Hi, friends! Today I’m excited to share the third part of my series of blog posts with macro expert, Emily Field, RD. In case you missed them, you can check our Part 1 HERE and Part 2 HERE! We thought it might be fun for me to share a typical “What I Ate Wednesday” type of post with you all, but to put a little spin on it, she’s going to rate/review my eats!
So that said, here’s a look at a random day of eats. I will say that this day of eats was documented well before we were stuck quarantined at home, so you’ll likely see some office meals and snacks included : )
7:30am – Coffee!
I always start my day off with a mug of my morning coffee at home while getting the kids ready for school. My coffee typically includes 1 Truvia packet, 1 scoop of collagen, and about 1-½ tbs of creamer
- P: 10g
- F: 3g
- C: 8g
Emily: Woman after my own heart! I love a coffee + collagen combo. It’s definitely not required, but can give a nice extra boost of protein without even “trying”. Collagen provides the amino acids responsible for repairing hair, skin, nails – as well as building a strong gut lining. It’s great to eat a variety of protein sources because we use the nutrient in all kinds of different ways in the body.
9:30-10am – Breakfast
Once I’m at work and finished up with the majority of the things waiting for me first thing, I then tend to have something for breakfast. Today’s breakfast was 1 packet of plain oatmeal, ~1tbsp raisins, a splash of unsweetened almond milk, and an individual sized peanut butter packet.
- P: 9g
- F: 12g
- C: 41g
Emily: A quick and easy portable breakfast! I love seeing a high fiber breakfast with the oats and dried fruit because we know fiber increases a meal’s “staying power”, so you stay fuller longer.
I see that you have a morning snack (below!), but should you not be able to or not want to eat something before lunch, you gotta boost the size and quantity in your breakfast or else you’re likely to be hungry! Consider adding a couple hard boiled eggs or mixing in a Greek yogurt to your oats to boost protein. I switch up my oats by adding Canadian bacon + over easy egg + riced cauliflower if I’m craving something more savory.
11:00am – Morning Snack
Some days, my breakfast will hold me over just fine until lunch, but I had a decent workout this morning and breakfast wasn’t very big, so I’m hungry for something else. I’m also craving something sweet, so I grab a package of this peanut butter trail mix and tell myself I’ll just have half. I eat the whole thing instead.
- P: 8g
- F: 20g
- C: 24g
Emily: I love hearing that your appetite and metabolism is picking up in response to challenging strength training workouts. Don’t ignore those hunger cues – eat up!
Your oatmeal breakfast was on the sweeter, higher carbohydrate side which could be one reason you’re experiencing some mid-morning cravings in the first place. Remember, carbohydrates (from sweetened oatmeal + blueberries) spike your blood sugar, which can mean all kinds of munchie cravings as a result. By eating whole, real food based carbohydrates and/or pairing your carbohydrates with protein + fat, we can largely eliminate these cravings because blood sugar stays more stable.
I could see you making your own trail mix with turkey jerky or dried meat sticks + almonds + chocolate chips + dried roasted chickpeas + whole grain cereal or grain free cereal. Make a big batch for the week and split it across several days!
1:00pm – Lunch
Today’s lunch looks no different from what it usually looks like. As long as I give myself the time, I almost always have a big salad, filled with lots of mixed vegetables, grilled chicken, feta, and dried cranberries. Since I don’t track the macros of any of the vegetables in my salad, I just make sure to measure/weigh the chicken, feta, cranberries, and salad dressing.
- P: 42g
- F: 12g
- C: 10g
Emily: This looks awesome! Great job getting a mix of protein, fat and carbohydrate containing foods here. No one likes a “sad salad” – you know the one with iceberg lettuce, lousy dressing and a couple of low calorie toppings. This looks like a filling and satisfying meal.
4:00pm – Afternoon Snack
Shortly after I get home from work, I grab myself two little halos (SO good!) and also count out a serving of these Mary’s Gone Crackers (these have quickly become some of my favorite crackers!!).
- P: 3g
- F: 4g
- C: 34g
Emily: Before tracking macros, reaching for crackers might have meant opening the box and diving in for a few fistfuls before telling yourself you “messed up.” After tracking, reaching for crackers means measuring your personally perfect portion. You can eat the foods your love without having an internal argument about whether you’ve failed your nutrition plan.
6:00pm – Pre-Dinner Glass of Wine
Jay had cracked open a beer, and I felt like joining him with a beverage, so I poured myself a small glass of white wine. I also took the time to measure it, since I was trying to be mindful on this particular day (and also because I knew I’d be sharing it in a post with you all!). I determine my macros for alcohol based on the WAG AlcCalc app on my phone, and usually have alcohol count more towards my carbs than fat, so this particular glass set me back about 25 carbs.
- P: 0
- F: 0
- C: 25
Emily: Enjoying a glass of wine with the hubby after work (and full time homeschooling!) sounds like the best way to round out the day! I love seeing you swap some carbohydrates (you can also swap fats) to allow for alcohol on occasion. Remember, alcohol doesn’t provide the body with ANY nutritional value and could prolong achieving your lean muscle gain or fat loss goals so we want to minimize consumption for the best results.
6:30pm – Dinner
Dinner tonight came easy, thanks to one of our favorite Chipotle Lime Taco Chicken in the Instant Pot! We did a sort of taco bowl, with rice (we were out of brown rice so just went with basic, white instant rice), shredded chicken, cheese, pico de gallo, and light sour cream. I totally would have added avocado, but quickly found out the one we had was bad. Womp womp. I also snacked on a few blue corn tortilla chips with the taco bowls.
- P: 44g
- F: 10g
- C: 31g
Emily: Excellent example of a well rounded, macro (protein, fat, carbohydrate) balanced dinner. The only suggestion I might provide here is adding more color if you can! This dish looks like you could have added a handful or two of greens right at the end of cooking to get a bit more vitamins, minerals and fiber. I’m constantly asking my clients where they can add more deep and dark colored vegetables because you can’t go wrong with eating more of these!
8:30pm – After Dinner Snack
I almost ALWAYS have a little something after dinner, you guys know that! Sometimes it’s purely out of habit, and sometimes it’s because I’m actually still hungry. Can’t quite recall which it was on this particular day, but this snack is fairly common: a Two Good vanilla yogurt, mixed with ~1 tbsp mini chocolate chips and a couple of crushed up graham crackers.
- P: 14g
- F: 8g
- C: 31g
Emily: A little something to end the night with – looks yummy! And, because you made it yourself, I bet you could have dialed up and down those macros to fit your needs and hit your targets by the end of the day. For example, if you saw that you were going to be short on carbohydrates, you could have added more graham crackers. Similarly, if you were short on fat, you could have added some nuts or seeds. Protein might be tough to add at the end of the day so that’s why it’s always great to front load at the beginning of the day.
More tips like these for hitting your macro targets (and not losing your mind!) in my free download linked here!
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Total Protein/Fats/Carbs*:
P: 130g
F: 69g
C: 204g
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*These numbers were actually within about 5-8g of my goal numbers that I work towards while I’m tracking.
So, there you have it – a full day of eats! I’m actually going to try to do another one of these soon, to reflect how my eating looks like while working from home, so stay tuned. For now, I want to give a big shout out to Emily for collaborating with me on these last few posts! It’s been fun to switch things up a bit and share a little bit more on this topic with you all, so if there’s anything else you’d like to see, let me know. : )
Rebecca says
I am imagining the nightmare that would be submitting my current day of eating and drinking to this person.
I really like this blog, but this macro stuff–especially right now–is just getting a little bit under my skin. Like, I get it, my daily quarantine alcohol consumption and handfuls of chocolate are not good. But I really don’t want anyone reminding me of that at this point. I know that tracking “macros” is supposed to be freeing and not a diet or something, but the judgment still seems to be encouraging restriction, and it definitely does not fit how I normally eat. It still sounds like a diet to me!
Anyway, it’s all good. Props to you for having the stomach to submit this to someone to be “corrected”/advised. I just get a bad vibe from these…so will avoid in the future, but will be back for the other content!
Courtney says
Totally valid points, Rebecca. Some people love it, and others don’t, and that’s okay! Hopefully we’ll catch ya for the next post soon! :)
Sarah says
Agree- seems very restrictive . (I love your blog btw Courtney but will skip these posts in the future)
Sophie says
Hey Rebecca,
I completely agree! Courtney has talked before about moving away from a more restrictive past with food, but lately these macro posts have felt very steeped in diet culture for my taste.
At the end of the day, macro counting is a highly restrictive diet. Weighing and measuring almost everything you eat? Jeez. I have my own history with an eating disorder, and I would not go back to these days for the life of me. I think macro counting can be a useful exercise for people with a complicated food history, to show how you can eat all kinds of foods and have a balanced day, but to do it regularly does not seem like a healthy, normal way to live.
For a long time I felt like Courtney’s values aligned with my own around food: primarily intuitive eating, enjoying food and alcohol at social events, treats that spark joy, movement because it feels good. I have really not enjoyed the recent shift toward numbers, nutritionists, and restriction, and have been reading less and less as these themes have peppered her posts.
To me, a balanced full life doesn’t involve measuring and calculating a glass of wine to have with my husband. And it’s pretty hard to relate to someone for whom it does.
Jay says
Would love to see one of these during a quarantine day…more realistic and timely. This day seems like a hand-picked “good” day.
Courtney says
Totally! This post had been pre-planned/drafted for a couple of weeks now (before all of this quarantine went down) so I agree with you, and am planning on documenting what a day of eats from home looks like right now. Stay tuned!
Michelle says
Question (maybe more for Emily) – It looks like your percentages are Protein 26%; Fat 32% and carbs 42%. Since you were close to your goal numbers, why more fat than protein in your diet?
michelle says
Looks like I calculated incorrectly – disregard my question
Fiona MacDonald says
This is so helpful! I don’t think I could ever count macros due to my past eating disorder but i loves seeing the tips Emily gave because I struggle to stay full between meals, not sure if from workouts or just habit but little tips like this might help ! Or heck I just like my mid day snacks ha
Kelly says
Super interesting! I’d be curious what a day looks like without a hard workout. I with I could view Greek yogurt as a “treat” at the end of a day. I love your topping choices but I would have wanted to swap the yogurt for ice cream! Ha! And kudos to you for your gracious and mature responses to your not so friendly comments to this post. 😉
Emily says
Thanks for this I find it interesting!