A 1770 calorie day from eleven everyday foods

Here is a full day cooked up from eleven everyday foods: a budget of 140 g protein, 190 g carbs and 50 g fat, which adds up to 1770 calories. The menu that came back lands every macro within 5 g and tells you each weight to the gram.

The order

The guest check for this table of one read like this, with the meal beside each food.

• Breakfast: rolled oats, eggs, blueberries.
• Lunch: chicken breast, white rice, broccoli.
• Dinner: salmon, potatoes, spinach.
• Snack: Greek yogurt, an apple.

The budget was 140 g protein, 190 g carbs and 50 g fat. Calories were not typed in separately. The usual arithmetic does the work: 4 kcal per gram of protein and carbs and 9 kcal per gram of fat, the figures given in the FAO paper on food energy, makes 560 plus 760 plus 450, or 1770 calories.

The menu

Here is what came back, in grams, with the state of each food spelled out.

Breakfast

• Rolled oats, dry: 113 g
• Eggs, raw weight: 170 g
• Blueberries: a standard portion

Lunch

• Chicken breast, raw: 180 g
• White rice, cooked: 113 g
• Broccoli: a standard portion

Dinner

• Salmon, raw: 140 g
• Potatoes, raw: 113 g
• Spinach: a standard portion

Snack

• Greek yogurt: 180 g
• Apple: a standard portion

Vegetables and fruit sit on the menu as a standard portion, and their calories and macros are counted in the totals below like every other line.

The tally

Add the day up and the tally reads:

• Protein: 138.9 g against 140 g, so 1.1 g under.
• Carbs: 193.5 g against 190 g, so 3.5 g over.
• Fat: 50.2 g against 50 g, so 0.2 g over.
• Calories: 1768 against a 1770 budget.

Each macro is inside the 5 g rule, so the stamp reads on target. Notice that the carbs are the loosest of the three at 3.5 g over. That is normal: a menu in whole, round weights cannot always hit every number on the nose, and the rule leaves room for it.

Why these grams

The food values come from the USDA SR Legacy table in FoodData Central, per 100 g. A few of them explain the shape of the day.

• Chicken breast, raw, brings 22.5 g protein per 100 g with 2.62 g fat and no carbs. At 180 g, it carries about 40.5 g of the day's protein.
• Salmon, raw, brings 20.42 g protein and 13.42 g fat per 100 g. At 140 g, it supplies about 28.6 g protein and a good share of the fat.
• Rolled oats, dry, bring 67.7 g carbs per 100 g with 13.15 g protein and 6.52 g fat. At 113 g, they carry about 76.5 g carbs, the biggest single carb line of the day.
• White rice, cooked, brings 28.17 g carbs per 100 g, so 113 g gives about 31.8 g.
• Potatoes, raw, bring 17.49 g carbs per 100 g, so 113 g gives about 19.8 g.
• Eggs, raw, bring 12.56 g protein and 9.51 g fat per 100 g.
• Greek yogurt, plain and nonfat, brings 10.19 g protein and 3.6 g carbs per 100 g with almost no fat.

Notice how few foods do the heavy lifting. Two proteins, two grain or starch lines and the oats do most of the work. The produce rounds out the plate, and the eggs and the salmon carry the fat.

How to read a menu like this

When you look at any day on the menu, read it in this order.

1. Check the stamp. On target or not yet.
2. Read the tally. Each macro should sit within 5 g of the number you asked for.
3. Read the foods. Check that the weights are things you would actually put on a plate.
4. Check the state beside each food. Raw, dry and cooked are different weights of the same food.

If a food seems wrong for your day, change the check and the menu replans at once. If a number seems too big to eat, lock the food at the weight you want and let the rest of the day move around it.

Make it your own

Nothing about this day is special. Swap the salmon for tuna, the oats for bread, the apple for a banana. The kitchen will serve a new menu with new grams. What stays the same is the promise: protein, carbs and fat within 5 g of the numbers you give it.

About these numbers

This menu came from one run of the planner on 31 October 2026, using SR Legacy values from the April 2018 FoodData Central release. Run the same foods and budget on the site later and you may get a slightly different arrangement. That is expected, because the kitchen can change over time. The tally, not any particular set of grams, is what matters. This page describes what a menu looks like. It is not advice about what to put on your plate.