Tips For Controlling Portion Sizes
A balanced diet and an active lifestyle are the best weapons to prevent and fight non-communicable diseases such as obesity, diabetes, and cardiovascular diseases. While this might seem hard to implement, the secret lies in making small, daily changes to your life until they all add up to create a healthy routine that is second nature to you.
In our supersized world, India too has fallen prey to the fad of large portion sizes and as more people eat out, they have stopped paying attention to how much they actually need to eat! Every restaurant offers generous bread baskets, accompaniments like sauces and dips, creamy salad dressings, etc, These changes in the portions size not only add extra calories in the diet, but also add on to the additional sodium and fat intake making one nutritionally deficient.
Here are some helpful tips to help you control portion sizes.
Watch What You Eat
- While cooking at home, offer proper portions to each family member and put away the extra food.
- While dining out, skip appetizers and start your meals with a salad or main course.
- While ordering food at home, eat a smaller size of pizza or any other dish. Order small-sized pizzas instead of a medium-sized one and divide the portions amongst the family.
- Always remove a small portion of whatever you are eating in a small bowl or plate rather than directly eating from the pack. This will help you to measure what you are eating.
- Keep healthy snacking options like fresh fruits, vegetables, hung curd dips with herbs and spices in appropriate portions before serving anyone at home, especially children.
- Don’t eat while watching TV or a movie or when you’re at the computer. Since you will not be paying attention, it will become harder to control how much you eat.
- While watching a movie, share the popcorn and avoid aerated drinks, candies and ice creams.
- It’s vital that you track your calories or watch what you eat as this will help you monitor your weight. This will also help you take appropriate portions as per your age and physical activity.