During the summer months with the kids out of school, we tend to relax and not worry too much about our food choices because we are on “vacation”. While relaxing is much needed, we also need to be careful about our portions. The easiest way to determine your portions, without measuring them is using your hands.

Simple guidelines to follow include:

Meat or protein portion = palm of hand width and thickness

Starch (whole wheat pasta, brown rice, corn on the cob, sweet potatoes) = your fist

Non-starchy vegetables (salads, steamed broccoli, asparagus, green beans) = as much as two big handfuls

Fruit = ½ the size of your fist (If fruit is not available when dining out, bring your own or have an additional ½ serving of starch.)

These simple guidelines can be very helpful especially when eating out to “guesstimate” right-sized portions! So the next time you are unsure of how much to eat, think about using your hand as your guide.

 

Interested to see if you know correct portion sizes?

Follow this link for a quick quiz to see if you can select the correct portions: https://www.choosemyplate.gov/supertracker-tools/portion-distortion.html