I left off last week talking about some of the flaws in the information provided by the MyPlate site. Again, I’m not a doctor or a dietician; these observations come from what worked for me. Folks should always check with their doctors before they make any big diet or exercise changes.
One of the biggest flaws is that the system doesn’t account for special conditions, particularly metabolic variances, such as diabetes. Foods often contain more than one macronutrient, but when they are classified, they are usually identified as the macronutrient they contain in the highest concentration. For example, beans are identified as a protein. They do indeed contain a lot of protein. But they also contain carbohydrates, the macronutrient it is most important for diabetics to monitor.
The other major flaw is the units of measurement the site uses. For example, in one of their sample diet plans, some of the food items are measured by weight (such as meat), but others are measured by volume or sight. This is done intentionally to make diet control easier. The trouble is measuring solids by volume or sight is inaccurate. For example, in this menu plan, you should have a medium banana for breakfast on day 3. But what is a medium banana? Which of these two would you pick?
The banana on the right weighs 21 grams more than the one on the left.
This isn’t much of problem when a food, such as lettuce, is low-calorie, but it can be a huge difference in a high-calorie item, such as peanut butter. That same diet plan calls for using measuring spoons for peanut butter.
When you fill a measuring spoon with a solid, do you round it? Leave a little space? Keep it level? It all depends!
This visual aid is simple to understand but it doesn’t account for the size of the plate or the weight of the food.
You’ve probably all heard the that your serving of protein should be about the size of a deck of cards, or your serving of rice should be the size of your fist. These tips are great for some people!
Others, like me, will round that measuring spoon, either intentionally or subconsciously, and wind up eating hundreds to thousands more calories than we need. Measuring by sight and volume is common in the United States but it’s less common elsewhere. I suspect the metric versus imperial systems play a role here.
I admit to feeling a bit obsessive when I bought my first food scale. It seemed like a bridge too far; but after really thinking about it, it made a lot of sense to me. Going back to my car analogy from earlier, it would be stupid to put gasoline into my car without tracking how much I was putting in. Humans don’t have automatic stops like cars do. Some of us are able to tell when we’ve had enough food and are able to stop eating. Others, like me, lack that capability. For me, weighing my food has had the best results and I still consider my first food scale purchase as the number one tool and reason I’ve had the success I’ve had. I’ll share more about my habits next week!