Many people are unaware of correct portion sizes and assume that bigger is better. Fast food restaurants are notorious for promoting larger portion sizes because they have the option to make the meal even larger. In order to remain competitive in the fast food industry, each chain offers its own deal to give you a lot more food for just a few cents more than a regular-sized meal. Restaurants have their own terms used to describe these extra large meals. Some terms include Combo, King-Sized, Super-Sized, Value-Meal, Biggie, and All-You-Can–Eat. An article from WebMD News by Sid Kirchheimer discusses that extra large portions are not just at fast food places but also in supermarkets, candy bar sizes, baked goods, and movie theater popcorn sizes. Kirchheimer explains that in 1908 the original Hershey bar was 0.6 oz. Today the smallest individual candy bar made is twice that big. He mentions that 30 years ago, bottles of Budweiser were 7 oz and are now available in 40-oz bottles. He say that, as a result of these bigger portion sizes, Americans on average eat about 200 calories more daily than they did 10 years ago.
Other examples of increasing portion sizes include:
| 20 Years Ago | Today | |||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Food | Portion | Calories | Portion | Calories |
| Bagel | 3" diameter | 140 | 6" diameter | 350 |
| Cheeseburger | 1 | 333 | 1 | 590 |
| Spaghetti | 1 cup sauce, 3 sm meatballs | 500 | 2 cups sauce, 3 lg meatballs | 1,020 |
| Soda | 6.5 ounces | 82 | 20 ounces | 250 |
| Blueberry muffin | 1.5 ounces | 210 | 5 ounces | 500 |
References:
Kircheimer, S. (2003). Even Hershey Bars, Beer Are Supersized Today. Retrieved August 25, 2008, from Web MD News Archive. www.webmd.com/news/20030131/popular-foods-growing-with-waistlines?page=2&print=true
National Heart, Lung and Blood Institute Portion Distortion http://hin.nhlbi.nih.gov/portion/index.htm.
