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Common Food Tracking Mistakes · Mocktail Minutes

• 0:22
  Brianna: Hello everyone, and welcome back to this week's episode of Mocktail Minutes.
• 0:26
  Brianna: This is Brianna.
• 0:27
  Brianna: I'm gonna do a short and sweet episode for you today, I promise.
• 0:30
  Brianna: I'm gonna keep it, I'm gonna keep it under 10 minutes.
• 0:34
  Brianna: Today, I am doing the watermelon flavor of the electrolyte powder plus.
• 0:39
  Brianna: I get it on Amazon.
• 0:40
  Brianna: It's basically the opposite of LMNT or LMNT.
• 0:44
  Brianna: It's instead of 1,000, milligrams of sodium or salt, it's 1,000 of potassium.
• 0:52
  Brianna: Which is helpful for me because mine is...
• 0:54
  Brianna: my potassium is always low.
• 0:56
  Brianna: Every time I do an HTMA, it's low, so I do better with a little bit higher potassium.
• 1:01
  Brianna: This one does it for me.
• 1:03
  Brianna: Okay.
• 1:03
  Brianna: So today, I'm gonna be talking about mistakes you don't wanna make if you're actually going to track your food.
• 1:14
  Brianna: Caveat to this is not everybody needs to track their food.
• 1:18
  Brianna: And I know we've had a couple episodes lately on intake specific ones and things like that, and calorie deficits and stuff like that.
• 1:27
  Brianna: The reality is, not everybody needs to track.
• 1:30
  Brianna: You can lose weight without tracking.
• 1:32
  Brianna: I've had a lot of people do it.
• 1:34
  Brianna: You can improve your health without tracking.
• 1:36
  Brianna: I've had a lot of people do it.
• 1:37
  Brianna: But there are some times and some individuals where you are gonna need to track to get the results you want For nu- numerous reasons, right?
• 1:47
  Brianna: Like to build awareness because you have a certain body composition goal, because you want to lose weight, and maybe you don't have a lot of weight to lose.
• 1:54
  Brianna: We've talked about this lately, too.
• 1:55
  Brianna: If you have five, 10, maybe even 15 pounds to lose, you are gonna have to be more intentional with what you're eating than you would if you had much more weight to lose.
• 2:07
  Brianna: That's just how it is.
• 2:08
  Brianna: Once you get down to being very close to your goal weight, it is hard to lose that last bit of weight.
• 2:12
  Brianna: And so a lot of times your intake comes into play.
• 2:16
  Brianna: So I know tracking food can be meticulous.
• 2:20
  Brianna: I don't think people need to do it forever.
• 2:22
  Brianna: I think if you're doing it forever, you're kinda missing the point of building that awareness of what the heck am I actually eating and what a portion sizes look like and what is, four ounces of chicken look like, that sort of thing.
• 2:33
  Brianna: But if you're gonna do it, you wanna be doing it right, okay?
• 2:39
  Brianna: Because again, you're already doing the hard work.
• 2:41
  Brianna: If you are tracking your food, you wanna get the most out of it because it can get cumbersome.
• 2:47
  Brianna: I feel like we should almost have an, a whole episode on how to track food without it being cumbersome, because it doesn't need to be as hard as a lot of people make it.
• 2:56
  Brianna: But that's not this episode.
• 2:59
  Brianna: If you're tracking your food, you wanna be getting the most out of it.
• 3:02
  Brianna: So I would say, number one, you're gonna wanna keep it simple.
• 3:06
  Brianna: Do not be trying to make these elaborate recipes.
• 3:11
  Brianna: I know there's a lot of tips and tricks.
• 3:13
  Brianna: Actually, Bailey shared a really good one on her story the other day of measuring your mixing bowls and writing how much they are on the bottom.
• 3:19
  Brianna: That way, when you make stuff, you can, you already know to subtract the weight of the bowl, all that.
• 3:23
  Brianna: That is for seasoned macro counters, okay?
• 3:30
  Brianna: If you are just trying to track your in- intake, you're trying to keep it simple, maybe you're newer to it, you're gonna wanna keep it simple.
• 3:36
  Brianna: We're not making casseroles, we're not making soups, we're not making, like, all these dump meals, which you can if you know the individual ingredients.
• 3:44
  Brianna: But we're talking keeping it simple.
• 3:46
  Brianna: I have my protein, I have my carbs, I have my fat Here it is.
• 3:52
  Brianna: Very simple.
• 3:52
  Brianna: If I'm doing steak and asparagus and potatoes.
• 3:55
  Brianna: Okay, I can weigh each of those things, input it, I know the amount.
• 3:59
  Brianna: I'm not relying on, okay I just made this whole casserole of 15 ingredients.
• 4:04
  Brianna: What am I getting of each?
• 4:06
  Brianna: That's complicated.
• 4:07
  Brianna: That's gonna take a lot of time, and that's gonna make you just not wanna do it, which kinda does suck for those people who really like to cook.
• 4:14
  Brianna: Because obviously if you really like to cook, you're like,"I'm measuring with my heart.
• 4:16
  Brianna: I'm doing all the things.
• 4:17
  Brianna: I'm putting all these things in." It may not be the time for that.
• 4:21
  Brianna: Number two, you wanna measure in mass And not volume, if this makes sense.
• 4:29
  Brianna: And you'll see it.
• 4:30
  Brianna: If there's a food label for peanut butter, for example it'll say one serving is one tablespoon.
• 4:35
  Brianna: Do not get a tables- You can if you're newer to this, but if you're like,"I'm ready to be nitty-gritty and just be done with what I'm doing," do not get a tablespoon and measure the peanut butter.
• 4:46
  Brianna: You're gonna wanna look directly to the side of that where it says,"One serving is one tablespoon," and then in little parentheses it's gonna say something like,"Thirty grams," or something like that.
• 4:56
  Brianna: You wanna measure the grams, because I can guarantee you those are two very different things.
• 5:02
  Brianna: A cup of something is different than the mass of it.
• 5:07
  Brianna: The tablespoons or the cup is different than the mass, and you will see.
• 5:11
  Brianna: Any, a- and especially if you're doing this with fat, because fat is the most calorie by volume.
• 5:16
  Brianna: It's very easy to underdo it.
• 5:18
  Brianna: It's very easy to overdo it with just a little bit of change.
• 5:21
  Brianna: So measure in volume.
• 5:23
  Brianna: Keep it very simple.
• 5:25
  Brianna: This is why a lot of people will measure chicken in grams, instead of ounces, and we talk a lot about"Hey, do you have three to four to five ounces of protein at a meal?" People will do it in grams'cause it can weigh...
• 5:38
  Brianna: People get used to grams.
• 5:40
  Brianna: I think that's the easiest way to do it, and s- for some people, this just takes a little bit of learning your food label and learning what to look for.
• 5:46
  Brianna: A lot of times we haven't even done that.
• 5:48
  Brianna: So that could be helpful just to, kinda see"Wait, have I really been putting that much, a, a serving of chia seeds in my smoothie or am I doing three?" Or,"Am I getting as much fiber as I think I'm getting from my chia seeds, or I'm getting less?" That sort of thing.
• 6:02
  Brianna: So measure it in mass, not volume.
• 6:07
  Brianna: The other thing I would say is saving things, right?
• 6:10
  Brianna: If you're a creature of habit and you have the same breakfast every morning or the same smoothie or the same type of snack, save it, pre-track it for the week, throw it in there.
• 6:19
  Brianna: Do not have yourself pre, like, going as you go, tracking as you go, because you're gonna forget.
• 6:25
  Brianna: You're gonna, not have time.
• 6:27
  Brianna: You're not gonna wanna do it.
• 6:28
  Brianna: If you're gonna have the same lunch all week, pre tr- track it once and put it in for all the days.
• 6:34
  Brianna: Make your life simpler.
• 6:36
  Brianna: That way you can kinda get used to that consistent intake, and then it helps you be a little bit more aware of that day of,"Am I actually eating my full meal or am I less hungry today?" Or,"Man, am I having extra snacky and I'm, like, adding all this other stuff?" So pre-tracking can also be very helpful.
• 6:54
  Brianna: It could save time.
• 6:55
  Brianna: Do it when you're pre-planning your meals for the week.
• 6:58
  Brianna: Track it ahead of time.
• 6:59
  Brianna: Does it kinda meet what I need?
• 7:01
  Brianna: Set it, forget it.
• 7:04
  Brianna: The other thing is ge- looking up generic things, right?
• 7:07
  Brianna: And MyFitnessPal, a, a lot of them now have a pretty good library of things'cause they've been around forever.
• 7:13
  Brianna: But let's say you're gonna have mac and cheese.
• 7:16
  Brianna: Do not just randomly look up a half a cup of mac and cheese and throw it in there, because you can look up a half a cup of mac and cheese, and there's gonna be, like, 50 different ones that pop up, and they're all gonna be vastly different.
• 7:27
  Brianna: Try to be specific.
• 7:29
  Brianna: Try to be specific.
• 7:31
  Brianna: Just putting in generic things, you're likely gonna be off.
• 7:35
  Brianna: And again, if you're someone who's like,"I'm really trying to change my body composition.
• 7:38
  Brianna: I'm trying to, get rid of that last bit of weight I wanna lose," it could be a big variation, and again, we're ones who we don't want you being in a giant calorie deficit.
• 7:48
  Brianna: So if you're only in a 200, 300 calorie deficit, but then you're way off your tracking by 500, you're gonna feel pretty annoyed and defeated that you've been tracking your food.
• 8:00
  Brianna: But what the heck?
• 8:00
  Brianna: The scale's not moving.
• 8:02
  Brianna: I'm doing all the things.
• 8:03
  Brianna: It- you're just gonna be overwhelmed, so try to just be specific.
• 8:07
  Brianna: The other thing is guessing when you're dining out, and I'm talking more, like, sit-down restaurants.
• 8:14
  Brianna: This also comes where you're, like, looking generic things up, that sort of thing.
• 8:18
  Brianna: I can tell you right now anything you have at a restaurant is gonna be higher in fat.
• 8:22
  Brianna: They are not back there measuring serving sizes and stuff with their oils and their butters and their sauces.
• 8:30
  Brianna: They're measuring with their heart, and they're making it delicious, which is the point.
• 8:35
  Brianna: 'Cause if you could get the same thing at home for$20 less, you wouldn't be eating there.
• 8:40
  Brianna: So just trying to think"Okay, this is the time I'm gonna have to be kinda generic, but maybe I need to overestimate what fat might be just so that I'm not way off the beaten path here." This is also where I'd say have a limit with dining out.
• 8:54
  Brianna: If, again, if you're in that phase where you're like,"I am going to buckle down the next six weeks, and I'm just gonna make it happen," you need to be limiting how much you're dining out because that really throws you off It just does.
• 9:09
  Brianna: And then the last two would be relying on restaurants to be accurate.
• 9:14
  Brianna: So like I'll see a lot of Cava and Chipotle have like nutrition calculat- calculators, which I'm gonna say, if you are gonna dine out, I do like ones where you can kinda control what you're putting in your bowl, like Cava and Chipotle.
• 9:28
  Brianna: But pay attention to what they're doing.
• 9:31
  Brianna: So when they go to scoop your rice or scoop your guacamole, which come on, we all want them to do a bigger scoop of guacamole than they should because it's extra.
• 9:41
  Brianna: I get it.
• 9:42
  Brianna: But the, those calculators online are based off of specific serving sizes, and if you know anything about food service, ladles and spoons and all the little different things they use are all like...
• 9:58
  Brianna: What is the word I'm looking for?
• 9:59
  Brianna: They're consistent, like across the board.
• 10:01
  Brianna: They're specific serving amounts based on the spoon size, the ladle size.
• 10:06
  Brianna: So they know when you're like purchasing food, for example, like for your restaurant, and you're like,"I need to make..." Oh my God, I'm having like RD exam like PTSD right now.
• 10:17
  Brianna: But if you're like,"I need to make 50 servings of this special this week, so I need X amount of chicken and X amount of this and X amount of that," you're gonna tell your cooks,"Hey, use this number spoon when you're serving out this because I have allocated for every single serving I need, and I know with this amount I'm gonna make 50 servings." Okay?
• 10:41
  Brianna: The 16 and 17 year olds at Chipotle do not care.
• 10:44
  Brianna: They don't care about cost.
• 10:46
  Brianna: They're just there.
• 10:47
  Brianna: The line's out the door, and they are throwing it together.
• 10:51
  Brianna: So when you do your little calculator and you're like,"Oh, my bowl is 500 calories," that's if they did it correctly.
• 11:00
  Brianna: They didn't.
• 11:01
  Brianna: Okay?
• 11:01
  Brianna: And sometimes I'll have people do...
• 11:03
  Brianna: And this, again, all of my clients, not all of my clients, but I have some very different clients, and there's very few clients I do this with.
• 11:09
  Brianna: But, Chipotle's new family thing that they do where you can get like all the different sides and it's like for up, like up to four to six people and you get X amount of servings of whatever.
• 11:18
  Brianna: They have a family style type thing now at Chipotle.
• 11:21
  Brianna: I will have them get all the things that they would put in their bowl, and then I have them weigh it using that Chipotle calculator of oh, what is one serving of their black beans?
• 11:31
  Brianna: What is one serving of their fajita veggies?
• 11:33
  Brianna: What is one serving of this?
• 11:34
  Brianna: And you measure it out on a scale, and your bowl at home is gonna be like half of what you're getting at Chipotle.
• 11:42
  Brianna: So then it just kinda helps you click"Okay, I have been making good choices.
• 11:47
  Brianna: I just didn't realize I am actually intaking much more than I thought simply'cause I was relying on their nutrition facts to be correct." Which they are, if it's the correct serving.
• 11:58
  Brianna: So- Do not rely on that.
• 12:02
  Brianna: And that is where tracking can be helpful because then visually, like I know what is the amount of rice I typically need to be like the serving that I need, and I know if they've done too little or too much, and I...
• 12:16
  Brianna: Then you just know that.
• 12:17
  Brianna: That's the silver lining of tracking, is you build that awareness, and then you set it and forget it.
• 12:21
  Brianna: And then last thing I would see I would say, and this is just my personal preference, a lot of coaches do it differently, but counting alcohol towards your fat macros.
• 12:33
  Brianna: Because ca- alcohol is seven calories per gram, but it's not a macro.
• 12:38
  Brianna: So you'll see that when you're logging your glass of wine or your margarita or whatever you're having, your calories go up, but your macros don't do anything.
• 12:46
  Brianna: What I recommend is because typically people are having alcohol when they are dining out, I have them count it towards their fat macro.
• 12:56
  Brianna: Personal preference.
• 12:58
  Brianna: And again, that's for a little bit more advanced, like we're getting nitty-gritty.
• 13:01
  Brianna: But again, this episode is for if I'm getting nitty-gritty.
• 13:04
  Brianna: If someone has really bad blood sugar or really bad insulin resistance, I might have them count it towards their carbs.
• 13:12
  Brianna: But in my personal experience, most people are not overdoing carbs, the people I work with.
• 13:19
  Brianna: I do work with some people who are definitely overdoing carbs.
• 13:22
  Brianna: But with the women specifically that I work with, they're not overdoing carbs, they're overdoing fat.
• 13:27
  Brianna: So what I have them do is I have them count their alcohol calories towards their fat macro I shared a video like a couple months ago of somebody breaking that down in a really good way,'cause I know that c- that can kinda be complicated.
• 13:44
  Brianna: You're like,"What?
• 13:44
  Brianna: What am I doing?" Alcohol is not a macro.
• 13:49
  Brianna: Okay.
• 13:49
  Brianna: I'm like at...
• 13:50
  Brianna: I'm not.
• 13:51
  Brianna: I'm a little over the 10 minutes.
• 13:52
  Brianna: I'm not gonna lie to you,'cause you could look at y- you could look at the episode and see that we're not at 10 minutes.
• 13:56
  Brianna: We're a little over 10 minutes, so that's it.
• 13:58
  Brianna: I'm not gonna go on any more tangents.
• 14:00
  Brianna: These are just, what are they?
• 14:02
  Brianna: One, two, three, four, five, six things I would do if I were to track and I wanted to get the most out of it so that I could reach my goals and maybe be done tracking for a while.
• 14:13
  Brianna: 'Cause again, tracking is not something that you need to do all the time.
• 14:16
  Brianna: I have people take breaks, and I have told multiple people,"No, we're not tracking." But everyone is different.
• 14:21
  Brianna: Everyone is at different parts of their journey.
• 14:23
  Brianna: And so if you're gonna track, this is what you can do to get the most out of it, and maybe this will kinda help you be a little bit less frustrated with something that seems so obnoxious.
• 14:35
  Brianna: So that's it for this week.
• 14:36
  Brianna: If you have questions, you can go ahead and reach out@mocktailminutes on Instagram.
• 14:40
  Brianna: We are in there all the time answering questions.
• 14:43
  Brianna: And if not, we will see you next week with a brand-new episode.
• 14:46
  Brianna: Bye.