According to my records, for three days this week I ate more than 3000 calories each. For four days, I had 1800 calories or less (give or take a few calories). What a mixed week! But you see, I have the records. It’s one of the many uses of a food journal.
Anyway, I was ill from last Thursday through Tuesday or so this week, and I didn’t really feel well until today. That’s in my food journal, too. I exercised Friday, but skipped Tuesday, since I wasn’t feeling well.
Because I keep a record of all this, I can watch myself carefully and control my food intake and know what’s going on. I have learned so much about myself this way. Self knowledge is the key to losing weight and the key to keeping it off once you have lost it.
My food intake and calorie count
Breakfast – 2 x North Carolina slow cooker pulled pork wraps (250)
- 500 calories
Lunch – Bratwurst wrap (300); Snickers ice cream bar (180); Twix ice cream bar (160)
- 640 calories
Dinner – 2 x plain grilled Johnsonville bratwurst with mustard (260)
- 520 calories
Snacking – candy (150); blueberries (25)
- 175 calories
Total for the day: 1835 calories (limit 1800 + 500 bonus from swimming, total 2300)
Recipes and food programming
The pulled pork is a slow cooker recipe, which is very nice in the summer. That means you don’t have to turn on the oven and heat up the kitchen, and pulled pork shoulder cooks really well in the slow cooker. And once it’s prepared, measuring portions is easy – just weigh what you take and multiply by 55 calories per ounce. I had just over 7 ounces in two half portions, which came to 400 calories total. That plus the flatbread wrap came to….500 calories for that meal. And I was really looking forward to it, and it was delicious. I was seriously hungry for breakfast, which made the whole thing really satisfying.
It is my plan to link my recipes to the blog content. I’ve created a new page for recipes and will start linking to it soon. It will be handy for others to see how I am portioning food and making meals that work while I am losing weight. I have a lot of data about foods that work for me. Some of them might be interesting to you. Some of the rewards might be fun to share, too!
It’s been a hard week with being ill, and also it’s been a real blast of summer this week too. I am looking forward to next week, when I can get back on my food routine for all seven days, and it’s supposed to be cooler. I would love to feel like the second half of my weight loss program is officially started.
-The Doctor