Portions help please

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lexon5
lexon5 Posts: 16 Member
in Food and Nutrition
Coming to the end of my first week so not sure what the scales will say on monday morning. Been looking through my food diary and wondering if there was anywhere that i could tweak what ive eaten. my main thing as that i dont understand portions and calories. i think this is because ive tended to follow slimming world which says you can eat as much x, y, z as you want as long as you follow the diet. Because of this its hard to work out what i should now eat trying a low fat calorie controlled diet. my target is 1730 cals a day which is a 500 decifit a day which should hopefully equal a 1 lb loss a week. For example to night i had lean mince beef with veggies and pasta but im not sure how much mince and pasta i should of had. whats a healthy portion:? my scales are in grams. Any ideas? please help. same with other measurable things like cereal etc.
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Replies

  • cmriverside
    cmriverside Posts: 34,052 Member
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    Buy a digital food scale.

    Use measuring cups and spoons.

    Sounds like you are living in Europe? I don't know what mince beef is. Pasta, a general size in the U.S. is 56g uncooked.....or about the size of a baseball when cooked. Meat, a portion is the size of a deck of cards. Veggies, you can eat quite a lot (except beans, squash, potatoes, and corn and carrots and peas - they are quite starchy) - so it depends on what veggie you are eating and hopefully you aren't adding anything like cheese or butter or sauces to the vegetable.
  • xarge
    xarge Posts: 484 Member
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    I don't know what mince beef is.

    Ground beef ;)

    And pretty much everything cmriverside said. Best is to get yourself a food scale. It's as precise as it can get.
  • lexon5
    lexon5 Posts: 16 Member
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    Yes am in the uk. have digital scales which i always measure my cereal with and measuring cups and spoons which im yet to figure out. Once if figured out how much im meant to be having then i think they will be indisposable.
  • kathyms13
    kathyms13 Posts: 497 Member
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    i was givern a booklet by a friend who is a personal trainer. there are 7 pages but i could give you a few ideas, the main thing it to use a smaller plate ,
  • cmriverside
    cmriverside Posts: 34,052 Member
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    Don't your boxes and bags have the portion size written on them?

    Try Google for standard UK portion sizes. I'm sure you'll find your answer.
  • paulaviki
    paulaviki Posts: 678 Member
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    Most packets of pasta I've seen give a serving as 40-50g dry which is about 100g cooked so that's the portion size I use. As for mince, normal size packs are 500g so if you have half a pack then log it as 250g. I just use the nutritional information on the packs, but read the portion/serving sizes carefully! My husband had a bottle of Yop the other day which was 500ml and the bottle said a serving was 75ml! So each bottle has nearly 6 servings.
  • RealWomenLovePitbulls
    RealWomenLovePitbulls Posts: 729 Member
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    This is from the Food Lovers program...

    What you need on your plate is : protein, a fast carb, and a slow carb

    1.Protein: meat, soy, protein powder, or cottage cheese
    portions: lean meats should be the size of your open palm, including up to your first knuckle
    dark meats or fatty meats should just be the size of your palm, not inlcuding the knuckle
    either one should be about the same width as your palm as well
    if you choose cottage cheese as your protein, it should be about the size of your closed fist

    2. fast carb is gonna be bread, pasta, oats, rice, potatoes, corn, winter squash, melons, high sugar fruits (cherries, grapes, pinapples) apples, bananas, oranges, peach, pear, plums, kiwi - your serving should be about the size of your fist, except for rice, corn, and sweets, which would be about half that.

    3, slow carbs include - veggies, leafy greens, tomatoes, berries, lemons, limes, beans, peas, and cooked greens - your serving should be about the size of your fist, except for beans and peas, which should be about half.

    make sure for your meal you eat one thing from each category

    try to keep your fats (butter and oil) down to about a tablespoon per meal!!
  • lexon5
    lexon5 Posts: 16 Member
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    All the portions are for a woman having 2000 calories or just states per 100g but i have no idea how many grams of things im meant to have. Any guidance on this is welcome as ive googled portions, pasta sizes, food in grams and theres no consistant answer. I checked on the NHS site (our medical care) and again its quite general. I need someone to say you can have x amount of this that and the other and thats what ill try to stick to.
  • paulaviki
    paulaviki Posts: 678 Member
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    I don't think there is just a generic list of how much of what to have, you have to learn to read the packets and weigh and measure and figure out your own portions using packets as a guide.I log everything before I eat, days in advance if I can and then I can adjust my portion sizes depending on what I am eating and if I am working out.
  • 47Jacqueline
    47Jacqueline Posts: 6,993 Member
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    Coming to the end of my first week so not sure what the scales will say on monday morning. Been looking through my food diary and wondering if there was anywhere that i could tweak what ive eaten. my main thing as that i dont understand portions and calories. i think this is because ive tended to follow slimming world which says you can eat as much x, y, z as you want as long as you follow the diet. Because of this its hard to work out what i should now eat trying a low fat calorie controlled diet. my target is 1730 cals a day which is a 500 decifit a day which should hopefully equal a 1 lb loss a week. For example to night i had lean mince beef with veggies and pasta but im not sure how much mince and pasta i should of had. whats a healthy portion:? my scales are in grams. Any ideas? please help. same with other measurable things like cereal etc.

    buy a food scale. Also there are 28 grams in an ounce.
  • cmriverside
    cmriverside Posts: 34,052 Member
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    All the portions are for a woman having 2000 calories or just states per 100g but i have no idea how many grams of things im meant to have. Any guidance on this is welcome as ive googled portions, pasta sizes, food in grams and theres no consistant answer. I checked on the NHS site (our medical care) and again its quite general. I need someone to say you can have x amount of this that and the other and thats what ill try to stick to.

    Yeah, there is no way for any of us to tell you that. The portion size is written on the pack. Eat that, and log it. Adjust if necessary next time. OR - prelog your food before you eat it and see if the calories amounts fit into your needs.

    This below answers you very well, too.
    I don't think there is just a generic list of how much of what to have, you have to learn to read the packets and weigh and measure and figure out your own portions using packets as a guide.I log everything before I eat, days in advance if I can and then I can adjust my portion sizes depending on what I am eating and if I am working out.
  • RealWomenLovePitbulls
    RealWomenLovePitbulls Posts: 729 Member
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    p.s. make ur diary public
  • Witchmoo
    Witchmoo Posts: 261 Member
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    I've done Slimming World for years and I would suggest if you've made for example a bolognese which is a sw recipe....a 300g portion of this would be a decent portion and then you should add your superfree, I personally have 200g of green beans and if I'm hungry 200g of cauli/brocoli too. If I have pasta I have 75g dry weight and rice I have 62.5g dry weight....this way I measure and calorie count but apply the sw principles which I find makes life easier in terms of recipes I know....
  • xarge
    xarge Posts: 484 Member
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    Sorry I'm a bit confused about this.

    Under Food > Recipes you can enter your recipe.

    You can add how many grams of pasta, mince, veggies, oil etc you used and divide it for the number of serving you had from that cooked pasta and you'll have your portion for the night.

    It's a bit hard for us to guess how much pasta you had. If you had dinner out then that pasta can be anywhere between 100 grams to 200 grams cooked. Serving size differs from one restaurant to another.
  • Witchmoo
    Witchmoo Posts: 261 Member
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    Should also add that doing mfp and calorie counting will drive home why sw bang on and on about superfree should be a third of your plate......as a result I now actually do it!
  • tlblood
    tlblood Posts: 473 Member
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    For me, I generally go with the serving size that is on the package...most meats are labeled as 4 oz, cheese is 1 oz...

    But more important that what is a serving size of xyz. is how much are you eating. I'll cut off a chunk of watermelon, weigh it, log it with the acurate weight, and eat it. I don't worry as much about cutting it down to the right size, I just worry that I logged how much I did eat.
  • sharleengc
    sharleengc Posts: 792 Member
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    I bought a food scale. I measure everything (pre cooked) then from there I decide how much of a serving I can have or want and weigh it based on the serving size portion. So, measuring cup and scale are my best cooking friends. I follow the serving suggestions and weigh/measure according to my calories.

    For example, a serving of ground turkey is 4oz. I weigh it then cook it. Same with noodles, a serving is 2oz, I usually weigh out 3 oz.
  • krumpli
    krumpli Posts: 76 Member
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    If you have a "normal-sized" coffee cup (not espresso, not huge, just normal) then this is usually about the same as what we Americans call "one cup."

    Or this is handy: http://www.google.hu/imgres?imgurl=http://topsytasty.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/02/portion_control_chartFULL1.gif&imgrefurl=http://topsytasty.com/blog/estimate-serving-sizes-with-household-objects-or-your-hands/&h=1284&w=888&sz=94&tbnid=a7aSASxznoRKQM:&tbnh=90&tbnw=62&prev=/search?q=portion+sizes&tbm=isch&tbo=u&zoom=1&q=portion+sizes&usg=__FPhQ7NT5j3wTLui21m8JV3iEuIo=&docid=xi-nwFBCr2GfzM&sa=X&ei=mJQVUJGhEYyWswbtnIGwDQ&ved=0CGoQ9QEwBA&dur=10342
  • lexon5
    lexon5 Posts: 16 Member
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    thanks for the comments. Like the idea of keeping the meals slimming world friendly and may have to use the reciepe function also. x
  • krumpli
    krumpli Posts: 76 Member
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    I think it's worth mentioning that over here in Europe, serving sizes are NOT labeled on packaging except in about 10% of the cases (and these are usually more "fitness" type items such as healthy cereals, yogurts, etc.). Rather, the nutrition facts are given in 100 g or 100 ml increments. For some items, 100g is a huge amount while for others 100g is a tiny amount... needless to say, it leads to a lot of math to figure out how many calories etc. are in the amount of food you are actually eating, and a lot of googling "30 g beans oz" and such!

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