What I Eat In A Day To Maintain My 60 Lb Weight Loss. And NONE OF IT Was Meal Prepped.
Buckle up.
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by Audie Metcalf
By now you’re been inundated with articles about my weight loss—I wrote the first one about a year ago and it nearly crashed our site, so I wrote this this this and this. To date these are the most successful articles we’ve ever published.
And here’s my before and after proof, so you believe what I say:
So as long as you keep reading them, I’ll keep writing them.
So many people DMd us (ok 6 of you) and asked for the classic “what I eat in a day” and until we officially hire a part-time social media person to help us make reels (for real get in touch if this is you) I’m going to be writing articles instead of making videos.
To make this more fun (or potentially less fun) I’m including a couple of options for B/L/D that are my typical meals. And, blessedly, all of them are at least 3 out of the 4 staples of ideal home cooking: Fast, healthy, cheap, good. FHCG. Really rolls of the tongue doesn’t it?
If you want exact breakdowns of protein or calories I’ll send it to you on dm. For this article, I wanted the images to speak to concepts more than specifics, to show how gloriously simple it is to eat delicious food, lose weight, or maintain weight loss. Overall though, I eat no more than 1600 cals a day and I always aim for at least 100 grams of protein. I’m also mindful of fiber and try to get 25 grams in every day. I also eat to stay full otherwise this whole operation falls apart! Oh, and ps, there is simply no other equation that works for weight loss apart from eating fewer calories than you burn. That’s it. That’s the only equation that works. Calculate your calories HERE if that interests you.
Breakfast
9:30 am: Oatmeal with egg whites and berries. I actually wrote an entire thing about this magical and perfect winter breakfast that keeps me full for hours. It takes 4 minutes to make and has changed my life. Also, if you take only one thing from this article, let it be to always have a huge carton of egg whites in your fridge. Life changing for weight loss.
Alt: Smoked salmon on a bagel thin with whipped cream cheese and the works, and a side of berries.
Alt: Breakfast tacos which I DID make a reel about!
Alt: This is a weekend breakfast when I have more time. Giant plate of food and still totally fits all my criteria. I do cottage cheese in the omelet (you haven’t lived if you haven’t tried this) and of course, I doctor the eggs with some extra egg whites. I do whipped cream cheese on toast as a hack I often employ because the cals are so much better than butter. And turkey sausage—more protein!
Lunch
1pm: I also wrote about how there’s something about a huge sandwich you can barely fit in your mouth that I just didn’t want to live without—there’s a couple of “hacks”on the article about how to make huge sandwiches work in a calorie deficit.
Alt: I also do a wrap sometimes—this one is egg salad made with cottage cheese and pickled onions and it’s beyond. I use this wrap* and you can end your search for the best wraps vs cals because this one is it. I did all the searching for you.
Alt: Curried chicken salad wrap made with celery and apples. Not pictured, many, many pickled things I ate off camera.
Alt: I wanted to show how I was eating during the holidays because we had all kinds of food in the house that we don’t normally have so I made it work by doing a very small sandwich with WHITE BREAD (no nutrition but so utterly delicious) and ham salad with sweet relish and mayonnaise. I am in an intimate relationship with all mayonnaise-based cold salads and this is no exception.
Alt: This cottage cheese bowl changes lives. There’s a dinner version coming later which I obviously don’t have on the days I have this for lunch. You can basically see all the ingredients except that beautiful glistening is actually honey and don’t ask me why honey is good on eggs and avocado and cottage cheese but it really truly is.
Alt: A quick, open faced turkey melt on a YELLOW BELL PEPPER. Truly, you haven’t lived until you’ve had this. I use the Sargento ultra thin cheeses because cheese is astonishingly high in calories and I swear to god if you just didn’t eat cheese for one day you’d be in a calorie deficit. I was.
Snacks
3:30: I don’t take expensive vacations, but I do have fresh shrimp in my fridge at all times. I know it feels fancy, but Whole Foods often has these jumbo shrimp on sale and NOTHING is more filling and delicious and exciting to look forward to than a little shrimp cocktail in the home. And one of the more impressive protein-to-calorie ratios that exists.
Alt: One of my little tricks is to make my plates really exciting and full and colorful. I mean, this plate of food is thrilling! It almost makes me forget I actually want a large McDonald’s fries and 8 Oreos. Here’s another version of that snack plate. Bountiful!
Alt: More of the same but this time more gut-friendly. You need to think of ADDING stuff to you plate not subtracting. So berries, high water content veg, alllllllllll picked things (my obsession). Also, I don’t have any snacks things that make it easy for me to shove my hand into it and extract a big pile of something. This is dangerous. If you have any of those, just get rid of them. If I had potato chips in my house, I would eat them. Period. If I don’t have them in the house, I don’t eat them. It’s very simple.
Alt: I promise you this—frozen fruit, eaten whole, still frozen, along with yogurt and whatever smattering seeds and things and perhaps a drizzle of honey, is a snack so delicious and satisfying that you will begin to dream of it the night before.
Alt: And this is just the reality, ok? Sometimes I empty an entire jar of giardinera into a strainer and eat the whole thing with my fingers while on a video-off zoom call.
Dinner
7:30 pm: I need to admit to you all in front of god and everyone that I make this dinner 2-3 times a week. I wrote about it here and it’s so delicious and so filling and it’s such a crowd pleaser (even with kids) that it’s heavily in rotation. Yes, this is the aforementioned bowl which also has honey on it. Shouldn’t work. Does.
Alt: I forgot I was doing tnis little assignment and stared eating before I could take a photo but this is a loaded sweet potato which is also something I make at least once a week. This time I did ground chicken with bone broth (extra protein) and tomato paste with all the usual taco toppings. Oh, and cabbage because it’s crunchy and crunchy things help me. Last week I did a buffalo chicken version. Delish.
Alt: Fish tacos made with cod. Cod is SO GOOD. It’s quite cheap, takes no time or effort to make (I cook it it on a hot skillet for some char with a tiny spray of avocado oil), and then throw them in these “Thincredibles” tortillas with some light sour cream (because I refuse to live a life without sour cream) and poof, dinner is served.
Alt: Turkey meatball bowl
Alt: flank steak (and chimmichurri) with purple potatoes (light sour cream and horseradish dip) and an obscene amount of asparagus.
Alt: 6 oz of salmon with easy homemade tzatziki, half a SP and light SC, and broccoli slathered in salt and lemon juice for flavor.
Alt: A meal I make when my husband and child are out at her Scouts meeting or having their own special meals out together—a breakfast dinner. It’s perfect, it’s filling, it takes 5 minutes.
Dessert
9pm: It depends on the rest of my calories for the day but sometimes I save enough room for an insanely delicious little bowl of corn Chex with Fairlife milk (protein!) and strawberries. Otherwise I’ll have a cup of peppermint tea and honey. I’m sorry this part is boring. The ONE food I don’t dream about is sugar. But if you must have a sweet treat every night, I recommend buy a box of individual mochi. It’s IMPERATIVE we do single-serving desserts or else all hell breaks loose. But of course, don’t get it twisted, bountiful sugar was had during the holidays. You only live once.
Audie Metcalf is the Editor-in-chief of The Candidly, and lives in LA with her family. You can find more of her articles here.
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