Portion Control & More Tips*

[janet]

Just Enough

Train yourself to get in the habit of having enough, but not too much. Eat as little or as much as you need, slowly, over time, to achieve a balance that's right for you.

You learn this from a process of slowly cutting back, just a little at a time, on the foods you enjoy.

If you're eating three fast food burgers every lunch, try two. If you're having two slices of pizza, have one. If you're having a piece of meat, two or three side dishes, and a couple of drinks--just have one side and one drink (and make that one water, how 'bout?)



Just a little less will be more than enough, and over time, you'll slowly lose weight without having to give up the foods you love.

[janet]

WeighOnce a Month

I recommend weighing yourself only once per month. Same day, time, place. Try weighing yourself first thing in the morning, before breakfast, after your morning “constitutional.� Then write it on a piece of paper, with the date, amount, and variation up or down.

Once a month is enough. If you weigh yourself more than that, it’s easy to get lost in small variations that may scare you into taking measures that are too dire.

Be reasonable with the pounds. Weighing yourself more than once a month never presents an accurate picture. You certainly don’t want to just see water weight changes; those are not real fat pounds. Some days you may go up slightly because of water or the weight of what you ate.



What you want is the net result of changes; the long-term not the short term fluctuations.

[Can You Guess?]

Portion control?

[Joy]

Here is a tip I learned while attending WW.
Get a couple of serving spoons and measure how much one scoop is when dishing up your food. An example is --I have a fairly large serving spoon that is about 1/2 c when I use it to serve things like rice, potatoes, etc. It is a good way to keep your portions under control without everyone knowiing you are measuring your food. Also after a while for using this method you get to know what a portion of each food looks like so when you are eating out you can judge your portions even when measuring isn't possible.

[happymomof4]

Reset your table. Replace larger plates and serving dishes with smaller ones, and you’ll almost automatically eat less. Use a tall, slender glass to help you drink less juice or soda than you would using a short, wide glass. And pay attention to how food is packaged before it even hits your table, because jumbo-size food containers can tempt you to cook and eat more than a healthy portion.


Often, the meat on our plate is too big, and we’re not getting enough fruits and vegetables. Get on track by matching up appropriate portion sizes with household items. For example:

Deck of cards = 3 oz. meat
Table tennis ball = 2 tablespoons peanut butter
Four dice = 1 oz. cheese

Or simply look at your hand. A woman’s palm is the size of a three-ounce serving of meat. A woman’s fist is the size of a cup of pasta or vegetables, and the circle inside an “OK” sign is a tablespoon of oil or salad dressing.

[RobertaD]

I heard a couple of tips on a tv show not long ago.

Lower the lights in the room you are eating in, bright light causes stress which makes us eat more.

Use a smaller plate as mentioned before, it gets filled up with fewer calories making use think we are getting more.

Don't eat at the computer, while watching tv or in the car only at the table.

Put low calorie snacks at your eye level and less desirable snacks lower where kids can reach them. Of course my thinking is don't even buy the junk food as our kids don't need them either.

When you buy snacks bag them up into individual serving sizes so everyone can just grab and go which makes packing lunches faster.

Roberta