‘I Took Photos Of My Food For 2 Weeks To Lose Weight—Here’s What Happened’

On Monday, I decided to weigh myself. I didn’t expect to have lost anything, so I was really surprised that I was down one pound since Friday. 

For breakfast, I ate what I thought was a healthy-ish meal: a homemade bacon, egg, and cheese sandwich on a croissant. Alone, each food item sounded harmless, but together it bumped up my total calorie intake to 587. That’s about double my recommended intake of 245! Snap immediately recognized that I was eating a sandwich on a croissant with bacon, egg, and cheese, but then I had to enter what kind of bacon, egg, and cheese I was eating. Normally I’d eat this without thinking twice, but seeing that number made me more conscious of what I was putting in my mouth the rest of the day. 

Related: ‘How Many Eggs Is it Really Safe to Eat Per Week?’

For lunch I had some leftover steak and quinoa, and for dinner I whipped up some chicken, okra, and fried plantains. Snap It recognized the chicken, but I had to type in the plantains and okra. Despite my unhealthy breakfast, I managed to stay within my budget with 75 calories to spare.

The next day, I went out for dinner with my family and ate pork ribs with white rice and salad. Again, the app caught the ribs, but I had to enter what kind of ribs and manually type in my side dishes. I’m a sucker for white rice and usually pile it on my plate, but Lose It reminded me that a cup was 205 calories. I also learned that eating six ounces of ribs (or two ribs) was 420 calories alone. To stay within my 435-calorie dinner budget, I decided to eat one and half ribs, only some of the rice, and skip my usual glass of wine.