Does anyone model their eating plans or days based on the food pyramid recommendations? I feel like if I ate everything it recommended, I'd go well over my weight loss calories. At the same time though, I think it has a lot of valid points, so I've been tracking my servings lately.

I have no trouble getting my veggies and proteins to "recommended levels" - in fact, after lunch today I'm at 4 cups veggies and 5oz meat. I can barely ever get my fruits or dairy in, though (like, I think I average 3-4 servings a WEEK), and my carbs don't even touch half most days (in fact, it's typical that I end the day with 2 servings or so of actual grains).

Is there anything wrong with this? Obviously I should try to eat more fruit and dairy, but I don't really like either terribly much. I do eat broccoli to up calcium often. Does anyone have any tips for me to still be able to lose weight but to follow the guidelines better?

Thanks!

FYI, the new pyramid was designed to be used as an online program customized by a person's age, sex, activity level and even weight loss goals (one of the reasons the graphics for it look so stupid in my opinion). I have been using it as my tracking program very successfully for weight loss however like you found, I never get enough in all categories on any day. However you can drill down to the nutrient level to see if you're getting enough of what is important to you.

For example, because of my age and other osteoporosis risk factors, hitting the dairy number is important to me. I can actually get 0 servings in the Meat/Beans category and still end up fine on protein because of all the milk and yogurt in my diet.

And even with renewed focus on fruits and veggies, I can only seem to get enough fruit OR veggie, but not both in same day.

Out of curiosity, I just went and looked at it. It's giving me the servings for a 2000 a day calorie plan, which is 500-800 more than I eat a day. So not too surprising that I wouldn't be able to fit in all their suggested servings!

I tried to see if I could get it to suggest a plan for 1500 calories and see how the serving suggestions changed with cutting 25% of calories, but there doesn't seem to be a way to do that. Oh, well.

I aim for getting 25 or more grams of fiber a day from fruit, veggies and whole grains, so I figure that if I'm reaching that goal and staying within my calorie range, chances are I'm getting a decent balance.

Yes, it is rather controlling on the way it decides on how far back you should cut for "healthy weight loss". I just lie to it and put in my goal weight and tell it I want to "maintain my weight" and then purposely create a calorie deficit as I log my activity there as well.

But then I do what you do, drill down to the nutrients I care about such as Fiber and Potassium rather than worrying too much about earning smiley faces for getting "enough" food.