It’s mid-January, which means about a third of all the resolutions Americans made two weeks ago are already broken. I tend to make a resolution but neglect to plan the steps to help me keep it. (Or if I do plan steps, I often don’t take the time to troubleshoot the kinks.) So this year, I’m keeping it simple: I’m changing dinner plates.
If you pull out your grandmom’s china, her dinner plate is probably the size of your salad plate: Today’s average dinner plate is one-third larger than its 1960 counterpart. Our large, fashionable—well, platters—encourage us to load up on a third more food, and we eat 92% of what we serve ourselves, according to research by Brian Wansink, the director of the Cornell Food and Brand Lab, and the author of Mindless Eating. Bigger plates lead to bigger hips.
Obviously, portion control is in order, and I like Wansink’s approach. Just get smaller plates! You can save the measuring cups and scales for actual cooking, and skip the partitioned dieter’s plates that remind you of being in a school lunch room. This month, Wansink launched the Small Plate Movement Challenge: Eat one meal from a smaller plate every day for at least a month. By switching from a 12-inch plate to a 10-inch plate, you’ll cut calories by 22%. So, according to the Small Plate Movement, if your normal dinner on a 12-inch plate is around 800 calories, switch to a 10-inch plate and you’ll lose 18 pounds in a year.
One thing the Small Plate Movement doesn’t address is what to load your plate with. It’s a safe bet that a 10-inch plate full of fettuccine Alfredo isn’t what the dietitian ordered. Many dietitians, however, do teach the “plate method” of portion control: Fill half your plate with veggies, a quarter with meat or another protein, and the last quarter with starchy foods like pasta.
Easy, makes sense, effective—I’m in! If you decide your diet strategy lies in new dinnerware, don’t be tempted to pull out miniscule salad or dessert plates—Wansink’s research shows that if you switch to plates that are too small, you’ll know that you’re skimping yourself, and you’ll be tempted to pile big helpings on your plate or go back for seconds and thirds. Folks at the Small Plate Movement suggest a 10-inch plate. My usual dinner plates are 10.5 inches, so I’m switching to a 9-inch plate, which I think will be big enough to keep me from feeling deprived. Another tip: No square meals. A 10-inch square plate has about 21 square inches more surface area than a 10-inch round plate. If none of the plates in your kitchen measure up, I’ve scouted out a few suggestions in this slideshow.
How are your resolutions going? Are you switching plates? Changing what and how (or maybe even when and where) you eat? Taking on a different challenge to help you live healthier? I’d love to hear your about your weight and diet resolutions, whatever they may be, and your strategies to keep them.
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Comments (10)
I am just wondering how do you, cut out some of the breads, pasta and potatoes. I am having trouble with that.
How can someone like me lose weight when I am really a picky eater. I dont eat fruit; if I do it is an apple or a bannana. I dont eat vegetable; if I do it is yellow green beens with breadcrumbs on it and corn. I dont eat steaks, fish, tomatoes, mayonaise, ketchup etc. Can someone give me some advise on this.
I work the graveyard shift(overnights) and my eating is all out of whack. What do you suggest
There are four components of an eating strategy.Number of meals, timing of meals, and caloric content for each meal. Breakfast is biggest meal, lunch next and dinner the smallest. No eating after a certain time to allow full digestion before going to bed. Caloric control an individual decides. And remember two helpings defeats the smaller plate rule!
Yep, obviously there’s no calorie counting involved with this strategy (unless you want to). I agree, counting calories is important, especially if you’re just starting to diet and re-educating yourself about how to eat; or if you’re trying to troubleshoot problems with your diet. But most people just don’t sustain that habit for very long. And unless you’re weighing or measuring every single thing, you’re only making a ballpark guess at what you’re eating. Brian Wansink’s research shows most of us are worse than we think at eyeballing portions or estimating how many calories we’ve eaten. (Check out The McSubway Study as an example; you can also look at his research on visual cues, portion size, and dish size at the Cornell Food and Brand Lab site.) In the long run, the ultimate goal of counting calories is to make sure you’re eating less than you used to (if you’re trying to lose weight).
The Small Plate strategy makes it simple to reach that same goal of eating less — switching to a smaller plate cuts how much you eat by more than 20 percent. He’s not the only one to propose the strategy of simply cutting back: In The Step Diet, James Hill tells dieters to eat 25 percent less. It’s easy to do, it’s not fussy (it’s much more discreet than whipping out a scale at a restaurant!), it’s a habit people can live with long-term, and it’s effective.
how do you keep track of calorie intake?
I started off with a 3 day fresh veggie and fruit juice fast to cleanse out my system from all the holiday cheer. I am doing some form of exercise for at least 30 minutes a day. I am concentrating on eating whole foods and practicing portion control and staying away from junk food, caffeine and alcohol. This may sound like a tall order, but really it isn’t. The juice fast helps a lot. After you have completed a natural juice fast, your body does not crave the junk stuff. You pay more attention to what you are putting into your body and also you feel great. I am meeting a old friend for dinner in 2 week, wish me luck. To all you New Year’s Resolutioners: Here’s to striving to good health habits, peace, love and happiness!
There are two things:
The biggest thing I’m doing is trying to actually keep track of the calories I’m taking in and have going out. This is pretty effective so far.
The other is focusing on eating whole foods as much as possible and avoiding processed stuff. It’s amazing how many calories get inserted into food when it is processed.
chad, how do you keep track of calories?
There are tools all over the internet to track calories like dailyplate.com, myfitnesspal.com, and peertrainer.com. I’ve heard good things about more than just those too.