1,500-Calorie Diet Ideas

When following a 1,500-calorie diet, the key to success is to eat low-calorie nutritious foods, so that you can eat enough to feel satiated while reaching your weight-loss goals. Planning your diet ahead of time will help you stay on track, eat full meals and reserve a few hundred calories for snacks throughout the day.

Breakfast

• Breakfast should be filling to help you get through the day. While sugary muffins are out, breakfast should be one of your larger meals, to get your day off to a good start and give you energy.

  One example of a good breakfast is 1/2 cup of old-fashioned oatmeal cooked in the microwave, with 1 cup of water and 1 scoop of protein powder mixed in, to add protein and flavor. The oatmeal contains 150 calories, while the calories in the protein powder can vary. The protein powder used in this example is All the Whey's chocolate protein powder, which contains 80 calories. This breakfast is extremely filling and only 230 calories.

Lunch

• Lunch is tricky when you work outside the home. Many people enjoy eating out at lunchtime, although fast food, the most common option, is not a great choice for those on a diet. Making good choices will make a huge difference, though. All but one of McDonald's premium salads with grilled chicken contain 320 calories without the dressing. The only one that does not is the Caesar salad, which contains fewer calories, 220. These are great lunch choices for anyone, whether you are dieting or not.

  Many fast-food restaurants offer salads, and because a salad takes some time to eat, you won't feel deprived. The only problem is with the salad dressing, so bring your own. Many salad dressings can contain well over 100 calories per a 2-tbsp. serving. That costs too many calories on a 1,500-calorie diet. Choose a reduced-calorie dressing that contains 30 calories or less per 2-tbsp. size. This brings lunch to 350 calories.

Dinner

• When it comes to dinner, include plenty of vegetables to keep calories low while staying full. Lean meats such as boneless, skinless chicken breast, turkey (both ground and breasts) and lean cuts of beef, with all the visible fat trimmed away, will provide enough protein for a healthy diet, without adding a large amount of calories from fat. A small baked yam or 1/2 cup of brown rice offer more nutritional value than white potatoes, white rice or pasta, and can be filling.

  A sample dinner would be a 6-oz. broiled chicken breast at 240 calories, 1 cup steamed broccoli at 42 calories, and 1 small baked yam at 118 calories. This sample dinner comes out to 400 calories.

Calorie Surplus

• The total amount of calories in three full meals using this sample diet is 980 calories. That leaves 520 calories for the dieter to divide among snacks during the day. Dieters should avoid consuming only one or two high-calorie snacks, and instead spread them out to avoid hunger.

  A few examples of low-calorie snacks would be an apple (80 calories), string cheese (70 calories), a flavored rice cake (50 calories), or 1 cup air-popped popcorn (30 calories). When a person makes a point of eating healthy, filling food throughout the day, she will be left with a surplus amount of calories, which can be used on small indulgences such as chocolate or candy, to prevent the dieter from feeling deprived and help keep her motivated.