How to Track Chopped Salad kits w/no dressing?
Hi Everyone- I just started Low Carb High Fat beginning of February, so I'm very new. It's going OK so far. I just tried some of the chopped salad kits (like Dole Asian Chopped), I always discard the packed dressing, croutons, fruit so all I use is the chopped greens and veggies. When I look in Carb Manager, it only gives the values for the salad made up w dressing. So when I try to track for day it throws my numbers off, even though its basically chopped cabbage! Any suggestions how to track these mixed salad?
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I'm also curious. I have read several places that some people don't even track leafy greens. So I haven't been either, I just try to stay a bit under.
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I would either measure out (just once so you know) or do my best to judge the amounts of what you actually ate, for instance, 1 cup shredded cabbage, 1/2 cup chopped kale, 1 tbsp. pumpkin seeds, that sort of thing. Some people do great not tracking certain foods, but for myself I find it helpful and keeps me honest with myself … I find I use up a lot of daily carbs on foods that I would otherwise consider "free" and most likely not count (for instance, the counter will add 1 carb for 2 eggs, or 1 carb for coffee, 2 carbs for a cup of romaine or mixed greens, etc.)... those little carbs add up pretty quickly.
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Just count it as cut up greens .
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If you use the same kit frequently, I would suggest dissecting one. Separate all the different ingredients into bowls, and weigh each one. I strongly recommend using ounces and not cups, cups are a very poor way of measuring loose, dry food. Create a recipe of your own based on the results. Then anytime you eat that particular salad kit you'll be able to just enter your My Foods recipe for it. If it's something that you do not eat frequently, then I suggest you guesstimate the various ingredients and enter them. Some of the popular YouTube keto experts recommend not counting the carbs in your daily greens. I love that idea, but I don't think it's a good idea, especially for people just starting on their keto journey. Even though those are healthy carbs, your body still has to process them, and they are going to impact your macros. Instead, I recommend spending as much of your carb macro as possible on healthy greens. After you've been doing keto for a while and know your body and how it responds to food, then if you want to try the "don't count greens" version go for it. I'm planning on doing that as my maintenance diet, but I love vegetables way too much to trust myself not to overindulge and drive my carbs out of sight during my weight loss phase. looking back I guess that I was probably eating 2 pounds of vegetables a day before I started Keto. I can demolish a pound of broccoli and go back for seconds. 🥦🥦🥦🥦🥦🥦
