Portion Control
Who says you have to clean your plate?
One of the keys to living with diabetes or managing your weight is decreasing the size of your food portions. It's not always easy - we're surrounded by 'jumbo' and 'super sized' fast food, buffet-style restaurants and 'all-you-can-eat' menus. When people get used to larger restaurant portions, they start serving similarly sized meals at home. The bottom line: the big portion trend has changed our notion of reasonable-sized portions and affected our health.
But we have some tips for reversing the trend. Try following these simple tips to help you maintain portion control.
When you get home from the grocery store:
- Immediately divide meat and fish into portions.
When dining at home:
- Divide cooked food into portions in the kitchen and serve them on individual plates. Leave the remaining food in the kitchen while you eat so you won't be tempted to take more.
- Don't forget that ingredients matter. Choose low-fat alternatives whenever possible.
When dining out:
- Eat half the food on your plate and take the rest home for another meal. Or split an entree with a friend.
- Pass on appetizers.
- Don't be fooled by over-sized 'healthy' salads that turn out to be filled with high-fat ingredients covered in high-calorie dressings.
You can also use these 'handy' measuring tips to estimate appropriate portions.
- fist = 1 cup (one serving of raw vegetables)
- thumb = 30g (a piece of cheese)
- handful = 30g snack food (1 serving nuts or 1/2 serving pretzels)
- thumb tip = spread serving (mayonnaise or margarine)
- palm = 90g (one serving of cooked meat)