Oh Nuts!

I'm a big fan of nuts! Especially almonds. They are my favorite healthy snack, full of healthy fats, fiber, and vitamins! In fact, I love them so much, it's a little bit of a problem...for years I have eaten them freely thinking it's healthy so eat all I want! Clearly that didn't work out for me, so today I decided to take a look at my portions of almonds. 

The package says the serving size is 1oz which on average is 22nuts= 160 calories =14g fat= 22%dv

People say "a handful" is the right amount. We all have different sizes of hands, but this is how many I grab in a handful:

Handful of almonds= 37 nuts=264 calories which is about 23g fat = 40% dv

But that's not the amount I would usually eat, I always dumped some in a bowl to eat, about like this:

Bowlful =106 nuts=757 calories 

which is 66g fat =100% dv 

At that rate, I often ate a whole bag in about a week and a half! A whole bag of almonds from Costco is about 7680 calories ...in10 days! No wonder I gained weight! 

Now that I'm paying attention and working on losing weight, I've had to decide how many nuts to eat. Nutrition labels give a daily value of fat of 65g. Using the myfitnesspal app, I've calculated my daily goal to be 57g which is 30% of my calories on a 1600 calorie diet. 

Most days, these are the healthy foods I eat that make up my main sources of fat:

3oz Salmon =11g fat

3eggs= 13.5g

Salad Dressing (olive oil)= 14g

String cheese= 6g

1/4 Avocado = 5g

1 T Chia seeds= 3g

All together that makes 52g fat...leaving not enough room for my almonds! On days I have chicken instead of fish for dinner, I can have my nuts. Otherwise I have to choose between the avacado or string cheese and the nuts. 

When I do get to eat them, even the 1oz serving is too much! I portion them out into 100 calorie packs in ziplock bags to keep it under control. 

14 nuts=100 calories = 9g fat=14%dv

(I really like cashews too, you get 10 for 100 calories)