For those making an effort to lose weight, calorie counting can be a great tool for keeping your food intake in check. Although most dieters are great at keeping track of the calories in their food, many forget to count the calories in their drinks.

Calorie counting helps dieters swap out out high-calorie food and drink items for lower calorie options, and also by picking low-calorie items with high nutritional value. The key to weight loss is burning more calories than you ingest through increasing your physical activity. Keeping track of food calories has become increasingly easy because food packaging and many restaurant menus now include calorie counts on their foods. But when it comes to choosing what to drink, it’s more difficult to keep track of those calories.

The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) offers these three tips to help you keep track of your liquid calories:

· Calculate the calories in the beverages you drink by multiplying the calories per serving on labels by the number of servings you drink. For example, if a canned or bottled drink has 150 calories per serving and contains two servings, you have consumed 300 calories.

· Choose diet, low-calorie, or no-calorie beverages, such as water or tea.

· Keep your coffee simple. Black coffee is low in calories, but added whole milk, flavored syrups, and whipped cream aren’t.

Even more difficult than measuring calories in everyday drinks is figuring out how to maintain a low-calorie diet while choosing a cocktail at a bar. Buzzfeed created a video to help calorie-conscious dieters choose the right drink for their weight-loss goal. The video breaks down the calorie counts in popular bar drinks by comparing them to the foods we eat everyday. For example, one gin and tonic is the equivalent of one ginger cookie.

Take a look at the video below.