Clyde1820

Try this: what you're doing, but once each week or every other week take stock of one food choice or ingredient you're having. Say, the Cheeze-It stuff. That's easy to nix, just by substituting it with something that has nutrition, has more of what you're looking for (healthy fats, proteins, complex carbs) and less of what's not helping you.

Consider, for example, rice. If doing white rice, you can do brown rice. If doing brown rice, you can do lentils. And many of the same dishes can be made with any of these, with slight adjustments. I think you'll find that a lot of ingredients and individual foods can be swapped in similar ways.

In my own case, I've ditched nearly 100% of all bottled sauces. Instead, I do sriracha sauce, mustard, homemade mustard, homemade sauces with olive oil / herbs / spices. And I just cook the foods a bit differently and leverage herbs and spices more heavily than before.


One easy guide: your overall weight and shape (measurements in 'key' areas) ... if one or both of those things are going in the right direction, great; if not, then you can easily nix a third or half of some meals and snacks in order to cut calories. Make your choices on food choices and ingredients, fine. So long as those choices keep improving, great. If it's still not quite enough, irrespective of the "standard" 2000cal thingy, an easy technique is simply get more stringent on portion controls and your exercising intensity/duration.

The quality and range of your food choices is going to take time. As will the swapping in of better choices with ingredients. But the above techniques might help you get there more quickly, with changes that are fairly easy to manage.


I think you'll find that caffeine addiction goes away after a month or two of flushing your system. Try halving the intake weekly, supplanting with water, until it's behind you. You'll have a few "bad" days, to be sure, but in a couple months it'll be a thing of the past. Nicely, it's a relatively mild addiction. (BTDT, myself. It isn't as bad as it seems right now.) Plus, the increased straight-water intake is going to make things cleaner and get treated better by the body's processes. You'll feel better, after several months.


I heat up a pot or two of a decent tea, every several days. Then I water it down quite a bit, and put it into a big 1gal+ jug kept in the refrigerator. It's one of my go-two drinks when I'm not doing straight water. (Can either do the tea bag way, or go with decent leaf teas [in those little perforated steeping balls].)


Another tip for an easy change: keep a dozen limes on hand at all times. Squeeze a half or whole lime into a container of water, and you'll find it's much more flavorful. Shave off the lime zest and add that to your tea brewing, and you'll get even more flavors. Other than the bubbles which you'll be missing, it's a good way to add flavor without hardly any calories.


Fats are rough, since they tally up at 9cals/gram. Whereas protein, for example, tallies at 4cals/gram. If you can swap half the high-fat almond or walnut intake for a high-protein alternative that has much lower overall fat (ie, a good whole-milk or lowfat-milk cultured yogurt), you can trim quite a few calories.

One thing I do: grind up a few cups of almonds+walnuts every couple of weeks, then use that as a sprinkle on top of whatever yogurt or salad or other thing I'm fixing. With the yogurt, the sprinkled almond bits plus a bunch of wedges from an orange or grapefruit makes a nice snack. If wanting a bit more protein and fat, adding in a lower-fat cheese [ie a lowfat Swiss] to the mix works well.

Another high-taste ingredient that can be used sparingly would be: bacon, that you've fried up earlier in the week, then crumbled and refrigerated. Makes a good topping to sprinkle on things ... ie, salads, soups and whatnot. Used sparingly, it won't add a ton of calories, but it'll really boost the taste and make it satisfying.


Tougher way: count all the little calories, and get it "right."

Easier way: if the ingredients are great, but you suspect it's just too much, then simply eat a third or half less and save the rest for later. (Much like you'd do at a restaurant. Such as an Applebee's chicken-broccoli alfredo, which is something north of 2000cals, and where a person could easily consume only a third of it and take the rest home in a doggie bag.)


A half dozen or dozen of the little Goldfish and a pickle spear sounds fine. But you could just add a few slices of a decent cheese, a slice of chicken, an egg or some other better choice. You'll get some fats, proteins, less of the "empty" carbs. Resulting energy will be better and last longer, that route.


Another easy tactic: make veggies the centerpiece of a meal, instead of the meat. Meat's fine, as are other dairy products. But if treated more as a "side" dish in a meal it can result in lower overall calorie consumption with much the same overall taste to your meal. Just less of the "heavy" stuff.

Again, watch the sauces, spreads and other less-important but calorie-rich stuff. Instead, rely on fresh herbs, liberal use of mild/moderate spices. It's amazing how much better tasting things can be, going this route.


Good luck on the changes, Jon. Both of you.

It's not all that tough, if you take one ingredient or food choice at a time, and think about some better, more healthful alternative in that dish for that ingredient. The change comes gradually, and it won't hit your body hard at all.