Hi. I'm just starting the zone diet, having read the books.

Calculator says I need 10 blocks of protein. Well and good. But the math has me confused.

10 protein blocks at 7 grams/block and 4 calories a gram is 280 calories.
10 carbohydrate blocks at 9 grams/block and 4 calories a gram is 360 calories.
10 fat blocks at 1.5 grams/block and 9 calories a gram is 135 calories.
That's a total of 775 calories.

Now I do need to lose some weight, and I'm not hungry on the diet so far, but below 1000 calories a day does not seem like a safe thing to do.

Am I doing the math wrong?

Thanks.

A couple of things...

First, you should eat a minimum of 11 blocks. Unless you are very small/petite, generally most adult women need at least 11 blocks.

The other thing is that when you calculate the fat blocks, you need to calculate it as 3 grams per block. The complete fat block is 3 grams. The protein block assumes that there is 1.5 grams of fat included with the protein, which is why your fat block is only 1.5 grams, and if you eat a fat free protein, then you would double the fat block (to equal 3 grams).

Each block should equal about 100 calories.

Hi Jeanne,

Try the "At-a-Glance" method shown here: http://www.zonediet.com/tools/zone-classic

It's easier and will assure you are not going too low in protein and daily block intake. It works great. I lost 100 pounds with this method and I've kept it off for over 15 years.

___________________________________

sue
Consultant of Zone Labs
Certified Zone Affiliate

Thanks so much! This really helps. I eat a lot of zero fat proteins (egg whites and non fat cottage cheese are favorites) so I guess I've been putting too little fat in those meals.

Assuming 10 blocks of fat come with the protein makes the total 910 calories a day and 11 is 1001 calories.

I redid the lean body mass calculation and it is still giving me 10 blocks based on my weight and percent body fat, but maybe this is off a bit. I'll go with 11 and see how I do.

Hi Jeanne,

You are probably calculating your protein and block requirement by hand, and doing it correctly. Dr. Sears set the 11 block minimum after his first books were written, so you wouldn't find mention of it in the earlier Zone books. If you use the Body Fat Calculator on this web site, you'll most likely find it will give you 11 blocks. Here's a link: http://www.zonediet.com/tools/body-...calculator Also, to ease you mind, in applying calories to blocks, even taking into account the 3 g fat into account, your result is conservative because you haven't added the total P, C and F calories in each food choice. If you were to count each and every calorie, it would increase your overall calorie count. For instance, many of the foods in the fat block category also contain some protein and carbohydrate (avocados, almonds, olives, etc.), those in the carbohydrate category can also contain some protein and fat (hummus, beans, etc.), and so on.

The ease of the At-a-Glance method is that there's no counting involved, and you end up basically with the same thing on your plate as you would when using the block method. Both methods work very well.

____________________________________________

sue
Consultant of Zone Labs
Certified Zone Affiliate

I've been curious about how many calories people actually eat on the Zone Diet and it always looked very, very low to me, but I wasn't counting each and every calorie. I was just adding up the calories for the P, C, and F like Jeanne was.

Anyway, I just tried adding up each and every calorie for a day in the Zone for a woman eating 11 P + 11 C + 11 F. For simplicity's sake, I made all the P turkey, and all the F olive oil. I made one third of the C apple, and one quarter of the remaining C whole wheat bread, and then the remaining C assorted veggies with an average of 45 cals per block (I calculated that based on 16 different cooked & raw veggies).

Just adding up the calories for P, C, and F for a woman eating 11 P + 11 C + 11 F, I got 1001 calories per day. But adding up each and every calorie for my hypothetical woman eating turkey, olive oil, apples, whole bread, and veggies -- I got 1147 calories per day.

So here's my crude rule of thumb: Assuming you are following the guide of eating 1 block of carbohydrate and 1 block of fat (at 1.5g) for each block of (low-fat) protein you eat -- you can estimate your total daily calorie intake by multiplying your total protein blocks per day by 105 calories.

Examples:
Woman eating 11 blocks of protein per day: 11 x 105 calories = 1155 calories per day
Man eating 14 blocks of protein per day: 14 x 105 calories = 1470 calories per day

(Yes, I'm one of those analytical types!)

Somebody else may have done a better job coming up with a rule of thumb for this and if so, I'd love to know what it is! In the meantime, I hope my little rule of thumb will be useful to somebody out there if only to satisfy their curiosity.