Portion sizes (rant)

[DarcyInOregon]

K, you posted about my favorite topic, which is being heart healthy and portion control.

I am not tiny. I am 5'9" and I have about 40-50 pounds of too much body fat. I've been working on my weight loss for many years, and I lost quite a bit of weight already, slowly, over time, with permanent behavior changes. Every day my focus is portion control and choosing my foods carefully, and so I've noticed the same things you have.

Regarding the huge portions in restaurants - it is unbelievable. Not only that, it seems to me that restaurants are looking for ways to make food more fattening. For example, a local restaurant chain added hash browns filled with different cheeses and sour cream to their menu. Menu items that used to have ordinary hash browns, maybe 150 to 300 calories, now have hash browns that are probably around 1500-2500 calories because there are two layers of potatoes, not just the one, and between the layers are gobs of cheese and sour cream. And I look around, and people are eating it!

Then how about sitting down and watching t.v. and up pops the fast food commercials. I refuse to eat at fast food restaurants because they are so unhealthy; indeed I've eaten at fast food restaurants fewer than one dozen times in my life and I am 52. I think the Kentucky Fried Chicken commercial is the worse. The commercial shows the mother bringing home fried chicken with mashed potatoes, gravy, cole slaw and biscuits and putting it down on the dining room table and announcing it is dinner time. What mother in her right mind would feed her family that high-fat, high-sodium, low-nutrition, high-calorie food? Yet Americans see those commericals on t.v. and they think it is how everyone eats, and so children grow up fat. Not only that, young children now have hypertension and high cholesterol, meaning before too much longer they will be diabetics with heart disease. How sad is that?

I can go on and on. This is my favorite topic. But I better shut up before I offend a whole bunch of people.

Darcy

[mimitabby]

K, you posted about my favorite topic, which is being heart healthy and portion control.

Yet Americans see those commericals on t.v. and they think it is how everyone eats, and so children grow up fat. Not only that, young children now have hypertension and high cholesterol, meaning before too much longer they will be diabetics with heart disease. How sad is that?

I can go on and on. This is my favorite topic. But I better shut up before I offend a whole bunch of people.

Darcy

Mine too! I am very concerned about the next generation; kids that don't move around like they should and then eat horrible fatty diets!! I can go on and on. Watch the children trudging home from school (the few whose mothers don't pick them up in their cars) it makes me sick!
then they go home, do homework and watchtv playonthecomputer.

[cherinyc]

Mine too! I am very concerned about the next generation; kids that don't move around like they should and then eat horrible fatty diets!!

On a personal note, I have a younger (not little) sister. She just turned 18, so I have been out of my parents house for most of her life. My parents seem to have grown lackadaisical since my brother and I, because there was no enforcing of "no you can't have another Coke" or "no you can't have a TV/DVD player for your bedroom" or "get off the computer and go do something outside". So in turn, she has had a weight problem since she was 12 (by about 70 pounds now).
The last time we all had dinner, I watched her go through about 7 restaurant lemonades. (I work for a pharmaceutical company that specializes in Diabetes Treatments) Seeing her consume all that sugar just killed me.
My brother and I - for years - tried talking to my parents about this, but their response was that when they tried to say something that she got upset. HELLO??? What's the price of sitting by while your daughter develops type 2 diabetes right in front of your eyes?
Don't get me started on how our society is going to slowly kill itself off.

[cherinyc]

For example, a local restaurant chain added hash browns filled with different cheeses and sour cream to their menu. Menu items that used to have ordinary hash browns, maybe 150 to 300 calories, now have hash browns that are probably around 1500-2500 calories because there are two layers of potatoes, not just the one, and between the layers are gobs of cheese and sour cream. And I look around, and people are eating it!
Darcy

I think the same thing about IHOP. I actually like their omelettes (egg-white) and their multi-grain pancakes (though I can barely finish 1, and they give me 3 WITH my huge omelette).
But the big promotion there will be something like "Rolled-battered-stuffed-puffed-caramel...double dipped-stuffed and smothered in whipped cream- French Toast.
What in the world is up with that? How could anyone in their right mind consume something like that for breakfast?

[chickwhorips]

But the big promotion there will be something like "Rolled-battered-stuffed-puffed-caramel...double dipped-stuffed and smothered in whipped cream- French Toast.
What in the world is up with that? How could anyone in their right mind consume something like that for breakfast?

i think thats just one meal for the day kinda promotion. so you would be saving money in the long run, right?

[Eden]

So I've been sitting here reading this thread and the TV is on. So far in a about 10 mins there have been at least 3 commercials about food - ribs, deep fried chicken nuggets and MickeyD's. Yup we put way too much emphasis on bad food in this country. When was the last time you saw a commerical about tofu?