HOLIDAY TRACKING by KATIE DEMETRIFF

As I reflect on my one year anniversary of macro tracking, I remember thinking it was going to

be impossible to enjoy the holidays tracking macros. I guess I felt that way because I was still

new to tracking and felt a bit overwhelmed. After tracking for the last year and learning some

rockin’ macro tracking tricks and tips from the community I feel more confident on staying on

track during the coming holidays. I also know I will be enjoying delicious foods that I love

during the holidays. I’m going to Rock the holiday tracking and you will too!

Some of the questions I had last year, as the holidays approached, I wondered how was I going

to track macros, what was I going to eat and what about the guests I had coming to visit, what

would they think about this macro tracking stuff I was doing? So I did some research in the

flexible dieting, fitting your macros realm. I kind of knew how to input a recipe into MFP but I

wasn’t always sure of how to figure out the serving sizes. For my first Thanksgiving, as a

macro tracker, I took all the recipes I usually make and started to input them into MFP to figure

out the macros. Let’s just say my new macro brain was blown away by some of the macros of

the utterly delicious foods I love during the holidays. So I started to look for some alternatives.

I was looking for lower fat or lower carb alternatives, especially if I wanted a little bit of every

dish I made for the meal. Of course when I entered the recipe I just put the servings as

whatever the recipe called for and of course most of them didn’t have the servings in grams,

most were just 4 servings or 4-6 servings (what does that even mean?) I wouldn’t be until a bit

later I discovered a great video detailing how I could figure out a dish’s macros per gram.

Essentially you input your ingredients in MFP, measure the dish, in grams, that the dish will be

cooked in, cook the dish and measure the dish with the food in it after it’s cooked, then

subtract the weight of the dish. The remaining amount of grams after subtracting the dish

grams is the amount of servings in the MFP recipe. Then when you decide to eat the dish you

can put in by gram how much you want to eat, and you are then able to manipulate it by gram,

instead of using decimals and fractions on a serving size to get the exact amount in grams

needed for your day. Doing this to all of your favorite dishes will help you figure out how many

grams of each dish you can have to fit your macros for the day. Just keep in mind if you have

an undeveloped day, the macros you have left over will have you eating the oddest

combinations, or just a whole bunch of egg whites to round out your proteins. And frankly if

you don’t have carbs left over to make that egg white meal into French toast it won’t be tasty.

Here is the link to the video on YouTube: https://youtu.be/ugwaSKZmLcM

As I said in the title the holidays are coming , which means temptations to fall off the macro

tracking wagon. I am here to tell you that you can survive the holidays and do it successfully

without feeling like you’re missing out. You just have to keep your goals in mind and focus on

how you are going to set yourself up for success to achieve those goals, regardless of the fact

that the holidays are coming. During the holidays you don’t have to miss out on any of the

food, you just have to plan for it. Because you know everyone will be having a holiday party

and all of them involve food! So before you get all stressed out on what to do or not do or

decide to fall off the macro wagon; there a couple of different ways that you can plan for the

upcoming holiday parties, whether at a friend’s house or the office.

First, you can plan ahead for the party and do what I call pre-gaming , only without the alcohol.

Before the party eat your meal you had planned for that part of the day. If you eat your meal

you will not be hungry and tempted to just have a little bit. Then you can enjoy the party and

not worry about going over your macros. Now some people will ask why you aren’t eating, or

to just have a little bit, it won’t hurt. I usually say that I am full because I already ate or I ate a

big lunch/snack.

Second, you can plan for some of the food at the party and input them ahead of time into your

tracker. Then you can build the rest of your day around the macros you planned for at the

party. We all know what kinds of food are at the holiday parties, so it makes it a bit easier to

gauge what to have for the meal. Just remember that this will be counted as a haphazard

tracking day, as you can never be very sure of what is in someone’s green bean casserole or

what extra ingredients they added to their pumpkin pie. I tend to stick with what I know, the

proteins- turkey and ham, and carbs I will stick with the known items such as potatoes, rice,

veggies. If I imbibe on any deliciousness I usually have a small amount or a bit or two, and of

course I track it!

The third option is you can bring a macro friendly dish to the party, especially if it is a potluck

party. This way you have a guaranteed item you can have at the party. I would suggest you

pre-game a little bit with a nice high protein snack before you go too. And of course plan it out

before hand!

Remember the holidays is a time to celebrate with friends and family and hopefully not a

stressful time. So be kind to yourself and forgive yourself if you fall off the macro tracking

wagon or forget to log it. Sure it may show up on your scale in a couple of days but with a few

days of regular tracking your back to Rocking Macros!

I’d love to hear about how our other macro trackers make it through the holidays or some

recipes that they make to keep them on track.

Until next time – Keep on Rockin