Nutrition Data:
Know It. Track It.

Most Common Weight Loss Mistakes
Not Knowing and/or Not Keeping Track of Your Nutrition Data

You can't balance your checkbook unless you have complete and accurate data. If you forget a purchase or mis-write just one amount, your balance will be off.

So how can you lose weight if you don't have a handle on your numbers? If you forget you ate something, or misjudge how many calories you've consumed, over time, your balance (on the scale) will be off.

Having decent calorie awareness will help. Use the nutrition data charts below to get a general sense of how your protein choices add up...

...and then adjust your choices as you see fit! Fish, poultry and meat don't usually come with a food label so the charts should help with these choices. Read nutrition labels to get additional nutrition data and/or use Calorie King to look up foods you are unsure about.

Beef, pork and lamb: Calories per (cooked) oz. Cal. Type 60 Well-trimmed Beef: top sirloin, sirloin steak, sirloin strip, New York Strip, t-bone, filet mignon, London broil, roast beef, delmonico Well-trimmed Pork: pork chop, ham Well-trimmed Lamb: lamb chop 70 Well-trimmed Beef: fajita meat, ribeye, corned beef, porterhouse Well-trimmed Pork: pork loin 90 Untrimmed Beef: porterhouse, t-bone, prime rib, filet mignon 100 Beef and Pork: sausage Beef: meatloaf Untrimmed Lamb: lamb chops Untrimmed Pork: pork chops

Poultry: Calories per (cooked) oz. Cal. Type 45 turkey, white, without skin 50 chicken, breast, without skin 55 turkey, dark, without skin 60 turkey, white, with skin chicken, breast, with skin chicken, dark, without skin 70 chicken, dark, with skin turkey, dark, with skin

Seafood: Calories per (cooked) oz. Cal. Type 30 cod, crab, crayfish, orange roughy, pollock, scallops, shrimp, Northern lobster, yellowfin 35 striped bass, perch, red snapper, sea bass 40 clams, freshwater bass, wild coho salmon, skipjack tuna 45 catfish, pink salmon, oysters, raw yellowtail 50 halibut, whitefish, mussels, rainbow trout, wild Atlantic salmon 60 sockey salmon 70 fried shrimp Want info on levels of mercury in different kinds of fish?

Wanna know one difference between chicken and beef?

Approximately 20 calories per ounce! That means if you eat 6 oz. chicken fajitas for example, in place of 6 oz. beef fajitas, you save 120 calories...and you didn't even have to reduce your portion size to save those calories! This saving translates to ~12 pound weight loss in a year.

There are three grades of beef based on the fat content of the meat. Select grade is the leanest, choice is in the middle, and prime is the fattiest grade.

If you buy lean meat in the grocery store, you are probably getting the select grade. In restaurants, choice grade is more common. Upscale steakhouses often buy prime cuts of beef because the extra fat adds more flavor. However...

The extra fat also contributes an additional 5-10% more calories and 10-25% more fat than choice!

(Read more about why calories matter.)

The charts above provide calories per oz. of cooked protein rich foods, so portions matter! You'll need to multiply according to your portion size to get your actual caloric intake.

(Learn more about standard serving sizes.)

If numbers aren't your thing, don't worry...

...you don't have to be a mathmatician or meticulous calorie counter to be successful at weight loss.

A better approach for you might be simply collecting nutrition data in a daily food journal without calculating any numbers. Just the act of writing down everything you eat and drink will help you eat less.

Studies show that people who keep a daily diet journal lose more weight than those who don't.

Write it down and you'll see. See and you'll believe.

Either way, if weight loss is your goal, you must find some way to keep track of your nutrition data...

So either improve your calorie awareness, or simply get down in black and white everything you eat and drink!

More weight loss.

Back to Personal Nutrition Guide Home.