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Guesstimating portions with real-world objects

Typical Portion Control Tips/Guidelines

“Deck of cards, Merlin; deck of cards,” my friend Dennis would always say as we sat down to eat ribeyes the size of kittens.

That terrific, if ignored, heuristic for estimating the desirable 3-ounce portion of beef came back to me this week with all the interest in the USDA’s mypyramid.gov site and the new dietary guidelines.

I’m a big of fan of these kinds of rules of thumb and was pleased to turn up this small collection of real-world portion size guesstimates . Here are a few of my favorites:

  • Cooked vegetables – palm of hand
  • Grilled Fish – checkbook
  • 2 TB butter, etc. – thumb (joint to tip)
  • Chopped fruit – tennis ball
  • Apple – baseball
  • Potato – computer mouse
  • Bagel – hockey puck
  • Pancake – CD ROM
  • Steamed rice – cupcake wrapper
  • Cheese – pair of dice
  • 1 oz meat – matchbox
  • 3 oz meat – bar of soap or deck of cards
  • 8 oz meat – thin paperback book

Got any other cool real-world guesstimators?


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Peter Parkes's picture

Most of them seem very...

Most of them seem very reasonable - but half an ounce of cheese? Who’s that for? A mouse? ;)

Merlin Mann's picture

Heh, I know. They’re very...

Heh, I know. They’re very modest by my estimation, but I think the idea is to make it easy to see what the nutrition label calls a portion, you know? I think a lot of people were scarfing things like potato chips thinking a portion was “a sitting” rather than, like, 5 chips or whatever. :-)

nalenb's picture

McDonald's has done all the...

McDonald’s has done all the portioning for me ;-)

finn's picture

Good luck trying to find...

Good luck trying to find a bagel the size of a hockey puck these days. On average, I think they are more than double that size now.

Matt's picture

I think Hockey Pucks =...

I think Hockey Pucks = About the size of a bagel is more helpful for me, since I have no idea how big they are.

Who made this list, a Canadian?

grubi's picture

What kind of sick freak...

What kind of sick freak only eats three ounces of meat at a time? BAH.

Lloyd's picture

Of course there's the whole...

Of course there’s the whole Libraries of Congress standard unit of data measure.

recog's picture

I notice that 2 TB...

I notice that 2 TB butter is on that list twice. If A = B and B = C, then tell whose thumb, from joint to tip, is the same size as a ping pong ball? That’s one weird thumb.

Merlin Mann's picture

It might be a metric...

It might be a metric rather than imperial ping pong ball.

sarah's picture

i kinda like the tiny...

i kinda like the tiny official portions. when i was little i used to feel really virtuous eating a big orange, because it counted as two fruits.

i’ve met a lot of people whose high school health classes used food guesstimations in reverse, to describe the size of growing fetuses (jellybean —> shrimp —> pear —> watermelon). the shrimp always creeps me out.

About Merlin Mann

Merlin Mann's picture

Bio

Merlin Mann is an independent writer, speaker, and broadcaster. He’s best known for being the guy who started the website you’re reading right now. He lives in San Francisco, does lots of public speaking, and helps make cool things like You Look Nice Today. Also? He looks like this, answers questions, and has something like a life.

Merlin’s favorite thing he’s written recently is a short essay called, “Better.”

 
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