Food Tracking Apps 

On-line Food Diary Ideas

My 3 Favorite Food Tracking Apps:

Carb Manager

Step two is when you create your profile. This is your gender, age, height, weight, activity level. It’s the 3rd step, ‘Goal’ set up that I really loved. Mostly because it totally nailed my goals without me having to tweak them. This app is low-carb but it is NOT afraid of protein. Yay! Based on my height, weight, age, it set my protein at 104 grams/day. Hallelujah! This would be an average amount of protein for me, some days higher, some days lower. Again, if you’re not familiar with me you probably don’t know that I am a big pusher of protein. Muscle is our organ of longevity and we NEED protein to maintain lean muscle as we age. You actually need to eat more protein as you age, not less. If you avoid protein because it gives you a bellyache or sits in your stomach, that’s a whole different issue that needs to be addressed and corrected.

The other thing I like about this app, it doesn’t put an emphasis on calories, again, hallelujah! Calories are just a data point. For me some days will be less and some more. Calories are important but they are NOT the be all end all especially if you eat real food.

Some of the other things I really love:

Pros

• Great food database
• Graphs show both grams and daily percentages of macros
• Super Easy Recipe Creator
• Large Notes area right on the same page with the food Diary
• Easily add Blood Sugar & Ketones to diary. Can select before meal, after meal or fasting.
• Area to create Recipes & Meal Plans
• Tracks all kinds or biometrics
• Community area where you can add friends, create groups or join the forum
• Has a great Mobile Phone companion app

•  If you want all the premium recipes you need to buy the Premium version. This is $8.49/month or $40/year ($3.34/month). You also have a 3 month option at $5.50/month
• Very cool Analysis Area only comes with Premium. Lets you look at streaks, projections, comparisons, benchmarks and my favorite correlations.
• Doesn’t connect to other tracking apps like my Nokia Wi-Fi Smart Scale. Such a bummer.

Cronometer

GREAT FOR THE NUTRIENT GEEK

This Food Journal website is incredibly comprehensive. If you like to get your vitamins & minerals from food this is the food diary for you. Cronometer is all about tracking nutrients. It breaks all your food down into not just Macro Nutrients but specific fats and amino acids. It also breaks out all of the vitamins and minerals so you can see where you’re hitting your daily requirements and where you might be low.

Two things I didn’t particularly like, the notes area and the recipe creator. The notes area isn’t visible on your diary page. If you make a note it shows on your diary but in order to read it, you have to click into it. The recipe creator is clunky and I found it very annoying to use. These are a couple of things that bugged me, hopefully they won’t be an issue for you.

Pros

• Excellent Nutrient Profile of Your Food/Diet
• Great Reports and other Tracking of Health Biomarkers
• Can add before and after images to track your physical progress
• Connect to other devices like the Nokia Smart Scale, Fitbit, Jawbone, Garmin, Polar
• Has a Mobile App

Cons

• Can only get extensive reports and comparisons with the Premium version
• Can’t sort food into groups like breakfast, lunch, dinner, snacks without the premium version
• Will recommend best foods for each nutrient which is great if say you’re low in a specific nutrient – only with Premium version
• When tracking your food, you must make sure to choose foods from the database that are NCCDB sourced. The source is listed next to the food so it’s easy if you’re looking. If you use a custom food instead you won’t get the nutrient breakdown. I made this mistake and couldn’t figure out why my amino acids were zero.
• No real on-line community connection but can share food & recipes with friend if you are all Premium members

This is an incredible food tracking website. If you want to track your nutrients, Cronometer is for you. I would spend the money and get the premium version. It’s $5.99/month or if you buy for the year it’s $34.95 which is a 50% savings over the monthly.

My Fitness Pal

GREAT FOR SOMEONE SEEKING COMMUNITY

If you’re all about community this is the website and food tracker for you. My Fitness Pal is huge. If you want to connect with friends or make new friends to help you along your journey, this is the place.

It’s also incredibly robust when it comes to tracking. You can track calories, macros, exercise, and other health biomarkers. It runs reports, it connects to other devices. It’s really great but I think it’s real claim to fame is the extensive community it offers to its members.

Pros

• Extensive Community Reach: Friends, Forum, Personal Blogging Area to share your story/journey. Can set personal diary to private, public or friends only
• Can set 5 specific nutrients to track: I have carbs, fiber, protein, fat and sugar
• Can set Diary up into 6 different meal categories
• Can set goals: macros, fitness
• Connects to Third Party Apps including Nokia Smart Scale and Fitbit
• Has a Mobile App

Cons

• Company/Website had a data breach – ugh
• Need to purchase a premium account if you want more customization. If you want to see calories by meal, that’s a premium setting.
• Nutrient Dashboard & Food Analysis available but only with Premium
• Hard to set low-carb/keto macros without the premium version. Can be done but you need to add the third party app FOODFASTFIT
• Need to be careful about your privacy settings if you don’t want to share your business with the world

You get a lot more customization with the premium version. If this is the Food Tracker you like then I think upgrading to premium is not a bad idea. It’s $10/month or $50 for a year. I can’t stress the community benefit of this site enough. Having a supportive community is huge and can really help people succeed with personal goals.

Final Words on Food Tracking Apps

I am not an affiliate sponsor for any of these apps. I use them and like them all. I bounce around. Right now I’m in a ‘Carb Manager’ phase. I would start with the free versions of all and if you end up loving the site you can think about upgrading then.

Food Tracking is an important part of lifestyle change. It’s great to do at the beginning while you’re figuring stuff out. Once you get used to your new food/eating style you can probably back off the tracking. The good news is, if things start to stall and your goals remain out of reach you can check back in and start tracking again. This is a great way to see if you really are still on course or if you might have slipped back into old patterns.

I can’t stress taking notes enough. Really, track how you sleep, your mood, how your food makes you feel, when you poop. This is all really important and can have a huge impact on your personal journey.

Quick, final story. The other day, I couldn’t stick to my plan. I was hungry and even a little nauseas, very unusual for me. It was the kind of nauseas that makes me want to eat because I’m pretty sure I’ll feel better. I knew I was in trouble and really not feeling well when I grabbed a pint of Mint Chocolate Chip Halo Top Ice Cream while picking up groceries for dinner. Anyway, I ate my way through the day and really enjoyed my Mint Chocolate Chip ice cream.

The whole point of this story is NOTES. I noticed that I had gone to bed super late the night before (2 am) and got up at my normal time the next day. I got about 3 hours of sleep. I’m typically more like an 8 to 9 hour sleeper. As evening approached, I wasn’t particularly tired, even though I’d been tired most of the day. I wondered if my lack of sleep was what messed up my appetite so I decided to go to bed early/normal even though I didn’t think I was tired. I surprisingly fell asleep very quickly. I ended up getting a good 8 hours of sleep. I woke up rested and felt great the whole next day. My appetite was back to normal and I felt full and happy after eating with no crazy sugar cravings. If I hadn’t noticed my notes about my sleep I probably would have stayed up late again and been a real hot mess the next day. Moral of the story, TAKE NOTES and READ THEM.

Be well,

Amy White, Functional Nutritionist

I’m Amy a board certified holistic nutritionist, certified functional nutritionist and lifestyle practitioner and certified Life Coach. I help women in midlife understand the changing needs of their body so that they can stop dieting and lose weight permanently. At 56 I live what I teach. Don’t believe the story that your best years are behind you. They are not. Your best years are just starting!