More Analytics: My Fitness Pal

Fitbit http://www.fitbit.com/ has a built-in food diary, but because I eat non-processed food i.e., whole foods,  as much as possible (NB: If Grandmother didn't eat it, neither should I.) it is a waste of my time to use Fitbit's food diary.

After exploring the Fitbit community, however, experienced users turned me on to a free app called My Fitness Pal https://www.myfitnesspal.com that syncs to Fitbit.

I have only been using My Fitness Pal (MFP) for a few days, but so far it is outperforming Fitbit's food diary by about 20 percent.  It is very easy to use, but I have opinions on how to make it better.  

                               Tailor portions to exactly what is eaten
                               Improve the recipe software


MFP uses a drop down menu for portion sizes, with  two or three options per entry.  This morning's breakfast was Breadshop's Honey Gone Nuts http://www.arrowheadmills.com/product/honey-gone-nuts.   I ate 1/3 cup, but MFP only lets me enter 1/2 cup.  There's a big caloric difference between the two, especially when added up over the course of a week. Less granola in the bowl means less skim milk too. Again, I poured in 1/3 cup of skim milk, not 1/2. I ate 1/2 banana  instead of the whole banana that MFP entered into my diary.

MFP figures I ate a 405 calorie breakfast.  I don't know how much less it was, but it had to be under 400. The 1/2 banana alone is a saving of 42 calories. If I am going to go through the exercise of entering all of this data, I want accuracy. My weight loss goal is 5 pounds.  I might reach my goal faster if I had accurate data.  And if I had a much bigger weight loss goal ahead of me, I would be totally discouraged by MFP's inaccuracies.

Then there's the "homemade" issue. Am I the only woman in America who cooks at home?  I think not.   I used a recipe from Deborah Madison's Greens  http://www.amazon.com/The-Greens-Cookbook-Extraordinary-Vegetarian/dp/0553051954/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1391784421&sr=8-1&keywords=deborah+madison+greens called Buckwheat Linguine with French Lentils, Carrots, and Chard.  It was yummy, perfect for a cold, snowy night. Well worth the effort.  I laboriously entered all of the ingredients into the nutrition calculator. MFP wanted me to enter it all over again, for a reason I have yet to ascertain, so that I could "share" it with everyone else, which I can't do as I don't own it.   I recommend you go out and buy the cookbook.  It will change how you think about vegetables!  

To add insult to injury,  for lunch I had--you guessed it--leftover Buckwheat Linguine with French Lentils, Carrots, and Chard.  I dutifully entered that into the app.  My wonderful lunch came up on my diary without any caloric information.  No calories, no carbs, no fats, no protein, no sodium, no sugar, no nothing!  MFP probably did that the day before, too, but I hadn't noticed it.

Losing those 5 pounds might took longer than I had thought.  I had better go find some more stairs to climb.