You open the pot of jollof, spoon it onto a plate, add chicken, and eat. The meal is fine. The question that brought you here is whether it is enough, and no one has given you a straight answer that mentions garri, eba and beans. This handbook answers it for adults and young adults who cook and eat Nigerian food and want a working understanding of calories and nutrients rather than a diet built on ingredients you do not buy. You need a kitchen you already use, a plate you already own, and ten minutes once a week to plan. You do not need a blender, a gym membership, imported food or a food scale, though a scale helps if you own one. The first move is to weigh or estimate one normal serving of the food you eat most often and write down three numbers: the food, the portion, and roughly what it gives you. Start with rice. One level cup of cooked white rice weighs about 180 grams and gives around 240 kilocalories, about 3 grams of protein and very little fat. Cook it in two tablespoons of groundnut oil and you add about 240 kilocalories, so the same plate now carries close to 480. Add one boiled egg at about 70 kilocalories and 6 grams of protein, and a cup of efo elegusi cooked in one tablespoon of palm oil at about 200 kilocalories, and your plate reaches roughly 750 kilocalories with about 15 grams of protein, 30 grams of fat and 70 grams of carbohydrate. That is a full meal for many adults. Write your own versions next to it using your own pot and your own spoon. You have the method right when you can name the calories and the three macronutrients for three meals you actually eat, without opening a book, within two minutes. Two mistakes cost people weeks. The first is counting only the staple and ignoring the oil, because oil you pour into stew, soup and rice often adds more energy than the rice itself, and a tablespoon of any cooking oil carries about 120 kilocalories whether you notice it or not.