caloric intake

I am a 22 year old female weighing in usually around 145. I'm 5'9, moderately active. I usually work out 5 days a week, 3 of those days are dedicated to weight training and 20 min cardio sessions involving intervals. I met with a trainer at my gym yesterday and he started me on this weight training regime along with cardio on opposite days. He told me that I should be consuming about 2000 calories a day. That seems like a lot to me especially because I am a vegetarian and its hard to find foods that can help to reach the goal he set for me.

I want to lose about 10 lbs and I think that consuming that many calories daily will hinder my success.

Can someone please help me understand calories a little bit better? I am so confused!!!

5'9 @ 135lbs puts you underweight.  Are you aware of that?


Here is your Expenditure on Sedentary:

"You burn 1800 calories during a typical day. Remember that this estimate is based on your body weight, height, age, gender, and your average level of activity"


I don't know how many calories your trainer has you burning at the gym, but if it's over or close to 800, you do need to eat 2000 calories.

most of your weight will also be muscle weight, so remember that too.

Nuts are an excellent source of healthy fats and usually have 200 calories per serving.  Even PB.

Okay, so maybe 2000 calories isn't so bad. I usually burn about 600 calories per workout.

I guess I am getting a little ahead of myself because I just started the new workout routine. I'm impatient.

Also, I am curious to know if anyone knows of healthy vegetarian meals that will help me reach my daily caloric intake. I am so sick of veggie burgers and salad! I mean that isn't all that I consume but it is definitely a major part of my diet.

Besides nuts, you can also add beans and fruits.

Do you have a Sprouts or Henry's Market near you?  They have a pretty cool cook book area, I'm sure you could find a vegetarian cook book with all sorts of ideas there. =)

pizza! vegetarian and not as bad for you as you'd think. the tomato sauce is actually kind of good for you. plus the cheese gives you plenty of calories. about 200 per slice, normally.

Don't forget to figure in juice and cooking oils. They add up too. Add an avocado or two! Yummy!

Oooo! Dips with your veggies can give you good calories too!

i have a vegetarian cook book. i wish i would use it more. it usually calls for a lot of different ingredients, and they can be pretty pricey!

thanks so much everyone for the feedback! i will take everything into consideration and hopefully come up with some better ideas to have a well balanced vegetarian diet. if it doesn't work, i will just ask my trainer to come up with something.

If you are looking for a place to find easy veggie recipes I recommend recipezaar.com. It is a free user-powered database that also gives nutrition facts for each serving of a recipe (like the recipe analyzer here). I use it a lot to find dishes when I have random ingredients and no idea what to do with them, like at the end of the week when I've been busy and no idea what to do. I used to be a vegetarian and still don't eat meat too much so I know how monotonous Boca burgers can be. If you're weight training, I also recommend adding dairy protein (greek yoghurt, cottage cheese) since that really helps with results.

"I am a vegetarian and its hard to find foods that can help to reach the goal he set for me"

WOOWOWOWOW YOU DID NOT SAY THAT

what VEGETABLES AND FRUITS do you eat? just mangos, avacadoes and olives?!

and remember that soy and soybeans are pretty high in cals

Edamame beans are great also - I add them to my salads and they gives a satisfying bulk to the greens :) Good protein and calories