For Day #3 of our January small daily tweaks to weight loss special we’ve created a visual guide with help from dietitian Claire Donnelly to help you teach yourself adult portion size servings at-a-glance. If you’re just joining us now, scroll down to see how The Tweak Diet works
By making small tweaks to your portion sizes, you’ll rein in the calories without feeling deprived or hungry and become more alert to portion super-sizing in cafes and restaurants. Because using weighing scales for portion sizes is not always practical the following visual cues can help you quickly gauge portion sizes.
Lean meat, chicken, fish – size of an iphone
Dairy products (yogurt and milk) – enough to fill a small tea cup (250ml) or the size of a woman’s clenched fist
Cheese – a matchbox size portion
Carbohydrates (breakfast cereals, rice, pasta, noodles, grains) and serving of fruit – size of a tennis ball
Small baked potato – size of a computer mouse
Butter, margarine, mayonnaise, sugar – size of tip of your thumb
Pancake – size of a CD
How about alcohol?
Happy hour may promote that Friday feeling, but alcohol packs a lot of calories with seven calories per gram. This is second only after fat (nine calories per gram). What’s more alcohol tends to bring on the munchies. Hence the calling of the midnight kebab or local chippie.
However you can still enjoy post-work drinks without derailing your efforts to curb the calories. Opt for the light white wines such as Riesling and pinot grigio. These have less calories than the higher alcohol whites (chardonnay and sauvignon blanc) and red wines (pinot noir or syrah) .
Compared to a pina colada which has 230 calories, a 170ml glass of a light white is 140 calories. Ask for a white wine spritzer and you’ll half the calories. Another great choice is a gin or vodka with slimline tonic for 55 calories.
Your January Daily Tweak Diet guidelines:
1. Start anytime. Some of you will be starting on January 1st, but that’s not compulsory. If you’re joining us after January 1st, simply go back to Day 1 and start from there.
2. Continue with each of your small changes throughout the month and come end January, you will have built up a heap of new healthy habits and will be well on your way to losing weight and feeling better.
3. If you fall off the wagon just get back on asap If you don’t manage to keep up all your small changes every day, don’t worry. Just get back on the next day or even better, at the next meal.
4. Measure once at the start and once at the end. That’s all Take your waist, hip and bust measurements and weigh yourself at the start and end ONLY of your tweak-a-thin journey. I don’t want you getting bogged down in the numbers and would prefer you focus on how much better you’ll feel (the weight loss will happen, don’t worry)
5. Send us selfies of your tweak-a-thin journey Post them to Healthista on Twitter, Facebook and in the comments below. At the end of January we’ll publish them and you’ll be in with a chance of winning a Healthista exclusive pamper hamper handpicked by yours truly.
More posts in Healthista’s January Daily Tweak Diet
Day #1 Record everything you eat
Day #2 Drink two litres of water daily
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