How To Start A Food Diary: The Basics

The idea of keeping a diaryrecounting all the food you eat each day might seem a little exhausting at first. If you’re trying to cut down on your calorie intake, scrutinizing everything you consume can even make you feel a little anxious or guilty.

However, tracking your food can also have a positive impact on your life.

A food diary is an excellent practice in mindfulness. It teaches you to pay closer attention to what you eat, how you feel when you’re eating, and even why you choose certain foods.Over time, you might learn more about what causes you to have negative experiences with food.

Food diaries can also help your doctor better understand your eating habits, which is useful if you’re dealing with a medical condition like diabetes.

What Does a Food Diary Record?

Food diaries are most beneficial when they’re comprehensive. Ideally, you should keep your diary with you at all times so you can make a note every time you drink or eat something.

Food diaries don’t just look at food – they also consider the things you drink too.

You might find it easier to keep your food diary on your phone. You can even download apps which help with tracking your food. This can be particularly helpful if you’re trying to get the calorie count for each item you eat.

Here are some of the points you should record every time you add an entry to your diary:

• What you eat: The most important thing to record is what you eat and drink. Remember, being specific is crucial here, so go into detail.
  
  Don’t just say you had a chicken salad. Include all of the sauces, the types of vegetables in the salad, how the chicken was cooked and so on. If you had extras like butter or condiments with your meal, include those with your record too.
  
  
• How much you ate: To the best of your ability, record the exact amount of food and drink you consume. You might measure something by volume, like half a cup, or look at the number of items on your plate. If you can get calorie counts or food weights this might be helpful too, particularly if you’re trying to diet.
  
  
• When you ate: Track the time of day you ate too. This can give you insight into when you’re most likely to want a snack or larger amounts of food.
  
  
• The situation: Record the elements of your eating experience. Who were you eating with? What kind of restaurant were you eating in? If you were doing something else while you were eating, like reading your emails or watching Netflix, write that information down too.
  
  
• Feelings: Finally, write down your mood before, during, and after you eat. How did you feel before you started looking for food, and did you feel better or worse when you started eating?

What did you notice when you started eating? Did you get that feeling of satisfaction you were looking for, or did you realize you were just eating because you were bored?

Remember, aside from being as specific as possible with your food diary, it’s also a good idea to be quick about writing things down.

Writing down information as soon as possible means you can more accurately record your eating habits.

Learning From Your Food Diary

A food diary is useful because it allows you to examine your eating and understand various aspects about your relationship with food. If you find yourself struggling to maintain your weight, or know you have issues with emotional eating, your food diary can help you know what your triggers are and how to avoid them.

The key to success with your food diary is being as accurate and specific as possible. While it might feel uncomfortable to write down every snack you have on a “bad day”, hiding the things you eat to make yourself feel better won’t help you in the long-term. Your diary needs to tell the truth.

You can keep your diary to yourself and use what you learn to make your own decisions about where and how to adjust your eating habits.

Or, if you’re trying to improve your health or overcome a health issue, sharing your food diary with your dietician or your doctor could be extremely beneficial too.