There are a lot of confusion regarding what calories are, how calories work and how many you should eat and how much exercise you needs to do in order to lose weight or how to count calories for weight loss. Understanding the importance of calories is a great way to start if you are trying to lose weight. Ultimately, any weight loss program that works will make sure that you are burning more calories than you are gaining.
Calorie is definitely a measure of energy that comes from the food we eat. Food calorie content is the amount of calories that specific food contains for a given serving size. It seems like most weight-loss diets focus a lot more on the calorie amounts, rather than the nutritional contributions of the ingredients within the meal.
Why People Need Calories? Certainly, we can not live without food nor can we live on water alone. We require food for the body structural development and growth, the energy in order to do daily activities – both mental and physical, ailment and disease prevention etc. Bear in mind the energy we have from food is where the calorie counting comes in. Final point here is without food, you starve to death.
How Much Do We Need and How about Calories for Weight Loss?
A particularly popular question. According to Wikipedia, the daily calorie intake suggested in the United States (age 31 – 50) is 2700 kCal for men and 2100 kCal for women going about daily activities plus the equivalent of walking 1.5 to three miles at 3 mph.
Nevertheless, is not a “Ink on the wall” sort of thing because each of us active at various levels and each unique metabolism requires its own calorie needs. To phrase it differently, the amount of calorie intake will depend on gender, age, the levels of mental and physical activities, individual metabolism and our health conditions.
General consensus about calories for weight loss purposes is that the more physically active (sports, exercises) a person is, the more calories they need considering the fact that they burn a lot, and vise versa. Furthermore see the US government dietary guidelines to learn more.
What Will Happen If Do Not Burn or Use Our Calories?
The human bodies are designed to convert meals into energy and store it for future or immediate use. Excessive physical activities such as exercising need to have a lot of energy and therefore we burn calories. Otherwise whatever energy we do not use is simply transformed and store as tissue fat. This means the more high calorific foods we consume then the less we are physically active, the much more likely we are to gain weight by the extra fat your body produces to store excess calories.
Calorie Content Per Gram By Food Type
- Fats (9000 calories): Sources include deep-fried food, meats, butter, cheese, fish oil, veg oils, chocolate etc
- Proteins (4000 calories): Sources include meats, eggs and dairy products. Proteins from plants such as beans and soy contain a much less calories.
- Carbohydrates (4000 calories): Sources include fruits, breads, cereal, carbonated drinks (soda), pasta, rice, potatoes etc.
- Sugars (240 calories): Examples are sweeteners and table sugars
- Alcohol (7000 calories): Liquor, Beer
Conclusion
Counting calories for weight loss can be confusing and complicated. Make simpler by identifying the meals you want in your diet then choose what you may need by the amount of physical activities that you do. Alternatively, delivered meal plans with the specific calorie content can be obtained through subscription services.