Not at all. Your menu sounds like a low fat, restricted calorie plan, to me. I'd hazard that 60-70% of your daily calories are coming from carbs in one form or another.

What is a carb? Anything that isn't a protein or a fat, basically. Fruits, vegetables, breads, cereals, legumes. They are all pretty much carbs. Are they all to be avoided? Not by any means. All carbs are not created equal. Some are good and some are not so good. The more refined a food the less nutritional value you'll find in it - 100% whole wheat would be a better choice over white bread. Brown rice would be a better choice over instant white rice. Berries would be a better choice over pineapple. Why? Because not all carbs are going to effect blood sugar levels the same way - some cause more insulin to be released than others. Choosing carbs that have minimal impact on blood sugar helps with fat loss and it helps keep you from experiencing extreme hunger when blood sugar plumets after a carby meal.

I see from your profile that you have read Atkins, you might then remember that the food choices in Dr. A's plan do not include much fruit, milk or breads at first. There are other plans out there, however, that do. You can see some of them and what they entail by clicking on the link in the right hand margin "which LC plan is right for me?".

How do we count carbs? We use carb counters - lists of foods with carb content indicated. There is one on this site under "Low Carb Tools" (atop every page), some of us also use a site called Fitday (www.fitday.com) where we can keep track of calories / carbs / protein and fat. After a while you get used to how many carbs are in certain foods and many don't even bother counting those anymore.

Is it necessary to count calories? No, absoultely not. Many find they can get by just fine w/o ever having to count. Others do it every once in a while to see just what they are eating, in case fine tuning is necessary. And still others do it daily, just because they perfer it that way.

What strikes me the most from your menu is the lack of protein - next to nothing at breakfast, the most important time for it, Nothing at lunch and a minimal amount at dinner. Simply adding protein to all your meals would be a big step to helping your body build tissue and stay healthy.

Nat