Hi!

uuuuh.... where to begin? .. erm ... OK, I got into this because my wife has gone on a diet and I want to support her. But it has caught on and now I do this for myself. I have about 10-20 pound to lose.

I sort of jumped into this whole thing and from the start have used FitDay (the computer program, not the web site) to track our calorie intake.

Then life got relly confusing. Some calories are better than others? Fat, which fat? Sugar? More or less carbs? More or less proteins? What is what! Argh!

Now I *think* I got it pretty much figured out. Still not sure about some things but that will come.

One thing I don't know is how in FitDay I can keep track of sugar. There seems to be no field for it

Another is... 100 calories are 100 calories but 100 calories from an apple are better than 100 calories from chips. But in the end... at the end of the day... still doesn't mean I can eat more (calories) in fruit than I think I burn in a day, right?

I love baking my own bread. But how do I figure out its calories?? Do I just add up all the ingredients and then divide by weight? The sugar (honey) that goes in reacts with the yeast ... so do I still count its calories or no?

Keeping track of everything is a bit of a job -- but I really like calorie counting: to me it seems to only sane/safe way to lose weight *and* to keep on track for the rest of my life.

Hi Matt!
I use Fitday too, they have a section where you can put all your ingredients in and they figure out the calories per slice. Yes, you have to count the honey! You'll need to figure out how many slices the bread makes for the Fitday to work. Do you use a kitchen digital scale? You could go by the weight of the whole loaf and divide that by your total calories, but you'd need the kitchen scale and figure out how many calories per oz. Do you follow me? I think the easiest way is to use Fitday and slice the whole loaf right away. The Bread will be saved then in your customs list and it'll be easy to add to your menu log every day.
Bobbi

Hi Bobbi!

Thanks for that info! Yeah, I bought a digital scale ... 1 week? 2 weeks? ago? ... It's *great*. Instead of buying tiny packages of stuff I just measure what I want to eat. It's SO geek but I love it (maybe because it is geek, lol).

I see the ingredients tab in Fitday but have no idea how to enter stuff there. I see Fitday itself has meals (say Lasagna) in the database with the ingredients listed... and those ingredients I can change... but for the life of it, when I enter a custom food I really don't know how to enter those ingredients.

By the way (and totally unrelated): I *love* my juice extractor so much that I bought a blender as well (had to find a way to use that icon....).

It's real fun to throw in all kinds of stuff and see what it tastes like. My kids think I have really lost it though! Yogurt, fruit *and* veggies??!?!?! LOL!

Matt..........In the Fitday, when entering the ingrediets you click on the "Search" button and type in the ingredients one at a time. For instance, type in whole wheat flour and it'll post it under the ingredients. Then click on it and put in the amount, cup,etc. Then go back and delete the flour and type in other ingredients.
Hope that helps.

Oh, I forgot to add something. At the top of the page under the title of recipe: Whole Wheat Bread or whatever you call it is the serving size. You'll want to put in the total amount of slices, say 12 slices. After you add all the ingredients, make sure you hit the save button. Then when you eat a slice of bread, click on the bread listed in the custom section on the right, hold it down and slide it over to your menu. It will list the whole loaf, click on the 12, type in 1 and you'll get the calories in the one slice of bread.
Bobbi

When using the ingredients tab you can also drag and drop the ingredients. I usually enter them individually into my customs. I do best with step by step instructions so in case you are the same way:

1. Click the "ingredients" tab
2. Enter a name for the recipe
3. To the right, select the "custom" pane if you entered the ingredients this way, or search to find Fitdays version
4. Left click and hold a particular ingredient on the right
5. Drag to the open area in the center and drop it
6. Change the serving or amount if necessary

Wow! Thanks so much! It works! (well, you knew that, lol)

Any tips on the sugar thing? I'm not sure that if carbs = 100 cal & fibre = 50 cal that the remaing 50 cals would all be from sugar. If so, then that is maybe a workaround to track sugar.

Btw -- this is *really* a nice place!!

Don't overalanalyze too much in the beginning. Keep track of your calories FIRST and foremost. Then, start making healthier choices in those calories.

If you start trying to calculate carbs, fat grams, percentages, and this and that right off (when it is actually unecessary to do so...) then you will burn yourself out.

Yes, 100 calories is 100 calories...and you have to cut calories to lose weight. Calories are the same as far as taking in less=losing weight, BUT the foods you eat are processed and used differently by the body. This is where WHAT you eat comes into play.

If you eat 100 calories worth of chips, and then you eat a 100 calorie small banana-your body can actually USE the banana...not so much with the chips. The body gets potassium, fiber, and other nutrients from the fruit...the chips pretty much give it nothing. This is what people mean when they say "empty" calories.

It isn't healthy to eat 1800 calories a day, and have 800 calories of that to be chips, "100 Calorie" snack packs, and other junk-because the body doesn't get "fed" from it. Food was meant to nourish-empty calories do not do that, and if you eat too many empty calories, your body doesn't get what it needs.
For instance, fruits and vegetables provide fiber, vitamins, and have antioxidants and properties in them that slow aging, prevent disease, and so forth. Chips, cookies, and even many "diet" products such as Baked Lays! and sugar free pudding don't provide the nutrients we need-so even though a calorie is a calorie weight-wise, it isn't healthy, and you don't get as good of results. Even though they are lower calorie, they are still "junk food" and are to be used sparingly.