At two weeks in, things are going pretty well. I haven't busted the budget on any day yet. My average daily expenditure has been $2.31, average daily calories consumed has been 1,642.
As you can see, there is some variability between cost and calories. bread is a cheap source of calories, and if you've been following specifically what I've been eating, you know I eat a fair amount of bread. It's all homemade, but some of it is simple Italian bread - basically just all purpose flour - which makes it pretty much empty calories. I've mixed in some wheat bread and corn bread for variety. I'm not wild about wheat bread, but I do like corn bread. Is corn bread healthier than plain white bread? It does have eggs, milk, and oil in it. Does the corn meal add anything? Or is it empty calories like all purpose flour? I'll let Kerryn chime in on that one because if it is better, I wouldn't object to eating more of it.
The calories are lower than necessary, given the fact that I do have left over money each day. What I probably should do is make a conscious effort to have more healthy vegetables on hand to add to the diet if it looks like I will have extra money at the end of the day. I did eat some carrots on Day 12 in the evening when I knew I had extra cash. Last night I thought about eating a bowl of frozen peas (cooked, not in frozen state, of course), when it became clear I had extra cash, but I was just too tired to make the effort.
I have been doing a pretty good job of keeping up with the exercise. On average I'm getting almost 500 calories of exercise, which I think is pretty good, and gives me an average net calories of 1,148 per day. This helps explain the weight loss I've been experiencing.
The goal of this experiment is to eat healthy on $3 a day, with weight loss as a secondary objective. I do want to show that I could eat a maintenance diet on $3. A maintenance diet would probably be around 2,000 to 2,200 calories per day. That could easily be achieved either through eating more bread or, even more cheaply, more brown rice. Brown rice is about as cheap as dirt - 160 calories of brown rice costs about $0.03. An ounce of cheese adds about 113 calories for $0.20. As Kerryn keeps pointing out, milk is good for protein as well. A cup of skim milk cost $0.19 at Walmart, and gives you 87 calories, and 8 grams of protein. I'm consciously trying to integrate more milk into my diet at this point. I won't drink a cup of it (yuck), but if I can cook it in, I'm trying to.
If you follow my spending patterns over the course of the day, you'll see I'm pretty conservative. I go cheap on breakfast and lunch so that I can be sure I have money left over for the evening. This is a comptroller instinct, I think. Better to have money left over at day-end than to be sitting at $2.99 and not be able to have dinner. The cost consciousness has left me with pretty low calorie meals almost as a side effect. Well, cost and a consciousness of trying to eat a little better. I don't really think that much about the calories, and it just sort of happens. That I like.
As you can see, there is some variability between cost and calories. bread is a cheap source of calories, and if you've been following specifically what I've been eating, you know I eat a fair amount of bread. It's all homemade, but some of it is simple Italian bread - basically just all purpose flour - which makes it pretty much empty calories. I've mixed in some wheat bread and corn bread for variety. I'm not wild about wheat bread, but I do like corn bread. Is corn bread healthier than plain white bread? It does have eggs, milk, and oil in it. Does the corn meal add anything? Or is it empty calories like all purpose flour? I'll let Kerryn chime in on that one because if it is better, I wouldn't object to eating more of it.
The calories are lower than necessary, given the fact that I do have left over money each day. What I probably should do is make a conscious effort to have more healthy vegetables on hand to add to the diet if it looks like I will have extra money at the end of the day. I did eat some carrots on Day 12 in the evening when I knew I had extra cash. Last night I thought about eating a bowl of frozen peas (cooked, not in frozen state, of course), when it became clear I had extra cash, but I was just too tired to make the effort.
I have been doing a pretty good job of keeping up with the exercise. On average I'm getting almost 500 calories of exercise, which I think is pretty good, and gives me an average net calories of 1,148 per day. This helps explain the weight loss I've been experiencing.
The goal of this experiment is to eat healthy on $3 a day, with weight loss as a secondary objective. I do want to show that I could eat a maintenance diet on $3. A maintenance diet would probably be around 2,000 to 2,200 calories per day. That could easily be achieved either through eating more bread or, even more cheaply, more brown rice. Brown rice is about as cheap as dirt - 160 calories of brown rice costs about $0.03. An ounce of cheese adds about 113 calories for $0.20. As Kerryn keeps pointing out, milk is good for protein as well. A cup of skim milk cost $0.19 at Walmart, and gives you 87 calories, and 8 grams of protein. I'm consciously trying to integrate more milk into my diet at this point. I won't drink a cup of it (yuck), but if I can cook it in, I'm trying to.
If you follow my spending patterns over the course of the day, you'll see I'm pretty conservative. I go cheap on breakfast and lunch so that I can be sure I have money left over for the evening. This is a comptroller instinct, I think. Better to have money left over at day-end than to be sitting at $2.99 and not be able to have dinner. The cost consciousness has left me with pretty low calorie meals almost as a side effect. Well, cost and a consciousness of trying to eat a little better. I don't really think that much about the calories, and it just sort of happens. That I like.
Mark, Kerryn: please extend the milk dimension...why skim? (taste, calories, cost) and/or why not 1%, 2%, whole, organic, non-organic.
ReplyDeleteNice rundown and dedication!
Lee