On almost any diet I have ever done, I found it pretty hard to have a nice big steak. So many calories, I thought. Since calorie counting is my lifetime plan, I approach things like steaks, quite differently now. After all, I want to have steak in my life. So I better learn how to make it work with calorie counting.
Tonight, we grilled some mouth-watering rib eyes! They were quite large, we got them from Sam’s Club. About an inch thick. At first I thought, I would just have steak and nothing else. Then I thought, we won’t do this too often. So I just won’t bother with calorie counting tonight. Finally I realized that I have a great little electronic digital scale. And I could weigh out my meal in nothing flat.
I had saved up my calories almost all day in anticipation of our meal. I decided that I would eat my whole steak, not just half. And I would have all the trimmings. So my plan was to weigh my meal and enjoy it. I would look up my totals afterward. I was not sure exactly what I was getting myself into, and I decided that if I went over, I would deal with it.
So I got the potatoes ready and Glenn brought in the steaks. Here is how I weighed out my meal:
- I got out a clean plate, set it on my scale and turned it on. The scale set to 0, and I set it to measure in grams.
- I cut the end off of my steak, to give to Valentine, my dog.
- I lay my portion on the clean plate and with pen and paper handy, I quickly jotted down the number on the scale. Then I tared the scale, which set it back to 0.
- I left my steak on the plate and added my potato, wrote down the number, and tared the scale again.
- I dipped up an enjoyable amount of butter, wrote down the number, and tared the scale.
- I added a nice dollop of sour cream, wrote down the number.
- Then I put my dog’s piece on my plate.
It probably took a total of about 1 minute to do all that. And now I had the valuable information I needed to see what it all came up to.
I sat the numbers aside and enjoyed my nice, warm meal. It was delicious, and so satisfying! I cut my dog a portion into very small pieces, so that I would not get it mixed up with mine. And I just dropped her a little piece on the floor every so often. We all ate together 🙂 Afterwards, I did my calculations.
I went to Google and typed in “beef”. They have fabulous nutrition information, right there on the search page. They had a way to count rib eye and I was able to get a very close idea of the calories in my steak. I followed by typing “potato”, “butter”, and “sour cream” into Google. I had numbers listed by grams for everything I ate and I was able to know exactly how many calories I had consumed.
It turned out to be about 840. Not bad at all! I actually have calories left over tonight. I’ll eat some veges and fruit, as to get my requirement of fiber. I’ll have to take a small calcium pill, in order to get enough for the day. Of course, I have plenty of protein. I will still have almost 400 calories left, and I think I will have a Snickers and Dr. Pepper.
I love calorie counting! It is a wonderful way to undo that old diet mentality, and learn how to eat again! If you are in the market for an electronic, digital food scale, I can get you one of premium quality, at a fair price. Just comment on this story and let me know.