Portions are out of control in the Standard American Diet. Do you know how much food you ate yesterday? If you had meat what size of serving of meat? Whatever happened to the single burger? Few people are aware of how much food they eat. Portion sizes of today’s food tends to exceed standard serving sizes due to our past experiences at family meals, the size of servings at restaurants, supersize meals, large bakery products and larger cups of soft drinks all contribute to the problem.
Typical portion sizes and calorie content of foods in the marketplace versus calorie content and portion sizes 25 years ago.
| Food | Portion size
Calories 25 years ago |
Marketplace portion sizes
Calories now |
| Bagel | 3- inch diameter, 140 calories | 6 -inch diameter. 350 calories |
| Cheeseburger | 4.3 ounces, 343 calories | 7.1 ounces, 535 calories |
| French fries | 2.4 ounces, 210 calories | 6.9 ounces, 610 calories |
| Soft drink | 6.5 ounces, 85 calories | 20 ounces, 820 calories |
| Muffin | 1.5 ounce, 167 calories | 6.5 ounce, 724 calories |
FOOD, FACTS and FADS 