How many portions of fruit and veg do you really eat a day?

[KitKat1985]

I know the goal is to eat at least 5, but I generally come in at about 3-4 pieces a day, which I don't think is too bad, but I wonder if I'm just being a bit slack compared to the average person.

So can I ask how many portions of fruit and / or veg you really eat a day on average?

Seniorschoolmum I might be wrong, but I don't think each of those will count as a portion - I don't think I'd eat a bean salad with 1.5 celery sticks in for example, and you'd need 2 satsumas per "portion" . Sounds delicious though!

See here www.nhs.uk/live-well/eat-well/5-a-day-portion-sizes/

To answer the OP - I probably eat 3 on a bad day, upto 6 on a good day. I think it's also about what you are replacing, but just how much fruit/veg you eat. Ideally it would be more veg than fruit too.

*not just how much fruit/veg

ohluckyme I work on a large handful being one portion. So the soup is 3 celery sticks, one large pepper, large onion, 400g can of tomatoes, 400g can of beans
About 10 cherry tomatoes with the gnocchi

Weighing things involves getting the scales out - too much hassle for a weekday supper.

I can be a bit annoyingly smug on this thread. My usual lunch is 7 full portions of veg

• Half a can of chickpeas, blitzed (1 portion, with fresh lemon juice and a garlic clove - but don't count them).
• Two different coloured peppers, sliced (half pepper = 1 portion. So 4 portions).
• Three full celery stalks (1.5 stalks = 1 portion. So 2 portions)

I have that Mon-Fri and often at the weekend too. Although I sometimes have a massive salad for lunch at the weekends.

I don't usually have breakfast and don't snack. Family dinner will always include veg. I usually aim for 3 portions per person, but can be in the range of 2-4 portions each.

So 8-10 vegetable portions plus 1 pulses portion and occasionally (2 or 3 times a week) 1 fruit portion as desert or breakfast.

On average 10 portions per day, in total

Gosh I don't think I could ever afford to eat 10-15 portions a day!

Between 1 and 7 I'd say. Average 3 or 4 probably, I don't count. Have berries and grapes or other fruit on breakfast every day. Sometimes something salad like for lunch usually with a piece of fruit. Dinner might be a big salad or something with veg. I should probably eat more portions.

Yesterday, grapes and raspberries with breakfast, today same but with fresh orange juice
Lunch, half a pizza and a huge tomato, avocado and mozzarella salad, today pate on toast
Dinner no fruit or veg, tonight frittata with mushrooms and a big salad.

Quite a few. I'm experimenting with skipping breakfast at the moment, but if I were still eating it:

Fresh berries with muesli and Greek yoghurt (and an apple juice if home)

Lunch: if home probably poached eggs with half an avocado on toast, or a salad (lettuce, toms, avo, celery, artichoke hearts), or a veg soup. If at work, maybe leftovers from previous night, say 1 potion F&V.

Followed by some fruit - 2 satsumas, a few plums, some melon and pineapple, whatever I've picked up.

Dinner - if something like spag Bol, there will usually be a tonne of veggies, if 'meat and 2 veg' type meal, will be 2-3 different veg.

I think I'd normally get to 5 portions as a minimum.

3 probably, but I generally only eat one meal.

In answer to what I eat a day. On a typical day:

Breakfast: Cereal with milk / yogurt.
Lunch: Veg soup / sandwich with salad in, with fruit and a yogurt / crisps. (So normally 2 portions at lunch).
Dinner: Usually something like pasta with a couple of portions of veg in.

So about 4 a day. I tend to eat on 'the run' a lot or whilst I'm working. Cost is a factor too. I thought the above was fairly typical, but some of you seem to eat a lot more fruit and veg than me!

[Waves to Fate]

Fruit - I have the same every day. Grapes, a banana and a glass of orange juice.

I don't each veg every day be honest. I'm making a chilli tonight and there will be tomatoes in that but that's it. Tomorrow I'll be having fish pie with peas and carrots.

I don't think about it much, I'm not fanatical about eating 5 portions a day.

I thought they have to be different types of fruit/veg to count? So even if you eat two peppers that’s only counted once?

I vary between 1-10. I love veg but some days am lazy.

On the official advice it has to be portions of different fruit/veg, so eating double peppers etc still only counts as one portion. A single portion is 80g.

I get around 5 on a good day if I'm meal-planning and actively trying to up my fruit/veg intake. On a bad day with toast for breakfast and a sarnie for lunch it can be lower . I am currently aiming for 10 a day though, so we'll see how that goes!

1-2 with breakfast, fruit with cereal/ granola.
2 at lunch - one fruit, one either veg soup/ salad, 2 at dinner. Another 1 either fruit or carrot sticks as a snack.
5-7- On a good/ normal day. On a bad day 3!

I don't have an average diet anymore (Paleo type to help with MS.)

Usual diet is:
Breakfast/lunch: 1/2 avocado, big handful of salad leaves, chunk of cucumber and a tin of mackerel in olive oil. I don't work so usually have my first meal around 11.00am.

Dinner: Steamed/baked filet of salmon/cod, 1/3 punnet mushrooms, a courgette and ginger.
I didn't include the crisps that keep calling me from the cupboard
I'm meant to aim for 9 or 10 portions but I'm honestly not that hungry because I'm not very active so not burning many calories.

Before I changed my diet I'd manage about 4 portions of veg.
I don't eat fruit and I'm told you don't actually need fruit. I makes me mourn all the time wasted trying to get ds to eat fruit and worrying.

Dh and ds(21) don't eat any veg. This isn't because I'm not able to cook for them often. When I do, they eat the veg I put on their plate usually. Lazy fuckers.

• this is because I'm not able to cook for them (they cook their own.)

None.

Don't like veg. Or fruit too much. Get some very occasionally.
I love salad but not when it's this cold.

It'll be about six or seven today, that's fairly typical. I get two in at breakfast, which is what makes the difference.

I usually try and put at least 3-4 different veg in every evening meal but don't know if each is enough to be counted as a portion, one piece of fruit a day plus pulses/salad at lunch (and sometimes raw veg as snack). Probably still not enough though.

Realistically about 3-4. Depends a lot of what I have for an evening meal. A weekend probably less.

Don't have breakfast,
lunch roll with lettuce in it (but don't count that as a portion)
Apple (1)
Sometimes a satsuma as an afternoon snack (0.5)
Dinner could be spag bol which would have onion peppers carrot and lots of tomatoes in it (2-3?) As realistcally one carrot grated through 4 portions of spag bol is barely a portion. Ditto with 2 onions. But if dinner is be chicken kiev with brocolli and new pototoes (1) so much less that day.

Some days none, some days more than the recommended amount.

one. a banana mid morning.

I don't aim for 5 portions, I aim for 10 smaller portions as lots of my portions are small.

Breakfast - usually a smoothie made with berries (fresh or frozen), almond butter, seeds and apple juice (the ingredients that count towards this), given that there are often maybe 3-6 types of berries/fruit, I can count it as a few.

Lunch has lots during the week mostly - 2 carrots, half a pepper (sometimes a quarter each of 2 colours!), half an avocado, fistful of lettuce, maybe 5/6 cherry tomatoes and the same of olives, fisftful of sugarsnap peas etc.. that usually counts as 1 portion per veg in the bowl so up to 7 (with a bonus 8th in summer if I have radishes from the garden).

I'll usually manage at least 1 apple or mandarin as a snack from my desk drawer during the day - sometimes a few pieces.

Dinner - can be nothing on bad days, usually at least 1-2 veg, and I try to do things like mixed veg stirfries etc a lot, so there are only small amounts of each but a variety of different veg involved - maybe mushrooms, onion, garlic, peppers, courgette, carrot, broccoli etc. I manage multi-veg options about 3/4 times a week.

The problems are around doing meals that DD can and will eat, in a hurry, at the end of the school/work day that are fast to prepare.

I still do some batch cooking of spag bol sauce and lasagna sauce and cottage pie dinners for the freezer that have lots of veg that are diced up in the food processor (carrots, mushrooms, courgettes, butternut squash etc) along with the onion/garlic/tomato base to the sauce. Cottage pie can have peas visible, as well as my secret ones (less mushroom but often broccoli or cauliflower work well with beef).

About 70% of my diet is vegetables. Not so much fruit because I'm not as big a fan but I do eat berries some evenings.

Not sure how many portions that is but suspect its loads. I don't eat processed foods though so the bulk of my diet is vegetables and protein.

Quite a lot at the moment im doing slimming world so immeating salad with lunch and sometimes tea plus the veg in my meal and im having over night. Oats with fruit in the moening not sure how many portions it eqiates too.