Able to create a custom meal and indicate number of servings

[mrshrdng1016]

I would really like to be able to build a recipie and then indicate how many servings it makes and how much I ate and see nutritional break down by servings too.  I think it would way easier than trying to enter all ingredients then when its time to eat the leftovers I can just add the recipie serving.

Moderator Edit: Clarified subject and updated label

[Gary_K]

I have communicated with support who suggested I send my idea here. I am attaching a link as your personal exploration may be better than my verbal(Written explanation) However, I will try.

I feel that your food logging interface falls short, especially with people such as myself who prepare most or all of their food at home. I have recipes that may yield 4 servings (Some more, some less). When these are made, I can either save or freeze portions for later dates. Instead of having to convert each recipe for ONE portion, other sites will give me the option AFTER the full recipe is input, to adjust the serving when logging, simply by adding "1 serving", "½ serving" or if I am feeling hungry "1 ½ servings", gluttonous "2 servings". I don't have to weigh out every portion every time I eat. Nor do I have to weigh every dish I make, to one serving.

As a "BASIC oversimplified example" I have a recipe for a stuffed spaghetti squash it obviously yields two servings. It would be very convenient to just input the recipe. Then if I wanted to eat 2 servings, I could log 2 servings, one serving 1, four servings I could log 4.

As I said, you may get a better understanding by visiting http://www.livestrong.com/myplate/

Another convenience you may notice when researching; I am not limited to Breakfast, lunch, dinner or morning, afternoon, evening snack or anytime. I can log a more accurate food diary by time of consumption and Pre or Post-workout meals. Very helpful when logging food intake. Yes, I am asking you to look at someone else's work. I hope it inspires you to rise above. The bar was set High by Livestrong.

Moderator Edit: Added Labels

[windkew]

Hey Gary,

I wrote a similar post recently and soon after I figured out that if you log into your fitbit account on the computer you an add "Custom meals". For example Create a custom meal "spaghetti squash"  and it will add the foods you associate with it, with the set portions.

-Kyle 

[Pociaskn]

I make most of my food at home, especially things like granola bars that make multiple servings per batch. To track my calories and nutrients every day when eating one serving is difficult. It would be great to be able to save recipes using foods in the database and entering the number of servings it makes per batch. That way, when you log your meals, you can pull up your recipe, choose the number of servings you ate, and have the app do all the calorie and nutrient calculating for you. You can do something similar to this with custom food creation, but the custom food still requires you to manually enter calories, fat, etc. instead of being able to choose component ingredients and quantities. Personally, I don't want to have to look up ingredient stats and calculate totals every time I want to add a new custom food, especially since this information is really available in the database.

[Inger]

Unfortunately, we've been requesting this over and over since fitbit first came out. There's never been a response. This is one of the most popular requests and SOOO necessary for making logging foods into a reasonable task, yet, for some reason, our requests go unheaded. For this reason, I just completely stop using my fitbit for about a year or so at a time, because taking the time to log every single thing in individually is just not realistic. Then I check back in to see if this feature has been updates/added yet, thinking that FOR SURE they must have added it by now. Yet once again, nothing has been done to accomodate all these requests. (At this point, as you can tell, I'm a little frustrated...) 😕

I too make huge meals from scratch during massive cook sessions, and then eat portions of them throughout the week. That fitbit doesn't have such a basic functionality as to track this, is crazy. They have pre-logged-in single serving processed foods, so if you eat crappy processed stuff, then you're rewarded with easy logging. But take the time to cook from scratch and now everything just got harder when you try to log those meals. Please PLEASE fitbit add this most basic funtionality...so many of us would be so grateful! 🙂

Every other food tracker I've used has this. But they're not linked to my fitbit, so I don't use those either. If they can do it, you guys can do it to, Fitbit. 🙂 It can't be that hard, as someone who does code says, it would probably only take a day of work to change this code. Please please PLEASE!

[André-Anansi]

MarreFitbit  Thanks for adding us to the consideration portion of development.

Can I ask what Under Consideration means? 

Could you explain anything about the development process regarding updates and suggestions?

I had purchased a food scale and special portined food storage conainers to use with my food tracking, yet the update never came. Could you give us a hint as to where in the process we are?

[André-Anansi]

Additionally, the weight of the meal should be a great way to describe the amount consumed.

Weight is already integrated, so 300g of rice, 10g of Garlic, and 80g of Tomatoe in a stew could be written as serving size of 100g of 'My jambalaya' or something like that.

Fractions can serve just as well. 1/2 of the meal would be 195g of the total nutritional/caloric value.

Please implement this.

[HAMnLEGGS]

Oh and macros need that fo SHO!

[johno85]

Hi,

I make all my meals from scratch and I would like a feature where I can put all the ingredients together from where I buy them, note how many people it serves and how many servings I have so that calories can be counted accurately.

To compliment the above request it would be handy to have a breakdown of the percentage of fats, carbs, protein eaten in a day / week / month along with the important vitamins, minerals and sugar consumed.

Hope you can put the above requests in.

Kind Regards,

John

Moderator's edit: added labels

[Kirty]

First of all would just like to say that I absolutely love my fitbit blaze and the app is fantastic, however, my only complaint is about the Food tracking.  The meals I create generally tend to serve more than 1 person/portion, for example my Honey Mustard Salad dressing is for 6 people but your meals section only allows for me to create recipes for 1 person.  Can you please create this feature, so that I can get an accurate calorie count. 

[sueb1997]

Waiting to hear that this option is available -- sounds like a good solution!

[Georgia98]

Hi 🙂 you can do this with an app called MyFitnessPal by creating a recipe, and you can also import recipes straight from online, which you can then link to your Fitbit app!

[johno85]

I know that MyFitnessPal App does this but it makes more sense to have everything is in one place, hence the request to have it as part of FitBit.

Get Outlook for Android

[Georgia98]

That is very true and Fitbit do really need to improve their food libraries but I figured using MFP until Fitbit (hopefully) sort the food side of things out would be a good substitution

[Gary_K]

Just to follow up.  There is no way to accurately create a meal diary with the fitbit app if you prepare you own meals from scratch.  You have to find other web sites like "Calorie count" import your recipes with the number of portions, then take that information and import it into fitbit.  An extra step that after a while makes you just not want to have to deal with fitbit's food diary, which can evetually lead to giving up -  It's unfortunate, but human nature.  

[TracyKalata]

This idea never got beyond "reviewed by moderator" as far as I know.  It is a shame that I have to use another app in order to build my recipe and then break it down into portions before I can log my home made meal into the FitBit app.  I use 411fit.com - it is very similar to FitBit but offers a bit more.  It doesn't integrate with my FitBit device or I would only be using 411fit.

Come on FitBit... we fitness-minded folks DO build our own recipies, and since there are other apps out there that take this into consideration, shouldn't you???

Moderator edit: Labels

[xWackix]

Fitbit's version of food logging is poor in comparison with the rest of the app.

I think we should be able to add in recipes of our own, and like my fitness pal, copy & paste recipes from the internet and have fitbit add them as a food for us to choose whilst loging.

Unless you buy your food ready made from a supermarket, or from a resaurant, or frozen, you cannot log it. I make most of my meals from scratch, and by doing this I am not providing the correct nutritional value and calories to my fitbit. 

Macronutrients etc would be excellent to keep track of. I have seen plety of users online asking for the same thing. It could be telling us we have had too may carbs, not enough protein etc, and even suggest foods we could have to help this.

Moderator edit:  Labels

[SunsetRunner]

Fab

[SunsetRunner]

I've been avoiding processed food and cooking for myself/my family alot lately.  Being able to enter a recipie and provide a serving size would be most helpful.

PS:  I use fitbit and its app/website solely as other app inergration has proved frustrating, inconsistant and ad-wridden.  I want one app, one fitness tracket and one website.  Hopping between apps is in-effective.  You should not need an engineering degree from MIT top log you home-cooked meal..

[RichGee]

This seems like a pretty simple idea to implement. I just created a meal, then wanted to log that I'd eaten 8 oz of it but found it was not possible. Now I have to go and weigh the meal as a total and then weigh the portion and divide all the ingredients of the meal appropriately. Ughhh.

Come on Fitbit, I just upgraded to Premium and expected to find this function. Thanks

[Pociaskn]

Bumping this. Recipe builders seem to be a highly requested feature, so let's give this some visibility!

[ShenellH]

I agree with this 100% I have been trying for so long to get the correct measurements of my food to log it into the FitBit app and it is draining. I am pretty much guessing at this point and that does not help me in the long run.

It is very hard to guess how many beans are in 3 tbsp of rice, how much sofrito and cilantro is cooked into the 3 tbsp of rice. At this point we should be able to put all the ingredients into the app, give it a name and then log it according to the serving size.

This is one feature that NEEDS to happen I shouldn't have to use MyFitnessPal when I want to be faithful to FitBit.

[iPeach]

Bumping this again as a necessary feature! 

[Bobz]

For such a very useful, simple suggestion, that was made over a year ago, it is amazing that it has yet to be implemented.

Fitbit doesn't seem to be very responsive to customers' needs.

[Phedre]

Right? How hard is this?

[tholds1]

I recently dropped MFP because they have added adds that flash across the screen as I am adding foods, etc.  I also like the idea of having everything in one app.  Fitbit has added features over time that have allowed me to delete other apps that worked with it, such as Digfit which mapped my walks and tracked my heartrate.  I would love the capability to create recipes and add the servings to my food tracker and have every thing I need in one tidy little app.