Sunday Support Group: How Many Calories Should You Eat Every Day? (OT)

I've been writing from time to time about my diet experiment. Recently, I'm sorry to report, the news has not been so good. I hit a rough patch. I started cheating on my diet and didn't seem to be able to help it. My weight began to go in the wrong direction.

But it was a mystery to me. What was going on? After more than a year of eating plant-based, wasn't I well adapted to it? I thought I was. Didn't I like it? I thought I did. Where was I going wrong?

To review, briefly: a "whole food, plant-based" (WFPB) diet is pretty simple: you try to get 80% or more of your calories (not of your food, your calories) from the seven healthiest foods most essential to your body:

1. Greens
2. Vegetables
3. Fruits
4. Legumes (beans, chickpeas, split peas and lentils)
5. Whole grains
6. Nuts and seeds
7. Spices, which might not seem important but are antioxidant powerhouses and can increase the health value of almost any meal

On a WFPB diet you minimize or eliminate dairy, meat, oil, and sugar. I learned to do that, save for my one "indulgence meal," sushi for lunch once a week. (Sushi uses both meat and sugar.)

So here's what happened. I'd been happily eating the same breakfast for two years. Then for more than a year I got in the habit of eating a big nine-inch bowl of salad every day for lunch—the "same thing every day" except that the ingredients can rotate to include dozens of things, including steamed green vegetables like asparagus or Brussels sprouts I throw on top. Never been a big salad eater in the past but I learned to love it.

Then for most of 2020 I'd been searching for a dinner meal that would be simple and tasty. I wanted something to use as a fallback, because I noticed that by afternoon I wasn't very motivated to prepare food. But it needed to have some built-in variety so I didn't get sick of the same taste day after day.

Finally I lit on a solution. I start with a reasonably healthy (organic and vegan—this one's my favorite) canned soup, add a couple of big spoonfuls of brown rice prepared in advance or a sweet potato cut into cubes and boiled, a clove of garlic minced, some spices, some beans from a can, and some organic diced tomatoes. The result is a "vegan stew" that's delicious and takes only a few minutes to fix. Using different canned soups as a base means it tastes different on different days.

I didn't mean to eat that every day, but to use it as a go-to when I didn't feel like cooking. But I like it enough—and I like the convenience enough—that I started eating it on most days.

That's when everything started to fall apart. Which I thought was a coincidence at first. Suddenly I found myself cheating by going for sushi more than once a week and eating Chinese takeout too often. After having successfully banished candy, my weakness, I started cheating there, too—and didn't seem to be able to control myself. And although I had been practicing "time-restricted eating"—eating only during a short window and fasting the rest of the hours of the day—for well over a year, and quite comfortably, I suddenly found myself getting peckish in the evenings and, again, cheating. With all that cheating, my weight started going up.

All this caused me some consternation. Was this the end? Was I going to follow the all-too-common dieter's pattern and regain my lost weight?

I was determined not to do that. When you reach what seems like a stopping point in weight loss, sticking to your plan becomes more important, not less. You're no longer getting the positive reinforcement of the pounds falling off, but it's just as important if not more so to maintain what you've gained. And by gained I mean lost, of course.

Yet repeated attempts to recommit to my regular eating plan seemed to fail again and again. I tried to reduce the amount of food I ate ate at every meal, but the more I did so, the more weight I seemed to gain. I'm at 203.4 this morning and I've been as high as 206, after being below 200 for months on end with a low of 194.8. (Those weights might seem overly precise but I have a good scale.)

What in the world was going on? I had successfully been eating mainly plants for 14 months and not only was I comfortable with it, I was happy with it! I had lost 55 lbs. and felt great. I had no misgivings about WFPB and no complaints about my food—on the contrary, I was very happy with both.

I looked for psychological causes. Was it unhappiness that was causing it? Was the sugar in my weekly sushi lunch (sushi rice is made with sugar) triggering cravings for more sugar, always my weakness? Was it a resurgence of my old addictive behaviors? Rebellion? Regression to past norms? Was I getting sick of the food and pining for old indulgences? I hadn't thought so. So then what could it be?

Chow down, Sherlock
The answer seemed simple once I figured it out: not enough calories.

My breakfast is probably never more than 400 calories. My lunch salad might be as much as 500 on some days but is probably more like 350 on others. And my poor man's vegan stew in the afternoons, as best I can figure it, was probably 650 calories at the most but sometimes less than 500.

So at my three regular WFPB meals I had been eating only a maximum of 1600 to 1800 calories a day and often less than that, some days maybe as little as 1300.

It's not enough. Thirteen hundred to 1800 calories a day is not adequate for a 6'1", 200-lbs., 64-year-old male.

So then I'd get weak and yield to temptation and pig out uncontrollably on candy, bread, quarts of oily Chinese takeout, and so forth. That would take me quickly from too few calories to too many—of the wrong kind. To be bitterly honest with you I even impulsively stopped for donuts once this past month, and guiltily scarfed down five for a quick hit of 1,600 extra empty calories. What?! I don't do that any more. That's something I used to do. I didn't eat five donuts in all of 2020.

It's a weird thing, but if you're going to eat 100% WFPB, you might have to work at eating enough. According to various sites like The American Cancer Society Calorie Counter or The National Institutes of Health Body Weight Planner, I should be eating about 2,600 calories a day. Once I adopted those soup-and-rice afternoon meals, I wasn't hitting anywhere near that.

It's hard. I don't know what 2,600 calories of broccoli and sweet potatoes looks like, but I'm guessing it's a right heap.

In re-committing to weight control I had tried to reduce the amount of food I ate at my three meals. Wrong move! It's just very difficult shedding our old notion that if you want to lose weight you have to eat less. It's ingrained in us. One truism I'm convinced of it's this: food restriction diets never work. If you think you need "willpower" and if you're deliberately depriving yourself or going hungry, you are absolutely going to fail. It's the beauty of a WFPB diet that you get to eat all you want to. I thought that's what I had been doing.

But you'll also fail if your diet is grossly insufficient in calories. That's the trap I've fallen into, I think, and it's why I started going off the rails and gaining weight again in month 15 or so of my experiment.

The solution: eat more. Not less, more. Just more of the seven healthiest foods, that's all. Not donuts.

So now I'm trying to find ways to add more calories to my three daily meals...but calories in the form of the healthy things I've decided I want to eat.

I'll report back in a few more months and let you know how it's going.

Mike

P.S. If you're new to plant-based, start here. Could be the start of the rest of your life.

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(To see all the comments, click on the "Comments" link below.)
Featured Comments from:

John Krumm: "I've been experiencing some serious cravings too. Eating more vegan junk (french fries, etc.) and then the occasional total cheat (fried chicken). Not sure if it's emerging from the COVID haze of winter, or what.

"On the not enough calories problem, I think that's why a lot of vegan experts recommend high starch, low fat diets, with plenty of potatoes, squash, sweet potatoes and whole grains. My problem is they all require cooking, and sometimes I just want something easy and brainless. I think the real problem is that any diet that does not arise naturally out of the culture and economy requires individual effort, and has a very high failure rate. Our economy provides cheap donuts in abundance, so eating donuts is not a failure, it's a success, just not for you."

MikeR: "It is a heap. I have one brother-in-law who adopted WFPB a couple years ago. He is leaner than he was when I first met him as a teen...38 years ago. Here is what I see him do, and this is typical: He'll take some time preparing his meal, into a large serving bowl that you might see passed around the table at Thanksgiving. Then he'll take 30 minutes or more to eat, because it's a lot, and it must be chewed. I wonder whether the time commitment to both prep and eating could be a factor? An opportunity for mindful eating? As they say in the Zen literature, 'Just eat.'"

Jeff: "Our bodies need a certain amount of protein to survive. We don't need any carbohydrates, although they are very addictive. Your plant based diet appears to be very high in carbohydrates and very low in protein. Our bodies can stay hungry until they get the protein they need. After an extended period on a low protein diet it's not a surprise that you are experiencing a lot more hunger. I don't think it's a question of calories, it's all about protein."

Mike replies: Pretty sure I get plenty of protein. Protein comes from plants, after all—that's where animals get it from. Cows don't eat steak.

All types of vegetarians get more protein than they need, and without the risks of consuming animal protein. Those risks are considerable—those consuming large amounts of meat and dairy are five times more likely to get cancer and twenty-three times more like to get diabetes than those who consume little or no animal protein.

Arjun: "I know I've thanked you before, but here I am thanking you again for getting me (and my entire immediate and extended family) onto the WFPB lifestyle. Several family members have literally reversed their diabetes after having been diabetic for decades! I do sincerely hope you're able to work things out and stay healthy!

Mike replies: I'm just passing it on! But I'm delighted your family has had good results.

beachbum: "Don't worry! Cut out the donuts and nuts and soon you'll be back in the 190s.

"By the way, if you've only watched Forks Over Knives via a streaming service then you've missed the extended interviews that are included on the DVD. Those extended interviews are fantastic and would delight anyone who enjoyed the main feature."

Mike replies: Alas, I do not have a DVD player. How does one get one of those, anyway? For years mine was built into my computer, but the ghost of Jobs (or the alive Jony Ive) decreed that they should be minimalized away.

Nick: "Hi Mike, adding two slices of whole wheat bread to each meal should add about 500 calories daily. And fiber of course! Put some hummus or nut spread on it to add taste and extra calories."

Mike replies: That's an excellent idea—I tried it today.

SAM: "Hi Mike. You inspired me and my Latvian wife to start eating WFPB late last year. We won't be going back. If you need more calories, eat more nuts, unsalted of course, with raisins, berries, grapes, or dried fruits. We keep a Tupperware-like box of pecans, walnuts, cashews, hazelnuts and raisins always filled. We snack on them whenever we feel like it. You get sweet and savory at the same time, and they are very nutritious and caloric.

"I'm sure you already know all this, but I just thought I'd mention it anyway. You've really helped us. Thanks."

Comments

[JimH]

Don’t you eat bread? Organic whole wheat bread is a good source of nutrition and calories. We probably consume 1/4 our calories in bread, both bought and homemade. Breakfast today was waffles with whole wheat flour ground fresh in the Vitamix. We also have a recipe for a nutritional salad dressing made with nutritional yeast. Want recipes?
BTW, we also consume a lot of organic meat. My experience is yo need the protein. And we consume a lot of organic olive oil, cooking and as a dressing and dip for bread.

[Rick Graves]

Are you considering adding snacks (fruit and/or nuts) in-between your regular meals? That way you won't have to stuff yourself at regular mealtimes to add additional calories. That's what I try to do.

[robert e]

Thanks for that reminder that austerity isn't the answer where diet is concerned. Obviously, "nuts and seeds" is the easiest path to calories on your list, but I'm sure it's more complicated than that. Looking forward to your eventual solution. Good luck, Mike!

[Kenneth G Voigt]

add nuts

[Mike Ferron]

I talk about good food and diet but often fail despite the language. But for the last month I have been on a whole food diet following two Video docs. I get on the scale once a week and have consistently lost one pound a week for total of 4. I am eating a lot more plant based foods and keep the diet low on carbs. No pasta, grains and zero sugars other than those that come natural in the berries I consume and the occasional drizzle of raw organic honey. I do though eat some protein via quality meats, seafood and eggs. Red meat is down to once a week.

I have mentioned this before but some recommend consuming quality oils such as extra virgin olive oil. It is confusing as to the advice contradictions concerning foods. Besides the oils take the poor tomato. For every good thing one can read it will be contradicted by those condemning nightshades. Then the egg. Some say bad, some say superfood. Anyway my 66 year old body is feeling better eating whole foods and avoiding the junk.

[Fred Haynes]

I know you see a cardiologist, but is it possible that your retaining water? Also do you use a condiment that contains salt? How about exercise, do you get enough?
Fred

[Albert Smith]

"What was going on? After more than a year of eating plant-based, wasn't I well adapted to it? I thought I was. Didn't I like it? I thought I did. Where was I going wrong?"

Just my opinion based on observation, but deprivation leads to rebound overcompensation. Tell yourself that you can't have something, and you'll want it with a vengeance.

People that I know are having dreams about bread, because they are convinced that it is poison, and deprive themselves of a staple eaten the world over.

What are the odds of them NOT eating bread (or fill in what ever food is considered taboo in your artificial constraint)? History says zero percent.

Eat in moderation, from all the food groups. Exercise a bit everyday to enhance the basic attributes (strength, balance, flexibility, endurance), and enjoy that occasional burger.

There's no overcompensation on "cheat day" if you're not cheating.

Good luck, Mike.

[Ben Rosengart]

I find nuts to be delicious, and reasonably dense in calories. They’re on your list, so maybe you can lean on them a bit more. I keep some chili-lemon almonds around for a healthful snack when I get peckish. Good luck and good health.

[Paul]

Have you checked the salt content of the soups that you use for your vegan stews? Canned soups are often very salty, and this could throw you off balance too. Remember, junk food is loaded with salt as well.

[c.d.embrey]

For many years students have been eating Hotdog Stew. There are many variants—some are made with Veg-All, some are made with Ramen. They all have one thing in common–they ain't very nutritious.

Learning to cook is easier than learning to type. You do not have to eat salads and steamed veggies for every meal.

There are plenty of vegetable meat-substitutes. Therefore you could make a meatless Beef Stroganoff.

Make pasta using Barilla-Vegetable-Rotini and Mushrooms–use meatless Meatsauce.

Shrimp is easy. All you have to do is thaw 8-) then make some shrimp-sauce. And unlike sushi, no sugar.

[Giovanni Maggiora]

Mike hi! Facing weight control problems myself, I’ve started keeping a food diary over a year ago, and I have built what is beginning to be a reliable dataset to analyze the reactions of my weight to my varying eating habits. As I can see it, there is no question that calories intake is the largest contributor to weight changes. And my analysis seems to show that the type of calories (I monitor separately gluten-rich foods and alcohol) is relatively immaterial to the overall calories/weight change correlation, just as almost immaterial are time-restriction habits. The greatest statistical significance is found, believe it or not, in _prior period_ weight changes (a sort of self-reversion, lose one day or week and gain the next) and _absolute weight_ levels: the thinner you get, the less weight you lose at equal calories levels. In practice, this means that if you’ve been losing weight with a given calories input level at some point it just won’t work any more. Perhaps because, as many say, your metabolism adapts to the lower intake and you burn fewer calories as you go about your day. But in the end, what I found is simply that, irrespective of your body’s reactions to a given calories intake, _keeping the intake low_ is extremely hard, especially keeping it significantly below your break-even point. It’s just damn hard to resist cravings for long periods. What you are saying, the importance of eating _more_ is just a different way to say that it’s maybe better not to try too hard, because when you go off track you will go _seriously_off track. I suspect that certain foods (carb-rich in particular: fruit, bread, alcohol) are more addictive than other, and the primary cause of loss of control. But I can’t _prove it_ yet. More analysis of hard data required!
If you’re interested to see more of my data findings, message me privately. Best of luck with your efforts! Wish me the same...
Giovanni

[Speed]

This is a nice exposition on the calories that you are taking in every day but ... what about the calories that you are using every day. Weight gain or loss or stasis is primarily a product of what goes in (food) and what goes out (calories expended). And it is moderated by a lot of things including a reduction in BMR (Basel Metabolic Rate) with age.

How much exercise do you get, on average, every day. We know that you walk but how much and how often? Has it changed?

[Luke]

A whole clove of garlic? Whew!

Also, here's my vote FOR this topic.

[Dan Khong]

Mike
Yep, you are not eating enough calories that is used to burn up the other calories. It's paradoxical. It's bizarre. It's a kind of fine tuning. And it does not conform to the laws of input and output.
All the best to weight management.
Dan K.

[James Symingtoin]

Interesting - my journey seems to be eerily familiar. Having lost 50 pounds last year (and I need to lose more) I seem to be cheating and progress has reversed and I am desperate to stop it. You might be right about the amount of calories as I was trying to stay at 2000 or less a day and I am your kind of size.

Curious to hear how you fare. Good luck!

[Ken Renton]

Why not introduce a modest amount of cheese, dairy, eggs, fish and even meat to your plant based diet. This will produce variety in taste, texture and colours to the dishes you eat. This will make it easy to increase your calorie intake without facing a mountain of greens. The approach in the books of Michael Pollan suggest eating a varied diet of almost anything….but not too much. It’s easy to watch the calories and get away from boring eating.

[James Bullard]

Back in 2005-2006 I went from 280# to 188# by a combination of exercise and limiting calories. I used a phone app (My Fitness Pal, there are others) to track the balance of calories burned VS calories consumed. Some people track carbohydrates (the app offers that option) instead. Unfortunately, my overconfident brain told me "Hey, I have this figured out. I don't need to diligently enter everything I eat and every activity. It's a habit now and I can just cruise without the bother of the tracking app."

Note: If you eat an extra 100 calories a day above what you burn, that is 36500 calories per year that will be stored as fat. An extra slice of bread is 100 (or more) calories. 3500 is one pound of stored fat. 36500 = 10# plus a bit. Guess what happened when I stopped using the app to track intake VS burned calories.

If you are feeling tired and peckish on the number of calories appropriate to your gender/age/body size it is probably an indication of either you aren't getting the nutrients you need or you have miscalculated your calorie needs. Everyone has a different metabolism so the charts might not be accurate for you. Also when your activity level changes, your metabolism changes with it. Stop exercising as vigorously or regularly and your muscles burn fewer calories.

Lesson for me: I HAVE TO SEE THE NUMBERS IN B&W DAILY. I should never have stopped tracking when I did and it is now a struggle to get back where I want to be. YMMV but I recommend the use of a tracking app. Your can do it on paper if you want but to me the app is more convenient and produces charts and graphs on demand. The difficult part is the discipline to JUST DO IT.

[Mike plews]

There is a very interesting episode of Nova on the subject of fat.
It suggests that weight loss is much more complex than simple thermodynamics.
I always thought of fat as a kind of gas tank but it much more complex.
The show is well worth tracking down. Anyway I feel your pain. I have been fighting the scale and slowly losing most of my life. 2020/2021 has been a pip and I have been eating a lot of stress and it's making my pants shrink.
You may have tricked your body into thinking it is starving and that triggers all kinds of bizarre stuff not the least of which is the urge to stick your head into a bucket of Kung Pao Chicken. Good luck,you can deal with this

[Peter Wright]

You may also not be drinking enough. Taking on water will reduce the feeling of having an empty stomach. But water is boring. Soda is out and alcohol is out, and you can’t load up on milk. My solution is to make up a jug of hibiscus tea and put it in the the refrigerator overnight. Makes a very refreshing drink. I also supplement with vegetable juice (but strictly the low sodium version).

[Cyndi Jones]

Dear Online Photographer
Good job! 55 pounds is a lot of weight to shed!
High calorie vegetarian foods:
Avocados, walnuts, any nuts, peanut butter, coconut, hearts of palm.
And they are satisfying!
Rev Cyndi

[c.d.embrey]

Alas, I do not have a DVD player. How does one get one of those, anyway?

E-bay is a treasure trove of obsolete technology.

For years mine was built into my computer, but the ghost of Jobs (or the alive Jony Ive) decreed that they should be minimalized away.

Several years ago my son, who has an industrial grade shredder, got rid of all my CDs and DVDs. Everything, including photo back-ups as well as entertainment discs. I've made digital files that either reside in the cloud or on my hard drive. My audiophile gear is also gone.

I'm retired and don't have any suits or ties either—why would I?

[Hungry Umbo]

I'm going through this madness right now about almost everything I eat. I'm 66 and I feel out of gas, but can't seem to burn fat neither. Id like to lose another 35 pounds, but short of eating so little, I can't get out of bed, I have zero solutions

Pre-60's, I didn't seem to have any problems with energy, or anything else. Now I can't look at food cross-eyed without getting some problem. A recent trip to the doctor discovered I have a slight heart "jump", and muscle-spasms, as well as increasing blood pressure, none of which I ever had before. Then I figured out by dealing with a foodie, that those are all the results of not enough potassium! I also found out that it's virtually impossible to get enough potassium without getting way too much salt from almost any prepared food!

Where is my space-age tube of astronaut food where I get everything I need by squeezing a spoonful out everyday? All I can figure out, is that it's going to take far more hours a day to prepare food that will allegedly be "good" for me, than I'd ever want to spend; and most of it is going to taste like crap!

[beachbum]

Good news. The 'Forks over Knives' extended interviews are now available on amazon https://www.amazon.com/Forks-Over-Knives-Extended-Interviews/dp/B00AE2IM9K
and google play https://play.google.com/store/movies/details/Forks_Over_Knives_The_Extended_Interviews?id=VKGzSmRNQsw
For those of you with Apple's DVD-crippled machines, here is your friend https://www.apple.com/shop/product/MD564LL/A/apple-usb-superdrive.

.

[JH]

To Hungry Umbo - bananas and avocados are excellent sources of potassium as are many other fruits and vegetables. Eat a varied diet and avoid processed foods. Don’t eat anything your grandma wouldn’t recognize

[R Kolewe]

Mike -

It may be that you are not physically comfortable at your current weight, in which case it makes sense to continue to try and lose weight. If, however, your concern is driven by that number known as the BMI, which does not consider age, I encourage you to have a look at the Smart BMI (https://www.smartbmicalculator.com/result.html) which factors that in. A 6 foot 1 inch 200 pound 64 year old male, as far as SBMI goes, is doing just fine.

[Earl Dunbar]

I’m a vegetarian (ovo-lacto) and over the last several months I’ve restricted my calories because for me that has been the way I’ve lost (or maintained) weight. I’ve made good progress but have hit a plateau and probably because of getting too few calories from time to time. My weakness seems to be chips - potato chips, tortilla chips, etc. Even the “healthy” alternatives such as vegetable chips can be calorie packed.

What I’ve determined is that it’s likely eating too few calories in the middle of the day that gets me into trouble, along with not being & working outside much in the winter months. I look forward to warmer weather so I can be out gardening and expending more calories.

[greg]

https://medium.com/insider/ive-followed-the-mediterranean-diet-for-years-here-are-11-foods-i-always-stock-up-on-37d4e47a1b0e. The Mediterranean Diet is inline with many of the recommended diets. Pollan, DASH, e.g.

The Mediterranean is well covered, I just happen to run across the above article yesterday. Agree on hummus. We use it in place of mayo in sandwiches. Hummus and carrots are great snack.

Ken Renton summarized a good approach which is I think in agreement with Pollan. Unless you have other reasons (of which there are many good ones) not eating a little meat and fish is too much deprivation.

You don't need a BMI calculator, a mirror is easier. A scale does keep one from creeping up though. Once I hit about 2 lbs above my desirable weight I eventually cut back a little.

[adamct]

A few thoughts here:

1. Since adopting a WFPB diet, I eat ENORMOUS amounts of food. As others have said, my salads would fill a wheelbarrow.

2. If I had a desert island food, it would be hummus. I am wary of bread (too little fiber, and it is easy to eat a lot of relatively empty calories), but love hummus with vegetables. I especially like to mix a little hot sauce into my hummus as a dip.

3. Try adding beans to your salads and soups. Very easy to do, plenty of fiber and very satiating.

4. I'm sure there will those who disagree with me, and you should be careful if you have high blood pressure, but I have noticed that I start "cheating" and snacking if I don't have enough salt in my diet. In the evenings, I get a crazy craving for salt. To be clear, it isn't that I'm looking for carbs or fat (i.e., chips or pretzels or french fries), it is salt itself. By adding more salt (or salty ingredients) to my meals, my cravings went way down. Try it. That might be part of what is driving your cheating. And when that isn't enough: popcorn. Salty, relatively low-calorie, and it has a surprising amount of fiber, because popcorn is whole grain. I am in love with Newman's Own Sea Salt...

Best,
Adam