Half Plate of Veggies!? Say What?
CrescentVolf
Posts: 87 Member
Hi! 
So, I was wondering how many of my fellow fitness pals grew up in a really misguided food environment? And if you did, did you ever struggle with the new what your plate should look like stuff for balanced eating?
When I was growing up, most of the time the vegetable of the meal was often a starchy veggie, maybe green beans but that was rare. I didn't realize so many wonderful veggies even existed. I didn't realize half my plate should have consisted of said veggies. It was almost shocking to me, but it shouldn't have been haha. I didn't understand how people could possibly do that, until I started making an effort to eat more balanced meals. It's been a huge learning experience, and I still have so much to learn.
Anyone with similar experiences?
So, I was wondering how many of my fellow fitness pals grew up in a really misguided food environment? And if you did, did you ever struggle with the new what your plate should look like stuff for balanced eating?
When I was growing up, most of the time the vegetable of the meal was often a starchy veggie, maybe green beans but that was rare. I didn't realize so many wonderful veggies even existed. I didn't realize half my plate should have consisted of said veggies. It was almost shocking to me, but it shouldn't have been haha. I didn't understand how people could possibly do that, until I started making an effort to eat more balanced meals. It's been a huge learning experience, and I still have so much to learn.
Anyone with similar experiences?
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Not really. Maybe it's because I'm old, but when I was growing up we pretty much always had meat, some kind of starchy veg (bread, potato, corn, maybe rice), and then vegetables. Probably about a third each vs. the half plate of veg, but increasing my portion of veg and otherwise going back to how I ate as a kid when I improved my diet some years ago wasn't too tough. Since being an adult and living in a more metropolitan area (and being exposed to some good restaurants and different ethnic cooking and the like) I do eat proteins other than meat and a much more diverse selection of dishes than we did, though, as my family's cooking was pretty unadventurous (I'd call it very midwestern American).
Anyway, I always thought of this, and the idea that you should have vegetables with lunch and dinner (sometimes it was just fruit with breakfast) was the standard American diet, as it was pretty much how I remember everyone eating as a kid and it's what my mother thought was responsible to prepare even though she hated cooking (I didn't know that until later). Obviously, I was naive or else things changed, probably both.4 -
CrescentVolf wrote: »Hi!
So, I was wondering how many of my fellow fitness pals grew up in a really misguided food environment? And if you did, did you ever struggle with the new what your plate should look like stuff for balanced eating?
When I was growing up, most of the time the vegetable of the meal was often a starchy veggie, maybe green beans but that was rare. I didn't realize so many wonderful veggies even existed. I didn't realize half my plate should have consisted of said veggies. It was almost shocking to me, but it shouldn't have been haha. I didn't understand how people could possibly do that, until I started making an effort to eat more balanced meals. It's been a huge learning experience, and I still have so much to learn.
Anyone with similar experiences?
My family mainly had canned vegetables when I was growing up. We had some variety but they were mushy and not very interesting. I ate what I was given.
When my dd was small we didn't have much money and I saved a lot of the vegetables, fruits and dairy for her. It became a habit to eat less of those foods so even when finances improved I didn't eat as much of them.
Now I eat a lot more fresh or frozen vegetables and prepare them in different ways. I don't follow any strict rule like half my plate at every meal should be vegetables but try to eat several servings a day. I'm doing better than I used to with that.
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We had a vegetable at dinner most nights but often steamed & overcooked. I starred eating more vegetables when I discovered roasting. Now I love most vegetables and eat a whole lot more.2
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I grew up being taught that I had to eat meat to be healthy and I'd get in trouble for not eating it or pushing as much of it as possible out of my burritos. Turned out that not true. I don't eat it anymore.3
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We had a family garden in our back yard. My mother taught my sis and me how to prepare the veggies.2
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I have a vivid memory when I was about six, refusing to eat my peas. Olive green from the can, boiled long enough to sterilize, and shrunken to little shrivelled things. It was a standoff and I think I won.4
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Another memory of raiding the garden for baby carrots, washed off (sort of) with the garden hose. The dirt likely supplied extra minerals and microflora.6
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I was always fed a wide veriety of foods. When i was 10 i choose to become a vegetarian (didnt last long) and my mom went over the top to make it work for me. My household was filled with chips, cookies, snacks, frozen food, and soda. It was also filled with fruits, veggies, protein, and grains. My mom taught me at a young age that life is about balance. If i eat those pizza rolls for lunch i had extra broccoli at dinner.3
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I grew up in an environment where the starch made the meal. Meat and veg were just incidental. So we would have a mountain of rice on the plate, with a few small pieces of pork, beef, chicken, or lamb, and just perhaps one leaf of lettuce or two slices of tomato or a bit of shredded carrot. Starch could also be potatoes or pasta but similarly in large portions. Likewise, the meat could be varied to include fish.
My wife grew up in a different environment where the meat made the meal. Then they would just have two or three small potatoes with whatever meat was being served, and perhaps a bit more veg than I usually got in my home. Our early married life was interesting, because no way would I only eat two potatoes in a meal!!
Somewhere in my working life I was taught about the Healthy Food Plate - half veg, quarter meat, quarter starch, but I never accepted it as a plan for me. Then my wife started to read a lot of stuff due to her mother becoming diabetic, and she wanted to take preventative measures for herself. Still didn't think it applied to me.
Now the doctor has suggested I'm pre-diabetic and could fix my condition by losing a small amount of weight. I've joined the MFP program and increased my exercise, while adjusting my food plate. My wife is gladly policing what I eat, and is very good at measuring that half plate of vegetables. Sometimes I still complain there wasn't enough rice, or potato, or pasta, but overall the adjustment hasn't been too difficult.
I actually hit the target the doctor set for me yesterday on my 129th day.11 -
Yes. We had a great big plate of meat and a heaping pile of mashed potatoes or rice and then some afterthought out of a can. I thought I didn't like vegetables, because they all tasted like the can they came in and were so mushy. Turns out I actually like green beans and all sorts of other vegetables. I surprised myself last week by eating and liking kale. People say kale is gross and a chore to eat. They are WRONG. I can't say I eat like I'm supposed to (see my log), but I can say that vegetables are actually not gross and that I'm eating more than I was before.4
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Most of the vegetables we ate when I was growing up were in the daily soup bowl. When in season, we had fresh lettuces, cabbage, tomatoes, cucumber, peppers, radishes, onions, corn, beans; however these vegetables were more of a garnish to the main meal, providing about 1 serving of vegetable per person. The main meal usually included several forms of cooked vegetable besides the protein. When not in season, many of our vegetables were fermented for storage or canned in glass jars. When I was grown up, my parents had a couple of freezers and then we would be able to have vegetables out of season that had been frozen in small packages instead of fermented or canned. My parents stored root vegetables in a cold cellar so we had potatoes, carrots, beets, cabbage, and turnips available for some months past their growing season, and dried beans/peas ... and yes I was brought up on a farm so my parents' grocery shopping usually consisted of staples that could not had on the farm.
PS ... and squashes, pumpkins ... yumm2 -
My mom made a huge point of every dinner having a veggie side dish in addition to whatever starch. She also paid attention to color and type, so she'd sometimes realize when it was too late and apologize "I'm sorry dinner is so beige tonight." She taught me corn and potatoes don't count as veggies. We had a lot of carrots, broccoli, cabbage. Beets, cauliflower. Yes to green beans sometimes, but lightly steamed. What wasnt' fresh was frozen rather than canned (mom's dad worked in public health in the 1960s and was a big proponent of frozen really early on).
For the record, my mom is the result of Home Ec classes in the 1950s. She was born during wartime and her mother was big in the Victory Gardening movement in their town. My grandma had a big garden every year until she got sick the year before she died.2 -
I had the opposite experience, my mum piled the veggies on our plate when i was a kid, plus made us drink her fruit and veggie juice concoctions regularly :sick: Even now, if i go stay with her on weekends she makes me eat my veggies, and i'm 44 (but still her baby) lol2
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My mom made a huge point of every dinner having a veggie side dish in addition to whatever starch. She also paid attention to color and type, so she'd sometimes realize when it was too late and apologize "I'm sorry dinner is so beige tonight." She taught me corn and potatoes don't count as veggies. We had a lot of carrots, broccoli, cabbage. Beets, cauliflower. Yes to green beans sometimes, but lightly steamed. What wasnt' fresh was frozen rather than canned (mom's dad worked in public health in the 1960s and was a big proponent of frozen really early on).
For the record, my mom is the result of Home Ec classes in the 1950s. She was born during wartime and her mother was big in the Victory Gardening movement in their town. My grandma had a big garden every year until she got sick the year before she died.
Again environment matters. Here lots of people thought "frozen" was equivalent to stale. In my wife's country they spoke of "fresh frozen" and understood that fresh food didn't quickly deteriorate after freezing it. Part of my job involves the marketing of frozen veg, and it is quite clear from shopping trends, that only a specific segment of our population uses this type of product.1 -
I'm so envious of all of these posts about people who had all these veggies growing up. My entire family hates them. We're from Cuba and my grandmother and mother grew up VERY poor - their veggies and side dishes were things like fried plantains and yucca, lots of avocados and root vegetables, beets occasionally... things you'd normally find on a poor small farm on a tropical island - so my grandmother never really learned to cook a lot of vegetables and my mother never learned to cook at all - so I'm the one gently introducing a new vegetable side dish every year at Thanksgiving, etc. There's such a great big world of food variety out there - I don't take it for granted that I'm in a position to enjoy that more than my parents and grandparents were.6
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It's nice to see soany who grew up with their parents instilling a knowledge and love for veggies! I know when I have kids, I will be doing that.
Also nice to know I'm not alone when it comes to the meat making the meal growing up, or maybe the starch. Haha0 -
I had the opposite. My mom was a vegan (and so was i) for the first 5 years of my life. We then transitioned into eating eggs and milk, but i've been a vegetarian my whole life. All of my meals were "health food". I remember my mom used to buy my sister and I the packets of kool-aid flavoring that you're supposed to mix with sugar and water and she would just put it in a giant pitcher. We were drinking essentially colored water thinking it was kool-aid (believe me, the first time i tried real kool-aid i almost died from shock).
I didn't have soda until in my teens and "junk" food was never around. It was a SERIOUS treat if I had something like candy or ice cream. These were generally limited to my birthday or christmas and in very small quantities.
edit: p.s. when i moved out on my own and could eat all the junk food i liked, THIS is when i gained like 20 pounds. I ate ramen, cheese fries, cheese pizza, pasta roni, ranch on everything, ice cream, bean burritos, you name it; damn near every single day!
Now after 5 years of maintaining my weight loss i eat a combination of both diets. I eat "health" foods, but i also eat some of those "junk" foods i love.4 -
We were a meat and potatoes household. We had lots of fresh veggies in the summer, but winter in the midwest is all about chili & cornbread, thick stews, and giant roasts. It took me years as an adult to convince my parents that peas and corn are starches, not vegetables.
To this day, i dread going back to my fiance's family's house for thanksgiving. My MIL tends to make one or two huge meals and we eat them all week. Last year that consisted of the following: pulled pork, brisket, ham, macaroni and cheese, "cheesy corn" (it involves a block of velveeta and two blocks of cream cheese), mashed potatoes, bread, and cookies. For four straight days I did not eat a single vegetable. I was so sick on the flight home...0 -
A meat, a starch, a veg and a "salad." The "salad" was in its own little side dish and was not necessarily what one might consider a salad today. Among the favorites was a slice of canned jellied cranberry sauce on a leaf of iceberg with a dollop of mayonnaise on top. Jello salads abounded also served on the ubiquitous leaf of iceberg and the glob of Hellman's. A half a canned peach (in heavy syrup, of course), iceberg, mayo. I'm dating myself and my mom's cooking, aren't I.3
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HeidiCooksSupper wrote: »A meat, a starch, a veg and a "salad." The "salad" was in its own little side dish and was not necessarily what one might consider a salad today. Among the favorites was a slice of canned jellied cranberry sauce on a leaf of iceberg with a dollop of mayonnaise on top. Jello salads abounded also served on the ubiquitous leaf of iceberg and the glob of Hellman's. A half a canned peach (in heavy syrup, of course), iceberg, mayo. I'm dating myself and my mom's cooking, aren't I.
this sounds like my grandmother's "waldorf" salad, and other monstrosities.2 -
I grew up eating my veggies...we pretty much always had meat, some kind of starch/grain, and veg. My parents and grandparents were also avid gardeners...my grandma in particular had a massive garden and seasonal vegetables pretty much year around.0
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There was not a ton of variety in my home growing up. We did the basic broccoli, cauliflower, squash, zucchini, potatoes and spinach mostly. Sometimes there would be rutabaga, asparagus or beets. We didn't have a whole lot of money in the budget so my mom just did the best she could with 6 people in the family.0
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Sometimes "salad" was canned pears, apricots, or peaches with cottage cheese on top and a dab of mayo. My mom insisted -- vehemently -- that Jello was dessert, not salad.
IF she sounds strident it is because she was fighting a losing battle in the 1970s rust belt. Jello was salad AND dessert. And bake sale treats (Finger jello, anyone?)
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CrescentVolf wrote: »It's nice to see soany who grew up with their parents instilling a knowledge and love for veggies! I know when I have kids, I will be doing that.
Also nice to know I'm not alone when it comes to the meat making the meal growing up, or maybe the starch. Haha
Wish you luck with the kids. We have three, and thought each time we'd do better than the one before. None of them were ever "proper" eaters. With all good intentions, it never worked out, because we never felt comfortable punishing or forcing them to eat what they didn't want, as our parents and grandparents tried to do.0 -
CrescentVolf wrote: »It's nice to see soany who grew up with their parents instilling a knowledge and love for veggies! I know when I have kids, I will be doing that.
Also nice to know I'm not alone when it comes to the meat making the meal growing up, or maybe the starch. Haha
Wish you luck with the kids. We have three, and thought each time we'd do better than the one before. None of them were ever "proper" eaters. With all good intentions, it never worked out, because we never felt comfortable punishing or forcing them to eat what they didn't want, as our parents and grandparents tried to do.
Sometimes you have to be a little tough with them. I wasn't allowed to leave the table until I'd finished all of my veggies, It's just how it was, it didn't mentally scar me or anything. I did the same with my kids, and now as adults they love veggies.0 -
We never had a lot of veggies. I don't really give my kids half a plate of veggies either though... but they have to eat them if they want dessert!1
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I have always had a lot of veggies and loved them. As a kid I would pile up my plate with them until there was no room left for other items, often requiring a second plate for the rest of my food, and I continue to do that to this day. My diet shock was grains. I could not fathom how 1/2 cup would be a serving. That's so tiny! I'm used to grains being the base of my meals and often considered 2-3 cups to be a normal serving. I still refuse to eat just half a cup, I do 150-200 grams of cooked grains (about a cup?).
No shocks with protein. I've always had just a bit of meat, if any. A 85 gram (3 ounce) serving is pretty respectable and about twice the amount I would usually go for if it's a type of meat I'm willing to eat. If it's something I don't eat, then zero meat for that day.
My parents did not make me eat vegetables. I liked them anyway and it didn't even occur to me that refusing to eat them was an option or something other people did. It was just how everyone ate, including all the kids I knew, so it was a non issue. Snacking on fruits and veggies was pretty common among kids.1 -
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We didn't really have veggies growing up. Unless the tiny carrots in frozen pot pies counts as veggies.
Frozen dinner veggies, and once in a while canned green beans. That was about it.
Until I started asking for them and putting them in the cart myself. Those choices were based on what friends' moms served. This was in the mid 70s.0
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