fries.
- Unfortunately there are a few incorrect entries in MyFitnessPal for cooked rice. Try to remember this. 1 cup of cooked rice has about 45 grams of carbs and is about 200 calories, and ½ cup will have about 22 grams of carbs and about 100 calories. If you choose a rice that is much different, pick another.
- First of all, remember that most of y’all are actually having cheeseburgers, not burgers, so search for that! A small cheeseburger (for example: In-N-Out) has about 480 calories (22g protein, 27g fat, 39g fat)… so most of those cheeseburgers that you’re getting at a restaurant are going to have much, much more than that.
- With fries let’s again take a lesson from a fast food chain. A small fries from McDonald’s is 230 calories (3g protein, 11g fat, 29g carbs)… how many fries did you eat? I see people enter “1 cup” of fries all the time, which is probably about 12 fries, not an actual order. Be realistic!
Mistake 3: Oils count. A lot. One tablespoon of oil has 14 grams of fat and about 120 calories. How much are you using when cooking your meal, and how much do you think they use at restaurants? Measure and see how much a tablespoon actually is!
Mistake 4: Entering foods with zero macros. Since a food tracking database is huge, you can often find a lot of different foods in there, which is a pro and a con. The con is that since anybody can enter and save anything, they might not always be right, and they can sometimes save a food with the calories listed, but not the macros. So when you’re tracking, take the extra second to look at the macros and make sure they’re all listed. Also make sure they don’t seem wildly off.
Mistake 5: You’re measuring cooked but tracking raw. Weight changes when you cook food. Animal proteins have a lot more water in them raw, then cooked so they will weigh less after. How much less? It depends on how you cook it, but about 30% less is a good rule of thumb. Grains though will get heavier after you cook them, because they are absorbing the water you cook it in. So, make sure that however you weigh it that you track it the same way. The most accurate is weighing raw and tracking raw, but don’t worry about measuring it cooked if you also weigh it cooked.
