Are Your Portions Making You Fat?

If there’s one thing in this world we can all agree on it’s that portions are getting larger. Are they making you fat?

Well, probably.

Even if you make an effort to eat healthy foods, and balance your produce with protein, whole grains, and carbs, there’s a good chance you’re overdoing portions. It doesn’t matter how healthy the foods are that you choose, if you’re eating too much then you’re going to struggle with weight.

What’s Making You Fat?

Let’s imagine you’ve chosen a lean piece of chicken, grilled, and chose brown rice, avocado, and carrots to eat. That sounds like a delicious, healthy dinner. Of course, that makes no difference if you have two whole avocados on your plate, with three breasts of chicken, and a half-pound of brown rice. You get the point.

The key to living a healthy life is portion control.

You need to listen to your body. It will be more than happy to let you know that you’re overdoing it on the portions.

One of the best ways to reduce your portions is to buy smaller plates. Your portion won’t look as small to you on a smaller plate. There’s something about the blank space on a plate that makes us want to scoop more potatoes on it. So, ditch your regular dinner plates.

We’ve also been trained to finish what’s on our plates. So, if your portions are too big and you know you’re done eating, you feel compelled to keep going until your plate is clear. Then, you have the gall to have dessert! Before you start cooking, you should calculate the correct portions so that you have exactly what you need.

Accurate Portion Sizes

Half of your plate should be filled with vegetables (non-starchy). This will help fill you up, but it won’t weigh you down. Vegetables are low-fat, low-calorie, and packed with fiber and nutrients. There are so many to choose from as well, so there are no excuses for not eating a wide variety of options. You should be getting five portions a day, remember.

As far as your protein, the meat you eat should be about the size of a deck of cards. If your protein is a legume, then you can increase the portion to half a cup (or about the size of a fist). Foods that are rich in carbohydrates should be the garnish to a meal, not the focus. When it comes to grains, the serving size is a half-cup.

Breakfast

• Cereal serving sizes are about a fist-size or a cup.
• Dense cereals (like granola) should run between a ½ or ¾ cup.

Lunch

• A salad portion is a cup, but if you’re using iceberg lettuce you can use as much as you like! It’s the additions like sauces or dips that increase your calorie counts.
• Try open-faced sandwiches and save calories.

Dinner

• Your meat protein should be the size of a deck of cards.
• A medium potato is the size of a computer mouse.
• A pasta portion should be half of a baseball.
• A portion of cheese is four dice.
• A serving of leafy greens is two tennis balls.
• A serving of fruit or veg is a fist or a baseball.

Other Snacks And Tips

• You should aim for around 4 cups of vegetables a day and 2 cups of fruit.
• You can use oils, but no more than five teaspoons daily (think cooking).
• No more than 400 calories of your diet should come from sugars and solid fats.
• You can enjoy around 3 cups of no or low-fat dairy.
• Your grains should stay below 10 ounces daily, and at least half of that should be from whole grains.

The  Easy Way To Lose Weight With Portion Control

There are many ways to control your portion sizes. Controlling your portion sizes allows you to healthily maintain your weight without the yo-yo dieting nonsense making you fat. To take the guesswork out of weight loss with portion control, you can easily monitor what you eat with an app like My Food Diary. It will help you to eat properly and be in control of your decisions, and by making healthy changes to your unhealthy habits you can lose all that weight and keep it off for a lifetime.