This week, I received a food diary from Camilla who was keen to take me up on my offer of a food diary review via the newsletter.
I’d like to do another one or two of these, so please do ask me if you would like yours to be reviewed.
This is what Camilla ate over two days:
Day One
Breakfast: porridge made with milk and water, topped with a little honey
Lunch: half carton of pre-prepared chicken and sweetcorn soup, and a small mango
Dinner: homemade chilli with rice and peas
Snack: 7pm corn cake with goats cheese
Day Two
Breakfast: none
Lunch: two egg omelette with bacon, peppers, mushrooms and onions
Dinner: harissa chicken thighs with peppers, carrots and onions. 2 glasses of wine
Snack: 10am carrot sticks with humus. 3pm pear.
And here are my thoughts, based on the knowledge that Camilla wants to lose weight.
The first thing I look at in a food diary is how many snacks someone is eating, it gives me a really good clue as to whether they are eating in the right way for them. Someone who is hungry all the time is not eating the right meals.
Day ones snack at 7pm is an hour before dinner, which makes me think it would be better to have just eaten dinner a little earlier and saved the calories from the snack. My hunch is that Camilla had probably just burst through the door after being at work all day and was too hungry to wait for dinner, so had a snack while waiting for her meal to be ready. This makes me look further up the food diary to see what was for lunch and whether there is anything we could have done differently earlier in the day to reduce her hunger.
Day ones lunch looks really pretty small to me. Most ready-made soups are really low in protein. Couple that with the bigger blood sugar spike that liquid meals tend to give, a sugary mango for pudding, and little to no protein at breakfast time, and I feel surprised Camilla made it until she got home before being hungry.
Depending on the level of change Camilla is ready to make, I’d suggest either adding some protein to her soup (perhaps by buying a pack of cooked chicken or some prawns to have on the side) and changing the mango to something less sugary, like some berries or an apple. Or, I’d suggest taking lunch to work with her – a huge vegetable rich salad or soup with a decent portion of protein would have left Camilla feeling much more satisfied and more likely to make it through to dinner without a snack.
Finishing my thoughts about day one, I’d also challenge Camilla to try a different breakfast. She may (or may not) find a more protein rich breakfast keeps her feeling fuller for the day. I’d ask her to try something with more protein for a week and see if she notices any positive effects from the change.
Moving to day two, we can see Camilla skipped breakfast. There’s no issue with that at all – getting 12-16 hours between dinner and your next meal is no bad thing.
The first thing I notice though is the mid-morning snack. Again, its totally fine to be ready to eat 14 hours after dinner, but I would suggest Camilla have brunch at 10am rather than a snack to see her through to lunchtime. Of course, it might have all worked out the same but in reverse – i.e. the humus and carrot sticks snack may have been at 3pm to tide her through to dinner – but, it might not. I’d always suggest eating a proper meal rather than having a snack to get you through to the time the clock says is lunch time.
This said though, we can see Camilla made it all the way through to dinner with only a pear, which adds weight to my suggestion to have a more protein rich lunch more often.
Looking at the mid-afternoon fruit I’d be asking whether Camilla was truly hungry at 3pm or if she just fancied something sweet. Its better to stick to meals with no snacks from a health point of view, but as we are looking at this from a weight loss point of view, I wouldn’t say too much about a piece of low-sugar fruit mid-afternoon. If a sweet craving around that time of day is a regular occurrence, I might suggest we look at whether skipping breakfast is the cause of that, or whether perhaps there could be a nutrient deficiency, dehydration, or even if Camilla’s sleep quality could be to blame.
Once I’ve got as far as I can by looking at a clients snacks, I look at the protein intake. Protein is really important. Without even considering the requirement our bodies have for protein, or the fact that people who eat more protein tend to have less nutrient deficiencies, we know that protein is the most difficult macronutrient for our bodies to store as fat; its also the most satiating – i.e. it wards off hunger longer than either carbs or fat.
In Camilla’s diary, I would say there is definitely not enough protein on day one, and that there is probably just enough on day two – I would want more information before I advised her on whether she needs more protein, although I would re-iterate to base each meal on protein and veg. I’d suggest Camilla tried to eat the foods with the highest amount of nutrients in them at every meal – very few ‘fillers’ required.
The next thing I look at is vegetable intake. We can see Camilla had very few veggies on day one and plenty on day two. Again, I’d be looking for more information before I would say Camilla wasn’t eating enough veg, so would simply suggest each meal contains at least two different veggies. I would also ask Camilla to buy a rainbow of veg and to make sure she eats the full spectrum of veg colours each week, choosing different varieties each week. I find this approach of trying to add, rather than telling a client to eat less of something, is much more effective.
I hope this gives you an idea of the way I usually look at a food diary from a client, although there are of course common themes, everything I do is a completely personalised gradual process starting from where you are right now, and moving at the right speed for you. You can see I’m not about starvation or crazy diets. For me, its about improving health and taking your nutrition as close to optimal as possible, then enjoying the weight loss benefits which come with that.
If you would like your food diary to be reviewed on this newsletter, please get in touch. If you’d like more in depth personal advice on improving your health, losing weight and getting in shape, I’d be delighted to speak to you about how I can help.