Benefits Of Using A Food Tracking App

I’ve used the food-tracking app Cronometer several times over the last few years. In July, I tracked everything I ate and drank for 4 days. Here’s what I learned.

An important caveat before we start: This is not a post about calories. I don’t advocate counting calories as a means to achieve health or even weight loss for those on a whole foods plant-based diet. I’m including that here because the Cronometer app provides this, but it’s not the most important data point. I’m also not overly focused on my carbohydrates, fat, or protein in grams — or my ratio of carbs, fat, and protein. My diet is currently landing in the 60/20/20 range (carbs/fat/protein); ideally, I’d like the carbs to be a bit higher at 65-70%. To get there, I’d adjust some of my recreational foods, e.g. crackers and chocolate, but I haven’t taken any action to do that thus far.

Average of daily food consumption across 4 days:

Calories - 1821 kcal

Fat - 61.2g

Omega-3 - 9.5g

Omega-6 - 6g

Saturated Fat - 10.9g

Protein - 77g

Amino Acids (molecules used to make proteins) - exceeded 100% RDA across all 9 essential amino acids each day

Carbohydrates - 264.1g

Fiber - 73.1g

Vitamins (a subset of vitamins A, C, B12, & folate)  - exceeded 100% RDA each day

Minerals (a subset of iron, calcium, potassium) - exceeded 100% RDA of iron & potassium each day; averaged 71% RDA of calcium across 4 days

Notes:

• All meals were prepared at home.

• Meals included some packaged/prepared food.

• Macronutrient and micronutrient consumption were fairly consistent across the 4 days. While I do my best to eat a variety of fruits and vegetables (plant diversity is important for gut microbiome health), I also repeat a lot of the same snacks and meals. When I like things, I tend to prepare them on repeat. Some people prefer a lot of variety in their meals, others don’t.

• My calcium results don’t make the argument for dairy. Almond milk fortified with calcium carbonate has 482 mg (1 cup) of calcium compared to 388 mg (8 oz) in yogurt and 310 mg (1 cup) in 1% milk.

  What I’ve learned from Cronometer about how much calcium I’m getting tells me I should replace some of the water in my smoothies with almond milk to make sure I’m hitting the RDA for calcium.

  Is dairy healthy? A number of studies suggest there are more risks than benefits.

• Omega 3:6 ratio. This is important. I’ll discuss this in more detail in a future post.

• Cronometer does not capture added sugars. I’m not sure why. I’m not concerned about natural sugars found in whole plant foods, so I didn’t include a sugar measurement here.

  It is important to take a look at how many grams of processed or added sugars you are consuming daily. You can find this information on the nutrition labels of all packaged foods. “The effects of added sugar intake — higher blood pressure, inflammation, weight gain, diabetes, and fatty liver disease — are all linked to an increased risk of heart attack and stroke,” according to Harvard Health.

  Two examples of processed sugar from my diet are kombucha — BKE Kombucha has 8g of sugar in a 12 oz can and Hu Kitchen dark chocolate has 7g of sugar, which includes 6g of added sugars in 1/2 bar — my typical daily serving size is 1/4 bar.

Now to the title of the post — what are the benefits of using a food tracker app like Cronometer?

1) Understand your ‘baseline’ (or typical consumption) of fiber, saturated fat, omega 3:6, vitamins, and minerals.

2) Make any necessary changes to your diet to ensure you are meeting the recommended daily allowances.

• Most Americans aren’t getting enough fiber. Fiber intake among adults in the U.S. averages 15 grams per day. The recommendation is ~30 grams per day.

  “A high fiber diet appears to reduce the risk of developing various conditions, including heart disease, diabetes, diverticular disease, constipation, and colon cancer,” according to UCSF.

  My fiber intake on a typical day is well above the guideline and I believe more is better.

• Micronutrients are also important. “Micronutrients are vital to healthy development, disease prevention, and well-being,” according to the CDC. Cronometer provides data on 12 vitamins and 10 minerals.

• Can I get enough protein on a plant-based diet?! I hope my Cronometer results help people reconsider any protein fears. I eat soy daily because of its numerous health benefits, but I am not going out of my way to ‘get my protein’ more than those on diets containing animal products.

  The RDA for protein is 0.36 grams per pound. I am exceeding that recommendation significantly, and there’s no evidence in my ability to gain strength or endurance to suggest that plant-based protein is inferior to animal-based protein. For those worried about strength or endurance on a plant-based diet, ensure you’re consuming enough calories and following a balanced diet. A balanced diet is all of the things discussed in this post: macronutrients, fiber, vitamins, and minerals.

  Is more protein better? “High amounts of protein make your kidneys work harder, which can cause kidney damage, or make existing kidney problems worse,” according to the Cleveland Clinic. Also, “a high protein diet that contains lots of red meat and higher amounts of saturated fat might lead to a higher risk of heart disease and colon cancer, while another high protein diet rich in plant-based proteins may not carry similar risks,” according to Harvard Health.

I have no affiliation with Cronometer. I find it to be a useful tool to check in on my fiber and micronutrients. The app has both free and paid options. The free option should be all you need to track your food for a few days.

Whether you choose to check out Cronometer or not, I recommend everyone take the time to understand whether or not their diet is providing the critical nutrients the body requires to operate in an optimal state of health.

Thanks for reading!

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Cover photo courtesy of Squarespace.