This is a part of the Ebook I am writing currently: Rational Approach to Scientific Nutrition.
What are Macros and Micros?
Observing different carbon chains led to the classification of different compounds. Now out of them all, those found in abundance are called macros and those in less quantity are called micros. That is why they are called macros and micros. Macro means “in large quantity” and so is the micros.
Macros
They consists of:-
- Protein 4cal/g
- Fat 9cal/g
- Carbohydrates(Carbs) 4cal/g
- Fibre 2cal/g
- Alcohol 7cal/g
Micros
- Vitamins
- A,D,E,K (Fat-soluble)
- B,C (water-soluble)
- Minerals
Calories:
It is a unit of energy. SI Unit is Joule but when it comes to nutrition we use calories everywhere.
1 calorie= 4.184 Joule(Just for reference for me, won’t be used anywhere)
In all the food items and on the calorie tracking app, Calorie is written but it’s always Kcal or Kilo Calories(1000calorie). We are using short-form everywhere because 1 calorie is very very less energy.
So 1 gram of carb don’t actually contain 4 calories but actually 4Kcal or 4000 Calorie.
How to track calories?
We need a Food measuring scale for that
Link: https://www.amazon.in/s?k=food+measuring+scale&ref=nb_sb_noss_2
Step 1: We put all the food we eat on the measuring scale and measure it in grams.
Step 2: We look for the food item on a calorie tracking app like Myfitnesspal/HealthifyMe and add the food items to the daily diary.
You don’t have to track calories manually on a sheet of paper. Just put it on the app and the app will tell you the overall calories eaten and the macro ratio.
Calories In, Calories Out(CICO)
This is the most important topic. It is not something new. You must have learned 3 laws of thermodynamics in school and it is the FIRST LAW. So the first law states that
“Energy cannot be created or destroyed. It can, however, be transferred from one location to another and converted to and from other forms of energy”
So this is what CICO is all about, it just helps us to conclude 2 things:
- When you take in(eat) more energy than you burn, you gain weight.(Calorie Surplus)
- When you take in(eat) less energy than you burn, you lose weight.(Calorie Deficit)
As depicted in the pictures, When calories eaten are more than calories burned, you will gain weight. Out of that how much will be muscles and how much will be fat depends on many factors, not covering it to keep things simple in this book.
When calories are eaten are the same as calories burned, weight is maintained.
When calories are eaten are less than calories burned, you will lose weight.
What Is Calorie Deficit, Maintenance, and Calorie Surplus?
Deficit and surplus are the accounting terms but before I explain calorie deficit and calorie surplus, you should know what is maintenance.
Maintenance Calories: It’s the number of calories at which you will maintain weight.
Ex. Let’s say you weigh 67kg. After eating 2500 calories for a week, if your weight is still 67kg then 2500 is your maintenance calories because you don’t lose or gain weight at 2500 calories.
Deficit means the amount by which something is short/deficient. So Calorie Deficit means getting deficient in calories. When we say we will make a calorie deficit in our diet, we mean that we will eat less than maintenance(hence creating a shortage). We make the shortage of calories to lose weight.
Just going with the above example, let’s say you weigh 67kg and your maintenance is 2500 calories. After eating 2000 calories for a week, if your weight reached 66kg then you had a deficit of 500 calories. Or you may say that you were eating in a calorie deficit.
Just like calorie deficit, when we say calorie surplus. We mean that we are eating in surplus above maintenance.
Just going with the above example, let’s say you weigh 67kg and your maintenance is 2500 calories. After eating 3000 calories for a week, if your weight reached 68kg then you had a surplus of 500 calories. Or you may say that you were eating in a calorie surplus.
I hope this clears out many things for you.
If you want me to cover any particular topic, do let me know.