To Clean Your Plate or Not... Portion Control

You will clean that plate before getting up from this table!

Sound familiar?  Most of us have either said these very words or heard them at some point in our lives.  The thought was that there are people out in the world less privileged.  These people will go to bed and possibly wake up with an empty stomach.  We should not be wasteful of the gifts we have been given; therefore, cleaning your plate was the only option.

I think this mentality has helped Americans on our road to obesity.  We have been cleaning our plates so often that many of us no longer know what it feels like to be full (or for that matter, hungry).  If people would take the time to place the correct amounts of food on our plates, the wastefulness would diminish greatly.

I guess what I mean is that if we load our plates with the right amounts of lean proteins and complex carbs in the way of fruits and vegetables cleaning our plates will become very doable.

For one, most clean eating foods are less dense and more satisfying than the processed, dense counterparts.  Clean foods are packed full of vitamins and nutrients vital to our bodies' health and wellbeing.  When we detox our bodies of all the garbage we have been ingesting, our bodies will naturally crave those things.

Portion control is at the very foundation of making that clean plate a reality without forcing someone to simply eat for the sake of eating.

 Here are some guidelines to follow:

• 1 meat serving is about the size of your palm
• 1 grain serving is about the size of 1 hand lightly cupped
• 1 fruit or veggie serving is about the size of both your hands cupped together.

If we follow the portion control guidelines and prepare clean, healthy food options, cleaning your plate will be a breeze.  Plus, you will be giving your body the portions needed to thrive without the worry of overeating in the process.