Keeping Track of your Calories on LIVESTRONG.COM

MyPlate is a calorie-tracking tool with a database of more than 600,000 food items to help you track your meals and meet your calorie goals. All types of popular restaurants, generic food items and even recipes are there for you to add to your plate. You can also track your workouts with The Daily Plate. For instance, if you do 30 minutes of cardio on the elliptical machine, The Daily Plate will tell you exactly how many calories you burned. It's a great tool to use to lose weight and get healthy.

Get started tracking your calories now. Visit the MyPlate on LIVESTRONG.COM here: http://www.livestrong.com/myplate/

Here are the easiest ways to use My Plate successfully.

Set reasonable goals
Most people start their diet and exercise plan without setting a goal, or with a weight-loss goal that is out of their means. The best way to set a goal you will be sure to achieve is to start in stages.

Start your Daily Plate diet plan with a goal of losing 5 pounds. A healthy amount of weight to lose per week is 2 pounds. After you sign in to your LIVESTRONG.COM account, go to The Daily Plate section of LIVESTRONG.COM and click "My Calorie Goals." You will enter your age, height, weight and weight-loss goal, and the generator will then tell you exactly how many calories you can eat per day to achieve that goal. After the first week, if you find it too difficult to reduce your caloric intake as much as the calorie calculator suggests, reduce the number of pounds you want to lose per week, and follow that calorie goal until you think you can reduce more.


After you lose your first 5 pounds set your next goals to 10 pounds. Make sure you re-calculate your calorie goals after every 5 pounds—your caloric allowance will change as you lose weight.

Track your food every day
The most important key to The Daily Plate is making sure you track your meals daily. Every snack (even if you just grab a handful of almonds) and every drink (that glass of wine at dinner), should be accounted for. If there is a food not listed on The Daily Plate, you can enter it in yourself or manually enter in your calories. By tracking your meals every day, you can make sure that you are truly hitting your calorie goals and on the path towards healthy weight loss.

Modify your diet if needed
Not losing the weight as fast as you'd like? Check out your daily intake of fat, sugar and carbs. Maybe you aren't eating enough protein, or maybe your body has grown accustomed to your diet schedule. Mix it up a bit. Most dieticians suggest not eating carbs after 6 p.m. and to have dinner before or at 7 p.m. If you are having trouble maintaining your calories goals or if you eat out often, check the nutritional info for the restaurant you are going to beforehand and choose a meal you know will fit into your diet. Knowledge is power—it's better to know beforehand then be surprised afterwards.

Take breaks
Constantly watching your calories can be taxing. If tracking your foods daily for an extended period of time becomes too much, then take a break! Re-adjust your calories goals to "Maintain my current weight" and keep that number in mind when you go out. If you've been tracking your foods for a period of time, you'll know a ballpark number of how many calories are in each meal. Just keep a mental tab of how many calories you've consumed throughout the day, and when it's time for dessert you'll know if you can treat yourself to that sundae, without taking away from all the hard work you put into your diet.

Track your success
The Daily Plate does more than serve as a tool to calculate your calories. You can track your weight loss, join groups with other members of LIVESTRONG.COM and even track the breakdown of calories, fat, cholesterol, sodium, carbs, sugars and fiber. It's the perfect way to eat well, set reasonable goals and lose weight the healthy way.