Weight loss recipes start with reading your food labels for calorie information.

Weight loss recipes start with reading the food labels for calories information, but...if you're trying to lose weight there's much much more you need to know. Because it’s not just about calories.

It's also about recipe ingredients: Check out the small table at the bottom of the nutrition facts label. Here you can find the limits for total fat, saturated fat, cholesterol and sodium, based on a 2,000 or 2,500 calorie diet.

Using this table as a guideline will help you decipher if the food product you want to cook with is an appropriate choice or not. In general, with weight loss recipes, dietary cholesterol should be under 300 mg daily, and sodium intake should be less than 2,400 mg.

Also look for food products that have little or no fat (try to keep it under 6 grams total), zero saturated fat, zero trans-fats, and low-to-zero cholesterol. In fact, with any of our weight loss recipes, if a food product lists trans-fats on the label, you’re best off avoiding it completely.

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If you really want to treat yourself and cook something indulgent, go ahead, but keep fatty ingredients, treats to a minimum. Make over-indulging the exception, not the rule. A healthy heart thrives on good nutrition, and over-loading fats, cholesterol and sodium will take their toll.

Be sure to check out the ingredient list for this key phrase: “high fructose corn syrup.” This is a red flag.Seeing this lets you know that there is a lot of refined sugar in this product, which is something you do not want in your weight loss recipes.

High fructose syrups make blood sugars rise rapidly, and then dive in a metabolic roller-coaster ride. This ride is not fun and will leave you feeling really down.

Beware of “partially hydrogenated oils.” If you see that on the ingredient list of any food product, you know there are trans-fats in the food. Your body would thank you very much if you put it back on the stores shelf.

Look for food products that are rich in fiber, vitamins, and minerals. Adults need to get between 25-30 grams of fiber every day, so add fiber-richl foods into your diet throughout the day.

If you think you’re not getting enough fiber, vitamins and minerals in your diet, try starting out your day with a fortified whole-grain cereal. Oatmeal is a great ingredient for many weight loss recipes. This can provide 50% or more of your daily essential vitamins and minerals, as well as a big serving of fiber.

Pre-packaged Snacks:

The first thing you should look for is the serving size and the number of servings per container.

Don’t skip over this without checking to see first how many serving your choice contains, you’re likely to assume the calorie content reflects what’s in the container. Your weight loss recipes

Wrong. You could gulp it down and then find out that the container held 2.5 serving. Now that "100 calorie" snack actually cost you 250 calories. Oops. There goes the calorie count for the day. The saying "from the lips to the hips" has never been truer.

Something else not to forget: If there are 2 servings or more, you’ll need to re-calculate all of the nutrition facts information on the food label if you plan on eating the entire package.

If you want to stick with just one serving, glance over at the food label serving size. This will tell you how many pieces, tablespoons, cups, etc., that you get to eat of that food. If you’re not sure how to size up half a cup of yogurt, measure it out. After a while you’ll get yourself familiar with that serving amount and save the step.

Now that you know how many servings are in the food you’re about to eat, it’s time to look at how many calories you’re about to consume.

Based on your total daily caloric need for the day, you can decide whether a food is too high in calories, or if it’s just right. In general, if you should be consuming close to if not 2,000 calories a day, so your meals should average out at around 500 calories.

Your snacks are just foods in between meals that average100 to 200 calories. Keeping that in mind, you’ll be able to make better food choices to support your weight maintenance needs, and you may find yourself reaching for that low-calorie apple instead of that high-calorie candy bar.

Reading food labels will help, with your weight loss recipes big time, but it’s not the secret to weight loss. Ya just gotta burn some fat running or walking and limit the amount of calories you consume each day to lose weight. It’s not any deeper than that.

Smiles…Gigi

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