Added pounds creep into the waistline by speeds of a few extra hundred calories every day or even every week. The stealth route for this happening comes through snacking and portion sizes, with the latter being the sneaky one.
When did portions get so big?
Many restaurants particularly in the United States like to load up portions with lots of fries and other cheap carbohydrates to give their customers the “full” feeling, rather than deliver a modest size portion for the same price. “More calories” became acceptable as “more value” so a lot of other food companies followed suit. Soon packages with pictures of bigger portions began appearing, and “Bigger is better” became a trend that resulted in the saying “Everything is bigger in America”, the size of the people included.
Why are big dishes such a big deal?
A large dish or bowl specifically is a big deal because it’s normal behavior to want to fill them with food. So if the plate or bowl is large, then natural inclination is to fill them with food. Big bowls of cereal… An extra heap of french fries to go with the burger and there’s your extra 400 to 600 calories and you end up with a meal well over 1000 calories. Do this several times a week, multiple times a day, and you have a caloric surplus of anywhere between 500 or 1000 every week. So in being unaware of portions, pounds of fat can accumulate at a tip-toe pace. Combine this with not weighing yourself every day, and weight gain becomes an inevitability.
What are better portion sizes?
While it may seem that the answer is simply to reduce the food, a better and easier strategy would be to reduce the size of the plates and bowls in your kitchen. Filling a smaller plate or bowl will help better gauge how much from your recipe or meal that you consumed. Attention to what composes the food should be considered too. Avoid eating big heaps of french fries, potato chips, and crisps that pile on calories very quickly and replace them with foods that have more fiber like broccoli, cauliflower, or other vegetables. Fried and salty foods usually are cooked and coated with oil, and shoot up blood sugar as their engineered taste for more and more kicks in.
Take a Break After Eating!
One thing I learned from my time as a fat kid was that if I poured another bowl of cereal or had the whole pizza right next to me, I would grab another serving while my hunger was cheering me on to eat more. However later in my life I found out that if I eat something and walk away from it for 10 minutes, my hunger would relax and the urge to eat like a wolf goes away. This trick is used when people suggest not putting yourself around food too much. It’s easy to eat and keep eating in the moment when you have the chance to eat as much as you want. Reduce the plate size, and give yourself a good long moment to enjoy having eaten a meal before going back for seconds.
If you need help with getting started on your journey check out my store page. You can sign up for my Facebook group or book a call with me!
Don’t give up, honor your gift
-Ed