alcohol and watching your weight?

maameeo

Hi guys,

recently been trying to lose weight and watch what i eat. Havnt been out in ages so havnt been drinking but ill be going out this weekend so im worried all my hard work with go down the drain in one night. I know people will say, just dont drink but i want to have a few and enjoy my night out.

My question is, whats the lowest calorie alcohol to drink? or if you have to have a few which is better to go for then others from a diet point of view?

Cheers

amacachi

Plain spirits like vodka with a diet or soda water mixer.

maameeo

amacachi wrote: »

Plain spirits like vodka with a diet or soda water mixer.

would jager class as one of these? im a divil for jager and rb :S

BeerNut

maameeo wrote: »

would jager class as one of these? im a divil for jager and rb :S

Not by a long shot. Jägermeister has added sugar and caramel, and Red Bull is packed with sugar.

rubadub

Long post here http://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/showpost.php?p=57902740&postcount=10

In short it boils down to amacachi's suggestion

amacachi wrote: »

Plain spirits like vodka with a diet or soda water mixer.

JonathanAnon

Why dont just drink what you want and work off the equivalent through exercise the next day.. After a serious night on the beer I usually try and work off the calories the next day..

Technocentral

I think beer/spirits/wine are one of the last few great pleasures in life, if you want to lose weight avoid them and drink grapefruit juice and eat water biscuits or whatever , if you want to enjoy life before you die drink them and **** the consequences.

Bigcheeze

JonathanAnon wrote: »

Why dont just drink what you want and work off the equivalent through exercise the next day.. After a serious night on the beer I usually try and work off the calories the next day..

What's a serious night on the beer ? I reckon I have to run 1.5 miles for every pint of beer. You might end up running a marathon after a serious session

LimeFruitGum

the jaegerbombs should be just a rare treat. (Sorry ...they have way too much sugar!)

I gave up beer as part of the plan to lose weight, so I just have red wine or vodka/gin with slimline tonic and a wedge of lemon or lime.
Basically, you have to avoid drinks with a high sugar content, to keep on track with the diet.

huskerdu

LimeFruitGum wrote: »

Basically, you have to avoid drinks with a high sugar content, to keep on track with the diet.

Sugar is not the culprit when you drink alcohol, ALCOHOL is. Alcohol has quite a high calorie content.

One 150ml glass of wine has about 100 calories.
One bottle of Heineken has 85 calories.

It is easy enough on the Internet to find out the calorie content of your normal drink.

Of course the OP should go out and have a few drinks. If you give up on all your pleasures in life to lose weight,
you will not enjoy your life and you are more likely to give up the diet. You should be aiming
for a sustainable change to your eating / drinking and exercise habits, not a diet that is torture.

A few suggestions to minimize the damage

Walk to the pub.
Drink sensibly and slowly.
Skip a few rounds and have a fizzy water instead.
Obviously, dont eat peanuts, crisps or a kebab.

Diet a bit harder for the rest of the week.

Relax and enjoy yourself.

rubadub

huskerdu wrote: »

Sugar is not the culprit when you drink alcohol, ALCOHOL is. Alcohol has quite a high calorie content.

SOme people take in more calories from the sugar than alcohol. I know a woman who would drink malibu with coke, the malibu already being loaded with sugar and the malibu being quite low in alcohol. More importantly 500kcal of sugar will make you fatter than 500kcal of alcohol, a study have shown this, I already knew it anecdotally.

huskerdu wrote: »

It is easy enough on the Internet to find out the calorie content of your normal drink.

Be very careful looking up calorie content online, for any products but esp. alcohol since I find a lot of wrong info and also recipies and % change around the world, so do measure sizes, e.g. a UK site might quote in 25ml units, I have seen people saying baileys was Xkcal, but in Ireland a baileys measure is 50ml

huskerdu wrote: »

One bottle of Heineken has 85 calories.

Perfect example -have you a link to where you found this. An irish market bottle of heineken is 330ml and 4.3% and is certainly not 85kcal.

It is always best to try and find the Irish version of the manufacturers website for info.

cc87

A good read.

http://www.leangains.com/2010/07/truth-about-alcohol-fat-loss-and-muscle.html

maameeo

just to catch up with you guys
so i went out and ended up having 3 glasses of champagne and 5 cocktails :S
not sure how bad that was on me but all week i felt great and fit until sunday after drinking felt sluggish and big.

but youre right, sometimes we need to go out and have a good time. i dont think i drink much or too often so I'll just work it off during the week

thanks so much for all the advice, Rubadub, that was a very good post (your link) thanks

hope you all had a good weekend!

MattKane

Here's 4 or 5 blog posts also worth checking out (click on link and scroll down) - regarding some more research on the different effects of calories from alcohol and so on.

huskerdu

rubadub wrote: »

SOme people take in more calories from the sugar than alcohol.

I am not arguing with the points you made, but the keyhere is " Some people".

Also, in giving advice to someone who is new to calorie counting, I felt
that advising that low sugar alcoholic drinks were not loaded with calories
was incorrect.

My general advice would be...

If you go out for a night and consume some drinks, be aware that
you are taking in plenty of calories. If you are trying to diet, drink less, eat sensibly but still enjoy your social life.

cc87

MattKane wrote: »

Here's 4 or 5 blog posts also worth checking out (click on link and scroll down) - regarding some more research on the different effects of calories from alcohol and so on.

In fairness all those blogs could be summarised by saying they think a bit of wine is good for you. I mean the "research" they are based on comes from newspaper articles.

TerrorFirmer

diet conscious people don't have much to worry about from say, vodka and diet cola/fanta/7up. The calorie intake is so low compared to the inevitable expendature of energy to be negligible.

rubadub

huskerdu wrote: »

I am not arguing with the points you made, but the keyhere is " Some people".

Yes, the key is "some people" -which you neglected to say, instead you made a quite definite sounding statement

huskerdu wrote: »

Sugar is not the culprit when you drink alcohol, ALCOHOL is.

And I wanted to make sure people did not think this is always the case.

From my experience most "beer bellies" are made in the takeaway after the pub.

huskerdu wrote: »

I felt that advising that low sugar alcoholic drinks were not loaded with calories was incorrect.

Who said this??

The person asked a very simple question

My question is, whats the lowest calorie alcohol to drink?

And drinking a pure alcohol like distilled spirits with no carbohydrates or proteins is the lowest calorie alcohol you can get.

paddyronan

If you are having spirits stay away from and fizzy mixers try juices instead and don't drown the spirits with them.
Or try sticking to wine won't bloat you like beer would.

rubadub

paddyronan wrote: »

juices instead and don't drown the spirits with them.

They have the roughly the same sugar content as coke or other drinks, and therefore the same calories. The next time somebody tells you some "amazing fact" about how a glass of coke has 79 teaspoons of sugar in it tell them orange juice has the same.

MOHPremierWine

I find its not so much the calories involved in the alcohol per se, but the calories involved in the food guzzled due to inebriated willpower...:o
Try mixing your drinks where possible... with non-alcoholic substances, that is! eg. white wine + sparkling water, diet mixers, fruit juices.

MOHPremierWine

An alternative would be Weightwatchers wines. I know that they are available in Tesco. They are produced in Germany, where because of less sunshine, the wine is less ripe/sweet, and therefore naturally less calories. Very well-made & delightful to drink too! Unlike most 'diet foods' you needn't suffer!:D

bryaner

I thought general rule of thumb was around 300 calories per pint of standard beer.

amz5

Are the drinks that are low in calories also low in cholesterol? Trying to find the best way to lower cholesterol while also being allowed to drink. I don't need to lose weight, but I figure they might be the same?

BeerNut

amz5 wrote: »

Are the drinks that are low in calories also low in cholesterol?

There's no cholesterol in alcohol, it's an animal fat. Moderate amounts of alcohol can increase the amount of "good" cholesterol in your system.

ntlbell

I know it's not really answering the original question but I think if you spend the majority of your time eating right and exercising etc and don't drink too often then just drink what you enjoy when you go for a drink.