It only takes a few hundred extra calories eaten here and there over a typical day to gradually build up and trigger a gain in weight. For example, if you are a normal weight right now, just having a couple of hundred extra calories each day could, this time next year, see you being a stone and four pounds heavier by the New Year.
Very often these extra calories come from us unwittingly eating larger portions and servings of everyday foods than we used to. Take for instance the size of an average scone. Back in the 1980’s, it would have weighed around 50g and have provide 157 calories. Now the average size of a scone from a supermarket is around 70g and if you go into a typical high street coffee shop, they can tip the scales at 190g with a whacking 600 calories.
Or think about chocolate. When we were growing up, a 50g bar was the absolute norm. Now 100g bars sit right next to them on shelves and don’t look unusual. It just looks like another bar of chocolate.
And here is the problem. We eat in portions. How many people do you know who, on picking up a now fairly standard 50g packet of crisps say: “Crisps used to come in 25g bags, so I’ll just eat half,” or “I’ll break this big bar of chocolate in half and have the rest later.” It just doesn’t really happen.
The consequence is that we end up unwittingly eating more than we think and more than we used to. Portions have, quite simply, become distorted over the last few decades and this distortion is taking its toll on our waistbands.
But it isn’t just that portions are getting bigger. Most of us wouldn’t know what the ‘30g’ size serving of breakfast cereal recommended on the box actually looks like, let alone, an average sized slice of bread or steak.
Here at Ador, we take portion size seriously. This is why our chocolate comes in 35g bars. Along with the pine nut extract it contains, which helps to keep you feeling full, 35g is quite enough – and with 179 calories, it won’t ruin your diet.
Same goes for our oat bars. They are 50g in weight. No one really needs a 100g flapjack, which you see for sale in train stations and newsagents. With 500 calories plus, they are a waste of your daily calorie intake. Our 50g bar contains Fabuless, an oat and palm oil extract, which, again, helps to keep you feeling full for just 168 calories. It is enough, believe us.
In fact, don’t believe us, give it a try for yourself and then tell us what you think.
The blog at http://tinyurl.com/yku5eyr has a useful guide to portion control that you may find helpful.
Meanwhile, the Food Standards Agency is proposing to encourage food manufacturers to offer smaller portions of their products to help people eat more healthily – http://tinyurl.com/yjeox9v
