Fat Loss Isn't Always What It Looks Like

When it comes to fat loss, portion control seems to be used a lot by professionals, myself included. But sometimes portion sizes aren't always what they seem.

For example, if you had a bag of chips and the same size bag of baby carrots, are you eating the same amount of calories? Well, I looked it up on the internet. 4.25 ounces of Koo Koo Roo baby carrots is 75 calories, while 4 ounces of Lay's potato chips is 600 calories. Consequently, you would have to eat a lot more carrots to equal those 600 calories of chips.

So a lot of it does come down to what you are eating, not necessarily how much you are eating. What perfectly illustrates this point is the book Picture Perfect Weight Loss by Dr. Howard Shapiro. I was turned onto this book awhile back by some other fitness professionals. I haven't read the book entirely, but I have looked at the pictures and this is what the book is about.

Dr. Shapiro shows you pictures of foods with equal caloric values and shows that you can eat a lot of healthy foods at one sitting and still not equal the caloric value of a particular junk food.

For example, he shows on one page a picture of a 2 ounce hot dog (really about 1/3 of a hot dog), 2 ounces of sausage (about 1/4 of a sausage), and 1/3 cup of macaroni salad. This equals 530 calories. On the opposite page he shows you 5 ounces of shrimp (about 8 pieces), red bell peppers, and onions, 2 portobello mushrooms, 6 asparagus spears, a potato, zucchini, corn on the cob (probably minus the butter), and 2 lbs of watermelon (about 2 - 1/4 slices). All of those foods equal up to 530 calories total.

He has many more examples of this in his book. It really starts to hit home to some people that you can eat a good amount of food AND stay within a reasonable allotment of calories, IF you make healthier choices with your foods. By looking at all those foods, the visual stimulation starts to kick it in for people.

So remember, you do have to take into consideration how much you are eating, but that can be greatly altered by what you are eating. The fattier foods will always have more calories in them then their healthier counterparts. Check out this book and see what you can learn.

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