Day 3 Food Diary - I went to McDonalds!!!!

Thursdays are an awkward day for me, and other then Saturday's sometimes can be the toughest day of the diet for me. Due to a very short amount of time to get dinner my mum and me have to go to Mcdonalds, as its quick and it gives us enough time to pick up my brother from Scouts.

Now I know you're thinking "you can make a packed lunch", I totally would but... I'd have to prepare it nearly 24 hours before hand, so it wouldn't be fresh and tasty and if I choose a salad which I'm likely to go for in the summer - it will all be soggy by the time I eat it at 8pm (bleh). So, I planned ahead. I knew I was going to Mcdonald's so I planned my whole days meals & snacks a few days prior and made a packed lunch for lunch time - I even planned what I was going to have at Mcdonalds!
I also tried a technique this week called Calorie Banking - although I wouldn't recommend this for regular usage, I will be doing a post about it over the next week or so.

Breakfast - 276 Kcal
30g Ready Brek
150ml Semi Skimmed Milk
10 Raspberries
Sprinkling of chocolate
200ml Fresh Orange Juice

Lunch - 514 Kcal
Mixed Salad Leaves 30g
Mixed Peppers (From Frozen) 40g
Garden Peas 50g
2 Slices Smoked Farmhouse Bacon
Smoky Bacon Crisps (Walkers 25g Bag)
Plus homemade barbecue sauce (recipe will be up in a few days)

Dinner - 1,521 Kcal
Big Mac - 490 Kcal
Large Fries - 444 Kcal
Ketchup
Fanta Orange Large - 210 Kcal
Dairy Milk Mcflurry - 340 Kcal

The reason I put the Kcal for the individual items for Mcdonalds is so that people realise how many calories you'd consume from a basic meal there. This was a treat and I don't want people to think its okay to have foods like Mcdonalds on a regular basis. The nutrition value's aren't really that great, high salt intake and generally not great BUT I went for the best most filling option. Baring in mind I ate my salad at 12pm, and ate this at 8pm I was starving - I'd been sat in Seminar's, sat in the car, walking and standing around for 4 and a half hours too, so I did earn the extra calories to balance out the extra intake and also did extra exercise the day after too just to cover myself.

Despite having the McDonalds and planning my other meals to be nutritious and filling I did manage to keep my fat percentage to a good clean 33%. Although my protein was shockingly low that day which I was least impressed with, but did not want to overeat, even with fruit just to boost that up.

Even after adding the exercise calories to my daily allowance (which my MyFitnessPal manually works out for me currently at 1,870 kcal a day) I still managed to be 72 kcal's under goal even with an added 524 kcal's from exercise from the day.

Clearly, and highly expected my main calorie distribution from the day was focused on dinner and my other meals and snacks for the day had to evolve around that. I personally chose no snacks and waited an 8 hour period for my next meal. I can't begin to tell you the regrets I had - especially sat in traffic on the M25 near Thorpe, moving slowly and my tummy rumbling knowing it still had ages to wait for some food!

I managed to have a good lunch and breakfast, which for me really was my goal of the day and as well to get a little bit of exercise in despite being super busy that day.

My key tip would be to try and plan your day and food with each other, try not to leave an 8 hour gap like myself, despite me not having an option and it being a rare occasion which I don't do often.

A good idea may be to plan your snacks in the morning so that you can graze on them all day reducing your hunger ever so slightly and without feeling guilty because its all weighed out to what you're allowed. Fruit, nuts and seeds are nutritionally good and can be really lovely snacks.