No Need for Portion Control Plates—Dietitian-Approved Tips for Easily Sizing Up Your Meals
Plus get expert tips for eating out without derailing your goals
Portion control is a cornerstone of intuitive eating, quieting food noise and weight loss. But it can be a bit challenging to achieve when you don’t have a food scale or labeled portion control plates on hand. To help take away some of the measurement guesswork, we asked experts to share their top tips for creating well-balanced portion control plates for weight loss.
How to practice portion control for weight loss
Dietitians say there’s no strict outline for portioning the food on your plate, especially since this will vary by meal and your personal dietary needs. But here are a few helpful options to consider.
A general rule of thumb is to fill half of your plate with vegetables and fruits, one quarter with lean proteins and the remaining quarter with whole grains, says Chris Mohr, PhD, RD, Fitness and Nutrition Expert for Fortune Recommends.
Woman's World Answers
Of course, quality is equally important as quantity. Specifically, it can be helpful to focus on non-starchy vegetables for half your plate and carbohydrates that are high in fiber, explains Michael Hershey, MS, RDN, Registered Dietitian Nutritionist at TeachMe.To and Owner of Michael Hershey Nutrition. You might also include healthy fats in smaller amounts, he says.
Adjust your portions throughout the day
When it comes to balancing your portions for weight loss, “the most important factors to consider are your schedule and your most active parts of the day,” says Brittany Werner, MS, RDN, director of coaching at Working Against Gravity, an online nutrition coaching program. “You should aim to consume a larger carbohydrate meal around your most active times in the day, as carbohydrates provide the quick energy needed for activities.”
Additionally, Hershey says it’s totally understandable not to have half a plate of non- starchy veggies first thing in the morning with breakfast (thought one way you could do this would be to include them in an omelet or skillet). But you would still want to see some kind of protein and high fiber carb, or protein and an unsaturated fat.
How to estimate portions for weight loss
While portion control plates serve as a visual guide, you don’t have to change up your dishware to know if you’re hitting your mealtime goals. The hand method is one of a dietitians’ favorite ways to measure portions, says Destini Moody, RD, sports nutritionist for Garage Gym Reviews. It’s convenient and the size of a person’s hand is proportionate to their body size, which allows for compensation of how that body size influences portion size, she explains.
So how exactly do you practice the hand method to estimate recommended serving sizes? You want your meat, fish or tofu to be about the size of your palm, carbs such as potatoes or pasta to be the size of a cupped hand and fruits and vegetables to at least match a clenched fist, she offers.
“Though healthy fats aren’t required to make up a balanced meal, fats like peanut or almond butter should be portioned to the size of your thumb, while butter and oils shouldn’t be bigger than a thumbnail in a meal,” Moody adds. “For nuts and seeds, a cupped hand is about a serving.”
Why a smaller plate helps with portion control
Using a smaller plate is helpful as a visual cue, says Werner. It limits the amount of food you serve yourself in one sitting and can help you feel full with less food, since your brain partially relies on visual cues to signal satiety.
A typical dinner plate is 10-12 inches, so opting for something smaller, like a 7-inch salad plate, can make an impact on your total volume, she says.
To make sure you’ll still feel full and satisfied with smaller portions, include plenty of fiber-rich vegetables, hearty grains and proteins, advises Mohr.
How to practice portion control for weight loss at restaurants
Of course, it’s more challenging to manage portions while eating out as we have less control over food preparation. “A restaurant’s food portions are generally larger in order to give consumers a greater sense of value for the money,” says Moody. “We often feel like we need to clean our plates to justify the cost.”
But you can still achieve your weight loss goals with a few smart tricks.
Ask for a to-go box before your entree arrives
“You can ask for a to-go box to come before your entree arrives and immediately portion half of your meal into the box to take home for later,” suggests Moody. “If you put this extra portion out of sight and tell yourself that what’s on your plate is what you’re having for dinner, this ‘out of sight, out of mind approach’ can help you control portions. You can always go back for more if you’re still hungry.”
Share an entree
Another option is to consider either sharing an entrée with someone or choosing one or two appetizers as your meal, says Mohr. This helps you still enjoy your favorite fare without being tempted to overindulge.
Listen to your body
It’s also important to be attuned to your body’s hunger and fullness cues even while out at a restaurant, adds Hershey. You should focus on leaving the restaurant comfortably full, he says. How do you know if you’re full without being overstuffed? Instead of asking yourself if you’re full, ask yourself if you’re not hungry anymore. This mindset shift helps you focus on meeting a need (hunger) rather than eating until you’ve completely filled your stomach.
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