Dieting And Food Portion Sizes
if you have been trying to lose weight lately, you are probably familiar with some of the obstacles that we all face. Sometimes, it can be difficult or impossible to figure out why a weight-loss program is not working. Are you eating too much fatty food? Are you not eating enough grains or vegetables? What about protein how much of that should you eat, and what should it come from? Is it all right to eat animal products, or should you switch to tofu? All of these are questions that most dieters have to struggle with on a daily basis.
One of the most important questions, however, is one that many dieters neglect to think about enough food portion sizes. No matter how healthy you eat, research shows that if you eat too much you simply will not lose weight. The old myth that you can eat as much vegetables and grains as you want is rapidly losing credibility, and many weight-loss experts and gurus put food portion size as the most important factor in how much weight you can manage to take off.
The problem is that there is no one guide to portion sizes of food. There is the USDA food portion sizes guideline to look at, but this is not universally accepted. The government is often bureaucratic, and it can take years to update food guidelines to the latest thinking. As a matter of fact, each diet plan seems to have its own guidelines for food portion sizes.
The important thing is to find a standard and stick with it. Too many people make the mistake of trying to eyeballs food portion sizes, but this neglect some of the problems that we face in our culture. Most of us are raised in an atmosphere where more is better. Restaurants, cafeterias, and even households tend to serve up huge portions of food, so what looks normal to us might actually be except excessive.
One of my friends a dieting expert himself recommends this rule thumb for determining food portion sizes. If you are just starting to diet, try out a basic type of food a plain vegetable dish, a breast of chicken, or whatever and see how much you need to feel like you have had your fill. Roughly two thirds of that is the appropriate food portion size. When you are first starting dieting, you want to be hungry all the time. If you are not, you are probably eating a little too much.
