When it Comes to the Issue of Serving Size, Even Vegetables Can Be Misleading
When we think about struggles with serving size, we generally think of processed, energy-dense foods high in sugar and fat. It’s the rare individual that gets four servings out of a pint of Ben & Jerry’s or stops after eating just eleven potato chips. Serving sizes aren’t one bit realistic, but consumers might not buy the products if they saw the amount of calories and fat in the portion size they actually eat. Luckily, FDA regulations are in the pipeline that will make serving sizes more reasonable (eventually). Overall, promising efforts are underway to make consumers more aware of the contents of packaged foods – both regulatory action and nutrition education.
One thing that probably doesn’t come to mind when you think of serving size is vegetables. Vegetables are what we’re always told to eat more of! But for many folks trying to lose weight or maintain their current weight, it is important to pay attention to the amount of starchy vegetables consumed (think all types of potatoes, yams, plantains, corn, some types of squash). Unfortunately, serving size can make this difficult. According to the label on a standard bag of sweet potatoes, a serving is: 1 medium sweet potato, 5″ long & 2″ diameter (130g). This is the standard serving in many tools people use to help track what they consume in a given meal or day and stay within their targets, such as MyFitnessPal.
And this sounds like a pretty good deal: a medium sweet potato has a very reasonable 130 calories. But more often than not, folks don’t get a measuring tape or a food scale out to measure their sweet potatoes – particularly when dining out – so medium is fairly subjective. Let’s take a closer look at how a “medium sweet potato” is defined. I took the smallest sweet potato out of my bag, which I would definitely consider to be a “medium sweet potato” at most. I found that it was 400g – or approximately 3 servings!
The thing that can be particularly misleading is that sweet potatoes shrink pretty significantly when you bake them. By the time it gets to your plate, it will appear significantly smaller and you are even more likely to think you’re eating a medium sweet potato, when in reality it may be 3-4 servings.
The point is, a 130g sweet potato would actually be what most of us would consider very small – particularly by the time it makes it to our plate. This is not to say you shouldn’t eat sweet potato as part of a nutritious diet conducive with achieving and maintaining a healthy weight – in fact, much the opposite: sweet potatoes rank very highly in terms of nutrition due to their fiber and complex carbohydrates. But for folks trying to lose weight or maintain their weight, eating 250-500 calories more than you realize in a single meal can be problematic, even if it is from a highly nutritious source like a sweet potato. My point is you need to know your serving sizes, even when it comes to vegetables. Knowledge is power.
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I think everything you are saying in this article is correct, however I do want to make one point. Obviously a “medium” sweet potato is a subjective term, however you fail to address that the sweet potato bag (which is pictured) specifically says “medium/5” long & 2” diameter” so they specifically say what size sweet potato is medium. Now that might not even mater because all the sweet potatoes in that bag may be “large” even though the serving size is “medium.” However I wanted to point that out. But you make a very great point about people really needing to pay attention to the actual serving size so that they aren’t swindled into eating more than they think.
Confused by your comment. I don’t fail to address that, that is exactly what this entire post is addressing:
My post specifically notes, “according to the label on a standard bag of sweet potatoes, a serving is: 1 medium sweet potato, 5″ long & 2″ diameter (130g)” and goes onto explain that “more often than not, folks don’t get a measuring tape or a food scale out to measure their sweet potatoes – particularly when dining out – so medium is fairly subjective.”