Eat Out Eat Well

mindful eating

Do You Make 2, 20, Or 200 Food Decisions Every Day?

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Questions and Decisions

How many times a day do you think about food?  How many times a day do you make a food choice? How do your environment and surroundings influence those decisions?

People grossly underestimate how many daily food related decisions they make – not by a little but by an average of more than 221 decisions.

And, most people are either unaware of how their environment influences their decisions — or they’re unwilling to acknowledge it.

Who, What, Where, When, And How Much

In one study The Cornell Food and Brand Lab asked 139 people to estimate how many decisions they make about food and beverages during one day. Then they were specifically asked how many “who, what, where, when, and how much” decisions they made for a typical snack, beverage, and meal – and how many meals, snacks, and beverages they ate during a typical date.

14.4 VS. 226.7 Decisions

The researchers then created an index to help them estimate the number of total decisions made daily. On average, people guessed they made 14.4 food related decisions each day. Amazingly, the researchers estimated that the average person in the study made 226.7 food related decisions each day. Obese people who participated in the study made 100+ more food related decisions than overweight people.

Bowls, Plates, And Packages

Another study of 379 people analyzed the effect of environmental factors like package size, serving bowl size, and plate size on how much they ate. Half of the people were assigned to what was called “exaggerated treatment” – they had larger packages, bowls, and plates than the other half of the people in the study. On average, 73% of the people who received “exaggerated treatment” thought they ate as much as they normally would – except they actually ate 31% more than the people who ate from the regular size packages, plates, and bowls.

When they were told how much more they ate and then were asked why they thought they might have eaten more:

  • 8% admitted they might have eaten more
  • 21% said they didn’t eat more
  • 69% said that if they did eat more it was because they were hungry
  • Only 4% believed they had eaten more because of the larger sizes that acted as environmental cues.

Of the 200+ food related decisions you make each day, how many of them are heavily influenced by environmental factors like the size of food packaging and the bowls and plates you use for your food?

Can you save yourself some calories by paying attention to your food choices and decisions and by “sizing down” your bowls and plates?

Can You Deal With One Fantastic Holiday Treat A Day?

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Peppermint candy and holiday chocolates at the receptionist’s desk.  Candy canes at the dry cleaners.  A rotating selection of Christmas cookies on just about everyone’s desk.  Happy holiday food gifts from grateful clients. Your neighbor’s specialty pie. And that doesn’t include the fantastic spreads at holiday parties and family events!

It’s All So Tempting

It‘s incredibly difficult not to nibble your way through the day when you have all of these treats tempting you at every turn. How many times do your senses need to be assaulted by the sight of sparkly cookies and the holiday scent of eggnog or spiced roasted nuts before your hand reaches out and the treat is popped into your mouth?

Be Realistic

It’s the holidays and even though some of these treats are a week’s worth of calories, by depriving yourself of them you’re denying yourself the tradition of celebrating with food.

Make the distinction between mindful indulgence in the spirit of celebration as opposed to mindless indulgence in the spirit of trying to taste everything or to soothe your psyche by eating.  The first is part of the nurturing, sharing, and communal spirit of eating, the latter is an element of emotional and over eating.

Nix The Restrictive Thinking

Creating a restrictive mentality by denying yourself a treat that’s always been part of your holiday celebration means it’s just a matter of time until you start an eating fest that only ends when there’s no more left to taste. Think of this:  what would it be like to swear that you won’t eat a single Christmas cookie when those cookies have been a part of your Christmas since you were a little kid and you baked them with your Mom?

Pick One – And Make It Special

You know that you are going to indulge.  Pick your treat, limit it to one, and enjoy it. To help control the temptation, decide early in the day what your treat will be and stick with your decision. If you wait until later in the day when all the food is right in front of you and you’re hungry and tired, you’ll find that your resolve is not quite as strong!

Just remember that the added treats are added calories – on top of what your body already needs.  And, those treats are often forgotten calories – until you try to snap your jeans.  So remember to figure the treats into the overall scheme of things.

Of course, if you don’t want to indulge on any given day – no one is forcing you.  In the world of caloric checks and balances, that’s money in the band.

Make an informed choice, too.  Being informed doesn’t deprive you of deliciousness, but does arm you with an element of control.  If you know the calorie count of certain foods, you can make the best choice.  For instance, perhaps you enjoy both wine and eggnog.  If you know that one cup of eggnog has around 343 calories and 19 grams of fat and a five ounce glass of red wine has around 125 calories and no fat – which would you choose?

For more hints and tips about holiday eating get my book,  The Sensible Holiday Eating Guide: How To Enjoy Your Favorite Foods Without Gaining Weight, available from Amazon for your kindle or kindle reader.

 

Take A Cue From Athletes: Rehearse Your Party Eating Behavior

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What happens when you’re invited to a “command performance”  party or event with a long cocktail hour followed by a fancy multi-course sit down meal?  Or maybe you’re going to a gourmet holiday lunch at a friend’s house where there will be lots of hot mulled wine, her special entree, and fantastic cookies accompanying mousse for dessert. You’ve been extremely conscious about eating well but you want to be both polite and eat some of the special foods and still be careful about overindulging on high calorie foods.  How can you enjoy your food, be polite, eat what really appeals to you, and leave with your waistline intact?

What Do You Want the Result To Be?

There’s no one-size-fits-all answer since we all have our own needs and preferences. You may swoon over ten- layer chocolate cake while I can ignore it but can never pass up cheese fondue.

Part of the answer lies in figuring out what you really want the end result to be.   Then you can create your own individualized plan  — your own foodMAP — that you can use as a template for what to do when you find yourself in the land of food temptation.

Visualize

Visualizing a situation that you might find yourself in and then rehearsing your actions in your mind ahead of time will help you successfully navigate a whole host of food landmines and eating challenges. That’s a technique coaches use to prepare their athletes. They’re taught to anticipate what might happen and to practice how to respond to a situation. Sports performance improves with visualization exercises—so can eating behavior.

To do this effectively you have to be clear on what you want the end result to be. Is it to enjoy every kind of food available but in limited quantities – or is it to skip dessert but have a full range of tastes of all of the hors d’oeuvres?  Visualize what the environment will be like, where you’re going to be, and with whom. Think about what food is going to be available, how it will be served, how hungry you’re likely to be, what your usual eating pattern is like—and what you would like it to be.

Will your host insist you try her special dessert and refuse to take no for an answer? Will you be eating in a restaurant known for its homemade breads or phenomenal wine list? Are your dining companions picky eaters, foodies, or fast food junkies?  Will your host be really annoyed if you don’t finish every course at the special sit-down dinner?

Proactive Not Reactive

Be proactive.  Figure out your plan in advance — earlier in the day or the night before. Visualize the situation and if there’s temptation or anxiety, close your eyes and picture it. Imagine what people will say and how you will respond in a way that will make you proud of yourself without giving in to external pressures and food pushers.

Armed with your rehearsed plan, go out, use it, and stick to it as best you can. You assume control, not the circumstances and not the food.  You are firmly in charge of what happens and what food and how much of it will go into your mouth.

Thinking About Chowing Down At A Barbecue This Weekend?

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Memorial Day Weekend – the “unofficial” start of summer weekends. Hometown parades with floats and kids in baseball uniforms.  Veterans handing out flags.  The lazy, hazy days of summer with lots of soda and popcorn and beer.  Also lots of barbecue and desserts – and lots of seemingly never ending caloric temptation — and bathing suits to get into!

Celebration and Remembrance

Just a bit of a reminder.  It’s wonderful to celebrate the unofficial beginning of summer.  But, there’s a reason for all of the parades and flags. In the states, Memorial Day, originally called Decoration Day, is a day of remembrance for those who died in our nation’s service.  First observed on May 30th, 1868 when flowers were placed on the graves of Union and Confederate soldiers at Arlington National Cemetery, in 1971 Congress extended it into a three-day holiday weekend.

Parades, Picnics, And Barbecues

Memorial Day is a day of national ceremonies and small town parades, but also of barbecues and picnics. For many of us Memorial Day also signals the start of a whole different set of thoughts:  how to avoid the glut of cheeseburgers and hot dogs; the mayonnaise laden potato and macaroni salad; the plates full of brownies and cookies; the dripping ice cream cones (sprinkles are mandatory); the freshly baked blueberry and peach pies; and the beer, wine, soda, and lemonade to wash everything down.

Gotta Have A Plan To Handle The Food . . .

Or you might never take off the bathing suit cover-up.  So, as you remember the people who gave service to their country, please honor yourself by choosing to eat what’s best for you.  Holidays and celebrations present food challenges.  A one-day splurge is a blip that doesn’t account for much.  A one-day splurge that opens the floodgate to mindless eating all summer long is something else.

General Tips For Mindful Eating All Summer Long

  • Before you grab some tasty morsel, ask yourself if you’re really hungry.  Odds are, with a tempting display of food in front of you, you may not be hungry but you just want to eat what’s in front of you for reasons not dictated by your stomach.
  • A good question to ask yourself is:  do I really need to stand in front of the picnic table, kitchen table, or barbecue?  The further away from the food you are the less likely you are to eat it.
  • If you know that the barbecued ribs, the blueberry pie, or your cousin’s potato salad is your downfall, either build it into your food for the day or steer clear.  For most of us swearing that you’ll only take a taste is a promise doomed to fail.
  • If you’re asked to bring something to a party, picnic, or barbecue, bring food you can eat with abandon – fruit, salad with dressing on the side, berries and angel food cake for dessert (no fat in angel food cake).  That way you know you’ll always have some “go to” food.
  • Don’t show up absolutely starving.  How can you resist when your blood sugar is in the basement and your stomach is singing a chorus?
  • Really eyeball the food choices so you know what’s available.  Then make a calculated decision about what you are going to eat.
  • Take the food you have decided to eat, sit down, enjoy it without guilt, and be done with it.  No going back for seconds.
  • If you’re full, stop eating and clear your plate right away.  If it hangs around in front of you, inevitably you’ll keep picking at it.
  • Give yourself permission to eat – and enjoy — the special dessert or a burger or ribs.  If you don’t, you’ll probably be miserable and there’s some chance that you’ll get home and gobble down everything in sight – because you made yourself miserable by not eating the good stuff in the first place!  Eat what you want and enjoy it (no seconds and no first portions that are the equivalent of firsts, seconds and thirds built into one).
  • If hanging around the food gets to be too much, go for a walk, a swim, or engage someone in an animated conversation.    It’s pretty hard to shove food into you mouth when you’re talking away.

What Do Eating And Crossing The Street And Have in Common?

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Do You Look Both Ways?

Didn’t your parents teach you to look both ways before you cross the street?  The very act of looking and analyzing the situation before you step off the curb means that you are being mindful of your surroundings and aware of potential problems – like a car or bike speeding toward you.

What’s That Got To Do With Eating?

The same process – analyzing the environment and being mindful and aware of your situation — should be true with eating.

Before you pop food into your mouth do you check in with yourself and figure out if you’re really hungry?   Is your stomach growling and are you queasy and having trouble concentrating because you haven’t eaten in a long time and your blood sugar is low? Or is your desire to eat being triggered by the wafting smell of the freshly baked bread coming from the open door of a bakery or the sight of just out of the oven chocolate chip cookies?

Those are the kind of triggers that can create an irresistible urge to eat  – even if you’ve just had a good sized and satisfying meal.

What’s The Issue?

There are many situations — like the bakery trigger — when you eat in response to external cues (what you see, hear, smell, or even think) rather than mindfully checking in with your body and determining if you’re actually hungry. It’ sort of like looking both ways before you cross the street and then making your choice to cross or not to cross, isn’t it?

Check It Out And Then Make Your Decision

Let your body talk to you – and then listen to it.  Before food starts traveling the path to your mouth, stop and ask yourself if you’re really hungry or if you have head hunger  — the urge rather than the need to eat because your emotions and external cues are telling you that you should. Do you really need to eat or are your emotions sending you “feed me” messages?

Stop for a moment and look both ways before you decide to take the eating path — and then step off the curb into the street if you deem it safe and decide that’s what you want to do.