Nutrition Charts

By MAD21

Calorie Count  has a great database of nutritional information among other things for just about everything out there, including restaurants who have published their nutritional info. There are a lot more of these out there, but I found this one to be the best, and easiest to read. You just type in the food you ate, it will give you a list of things to choose from, and then it gives you a nutritional chart that looks just like the ones you find on your cereal box.

Formulas for Percentage of Daily Intake for FAT and PROTEIN

By MAD21

Total FAT should be around 25-30% of your daily calories. To find the percentage you have eaten, or should eat, multiply total calories for the day by 30% (0.3) then divide by nine. For example, if you ate 1900 calories today, you multiply that by 0.3 then divide by nine. Total fat intake for that day should at or below 63g.

1900 x 0.3 / 9 = 63g

Total PROTEIN you should have in a day is around 10% of your daily calories. To find the percentage you have eaten, or should eat, multiply total calories for the day by 10% (0.1) then divide by four. For example, if you ate 1900 calories today, you multiply that by 0.1 then divide by four. Total protein intake for that day should be near 45g. This is what I found in my research. However, I have also read in several places that if you are very active, you should eat about 15% to help feed your muscles. So just replace the multiplier above with 15% to find that number (71g).

1900 x 0.1 / 4 = 45g (which I think is too low for active people)
1900 x .15 / 4 = 71g

One calculator that I found to find out how much protein you should be eating showed this formula, which agrees with what I said above for eating more if you are active, is below:

Regular active person: your weight X 37% (0.37)
Active person: your weight X 50-60% (0.5-0.6)

So if you weigh 145 pounds not active, you should be eating about 54g of protein.
If you weigh 145 pounds and are very active, you should be eating about 72g of protein.

Fiber!

By MAD21

Every resource I went to about fiber said that the average person should be eating 25-30g of fiber every day (and not more than 40g—yikes!). When you first start writing in your food diary, don’t make any changes to how much fiber you eat for the first few days. I found that my original average intake was only around 16-18g per day. Work your way up slowly to the recommended amount to allow for your body to adjust. If you try to eat too much too fast, you will find yourself very uncomfortable (stomach cramps, gas, etc.)

To Salt or Not to Salt...

There is a lot of controversy over the amount of salt people should be eating every day. This amount will definitely depend on any medical issues you may have. But the health industry will have you believe you need to stay away from it as much as possible.

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Basil Metabolic Rate (BMR)

By MAD21

"How to calculate your caloric neeeds and lose weight" is a great resource of information. You can find a total daily calories calculator, etc. When you do this, make sure the weight you put in the first calculation is your goal weight. I have found 3-4 of these calculators published by various people (Shape Magazine, Fitness Magazine and a few online). The formula in each has been nearly identical. When you find what your caloric intake should be, you may want to reduce your calories slow at first to get you down to your daily goal for intake, so you don’t feel like you are starving all the time.