What Can I Eat for 1500 Calories?

This is an average days food for me, though this is without going to the gym. I add extra calories depending on how much I exercise.

BREAKFAST -

40g Quick cook oats, made into porridge w/ 125ml semi skimmed milk and 75ml cold water, and ground cinnamon. Sweetened with maple syrup Flavdrops from www.myprotein.com

1 Red grapefruit

Green tea

58g Myprotein Diet Whey Protein Powder Double Chocolate, made up with cold water

Calorie total - 462

LUNCH

185g Canned tuna in brine or water, drained. Mixed w/ 30g Vita D'or Light mayo from Lidl - Cheaper and nicer than Helmans!

6 Ryvita Wholegrain crispbreads

Half a ripe avocado, sliced

Season the tuna mix with sea salt and freshly ground black pepper. Divide the tuna and avocado between the 6 crispbreads. *Sprinkle with roasted black sesame seeds, and a drizzle of chilli sauce!

*Optional - will add a few extra calories, but spice can be good for metabolism.

Calorie total - 501

DINNER

100g Chicken breast

150g Broccoli

80g Frozen sweetcorn

100g Cos/Romaine lettuce

15g/1 tablespoon Unsalted butter - Lurpack is a favourite!

Calorie total 390

Last night I put my chicken and sweetcorn in a small baking dish. Sprinkled over some sliced red chilli, ginger, garlic, and coriander stalks. Seasoned with black pepper, and poured over about 100ml chicken stock w/ a dash of low salt soy sauce. Dotted it with the butter, and baked in the oven for around 20 minutes, or until the internal temperature of the chicken was 74 degrees celsius. Garnished with coriander leaves, and served with broccoli and lettuce, delish!

SNACKS

100g Granny Smith apple

15g 100% Peanut butter - No added salt, sugar, oil etc. Just peanuts, and forget low fat versions, blurgh!

Calorie total - 140

Days total calories - 1493

So that's what I eat BEFORE adding exercise calories. When I do 90 minutes at the gym, I burn around 400 calories, which would give me a NET calorie intake of 1093, so I would eat an extra few hundred calories in order to be healthy!

The more you move, the more you get to eat! Pretty sweet eh!

Please check out my previous blog entries for more swirly stuff from my brain :)

How Many Calories Should I Eat To Lose Weight?

To work out the amount of calories you need in a day, calculate your BMR.

But what IS a calorie?

A calorie is a unit of energy. We eat calories in order to produce enough energy to go about our daily lives.

Soooo, what's BMR?

BMR stands for - Basal Metabolic Rate. It's basically, the amount of calories your body burns by simply surviving. If you were in a coma, your body would burn this amount of calories through organ function, digestion etc.

I tend to eat close to my BMR, but you can play around with your calories to see what works for you. Just don't dip below 1200, your metabolism can slow down, and fat loss slows down! PLUS, you could lose important Fat Burning muscle!!

1 lb of fat is equal to approximately 3500 calories. So to lose 1 lb a week, eat 500 calories less a day!

How do I calculate my BMR?

There are a few different formulas that you can use. They involve your height, age, sex, weight, and activity level. But the easiest way, is to visit websites such as -

www.myfitnesspal.com

www.caloriecount.com

www.bodybuilding.com

Or good old Google. You'll probably get slightly different numbers from each one, but go with the average amount to start with.

So now we have our BMR worked out, (Mine being roughly 1452) we can begin to look at our food. We need to spread our calories over breakfast, lunch, dinner, and snacks.

But wait! There's more!

To be sure that we're creating a 500 calorie deficit each day, in order to lose 1 lb a week, we need to calculate our TDEE!

Oh c'mon! You're messing with me right? What the heck is TDEE?

TDEE = Total Daily Energy Expenditure!

To work this out, do the exact same thing you did to determine your BMR, just with a TDEE calculator!

My TDEE is around 2248. So subtract 1452 from 2248 = 796 calorie deficit! So potentially, I could lose just over 1 lb a week, as my total calorie deficit for 7 days is 5572!

Bottom line, eat clean, and stay active. Lift heavy weights, ladies, trust me, we won't get bulky as we lack testosterone! Those female body builders? Yeah, they probably do steroids! Supplement strength training with cardio - 10 minutes of interval training to warm up, and cool down is a good start. 30 minutes at the same pace on a bike/cross trainer/treadmill isn't just boring, it's a waste of time! It's a bit like walking in circles, we never get anywhere!

But anyway, the amount of calories I eat is around 1400-1600 a day, eating closer to 1400 for the majority of the week, and including a cheat day with a few extra calories! It might not sound much, but by making healthy choices, it can be a lot of food!

I hope this helps :)

Why quitting my job was right for me!

It seems that a few things were assumed when I gave my notice at my old job! These things have come into light in the last week, and have annoyed me a little!

My reasons for quitting were -

I was miserable working for a chain restaurant.

The hours were unsociable, EVEN for a chef job!

The food was all bought in.

My days off consisted of doing laundry, and not much else.

I was exhausted. All. the. time!

Late nights, and early starts do not mix.

My health was suffering - I only got to eat one proper meal a day, during my split.

My metabolism was ruined, from under eating, and burning more calories than I consume by hundreds! Now making my journey 10 times tougher!

My strength was weakening. I had trained so hard for 6 months, then all a sudden, my gym life was over, and it was ALL about work!

I DID NOT quit because I couldn't handle the covers! B*tch, please! I've done more covers, with less chefs, and making everything from fresh ingredients, FROM SCRATCH! Nothing frozen, apart from peas, prawns, and fries!

Shouldn't your health come first? When I started my journey to become the healthy person I'm going to be, I didn't count on being set back by a job! I'm 6 months behind schedule. From mid June to the end of August, I lost around 18 lbs! This was purely through under eating, and working lots of hours! Not good!

At the end of August, I went to a food festival, and I ate so much food, it was awesome! I put on about 5 lbs that weekend haha!

Then from the start of September, I started eating the food at work, as the other guys quite rightly said, I'm entitled to it! Unfortunately it's mainly carbs - Pizza, pasta, potatoes.

So the weight I lost, slowly crept back on again, until the New Year, when I went back to the gym, and started to eat clean again - YAY!!!!!!!!!!!!

I'm not going to dwell on the fact that I'm behind schedule, it was a big ole bump in the road. I'm back on track with my eating, and exercise, and life is good, now I have the time to invest in the most important thing, MY HEALTH WOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!

So, if you have made a resolution to lose weight, get fit, or be healthy, do it! Don't quit, and if obstacles get in your way, remove them, or take another route!

Here's to 2015 - This is the year I reach my goals, and smash them out of the park!! I hope you reach your goals too :)

Happy New Year - 2015 woop woop!

Well it's been a while since I've had a chance to write any new blogs! I started a new entry back in July, but never had the time, or energy, to continue! So this is what I had started writing before I quit in the winter -

Summer's here... New job = no life!

As predicted, I ended up getting a new job in June that has taken over my life! Damn!

I've been working crazy shifts at a restaurant, well, I say restaurant, this place is unlike anywhere else I've worked in all my years as a chef!

It's a chain, which means lots of really ridiculous rules and regulations set out for everyone, these people are worse than the Environmental Health Dept!! The food is middle of the road (Far from fine dining), by my standards, and experience, so I'm just seeing it as I get to work with some funny people, and save some cash!

When I was interviewed, I was asked the question, "What made you apply for this job?" I said that I love Italian food, and wished to gain more experience in the cooking side.

The truth of it is though, I really needed a job as my savings were dwindling! I do love Italian food though, and hope to visit Italy one day :)

A typical shift is a split, with a two hour break in the afternoon, and finishing at some time around Midnight, or later. An example would be 10am - 3pm 5pm - 11.30pm (According to the rota)!

It's bloody hard work, I've never had blisters between my toes before, urgh, I'm grateful for those special Compeed blister plasters! My poor feet are taking a battering!

In six weeks I've lost a total of 8.6 lbs, even though I've not had the time, or energy to hit the gym! I'm literally working my ass off! I'm also not eating the food, I take my own lunches of tuna, crispbreads, and salads, though I only get to eat a proper dinner on days off..

I miss my gym buddies though, and I'm starting to get weak again :( NOOOOOOOOOooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo! Let's hope 'Muscle Memory' is a real thing!

We've had some gorgeous weather here in Cornwall lately, so if lunchtimes are quiet, the numbers are made up by letting everyone through the door in the evenings. The past two nights have been crazy! The ticket machines never stop, and the tab grabbers fill up within minutes! An upside to this is, if all the tables are full, they can't take any more orders. So it's safe to say that service is an absolute beast! Yet not always organised properly, pumping tickets through like there's no tomorrow, and crashing the kitchen! There is only so much each chef can do at any one time, so it's safe to say, this place is a bit of a shambles at times!