Do you find it easy to eat your 5 potions of fruit and veg daily?

[CatteryCatss]

I have a yoghurt bowl for breakfast each day with at least 3 portions of fruit in (usually strawberries, raisins, raspberries and banana chips)

Then I’ll have around two portions of veg with whatever I’m having for dinner e.g. mixed salad and corn on the cob with a burger or green beans and carrots with cheesy pasta.

I think I’d really struggle if I ate my five portions individually, though!

I eat a lot of fruit and veg
I have a fruit and veg smoothie in the morning
a bean and veg soup for lunch most days
stews in the evening with beans and veg
ive been vegetarian since 1980 so I guess I’ve got used to a veggie diet without all the recent processed stuff. Plus i was a student for a long time and so leant to eat cheaply

@wooliegloves despite my veggie stats I can’t believe I didn’t know chickpeas were vegetables 😳, I always thought they were a sort of bean 🥴

That’s my thought too- there’s absolutely no way I could eat the volume of food that entails! I can eat 10 different things but I assume that that your list @stealthsquirrelnutkin includes only sprinklings of a number of these?
I imagine that if you included a few herbs, nuts etc then I eat nearer 15 a day but I thought it was the portions that counted?

I imagine that if you included a few herbs, nuts etc then I eat nearer 15 a day but I thought it was the portions that counted?

There's two different ideas being discussed on this thread, both of which are useful.

One is 5-10 'portions' of fruit and veg a day. Eating a good quantity of (mostly non starchy) plants has been shown to be correlated with health/longevity. A big pile of cooked broccoli or greens every day can be two portions.

The other is 30 different plants a week. That can be smaller quantities and includes a wider range of plants including grains and nuts. This is reckoned to support a good microbiome. The Zoe project is continuing to research this, their recommendations may change as more data is acquired and analysed.

Of course it is easy to eat that volume unless you have a stapled stomach or the like - in which case - do you really have a healthy relationship with food that should be promoted?

You might have to eat less of other stuff

Let's get to 10

An apple and a handful ( 5 ?) of strawberries part of breakfast - with plain yogurt, a slice of toast or whatever -2 portions - that's not hard

Lunch a 2cm chunk of cucumber , 4 pepper slices and one celery stick with say hummus ( oops extra chickpeas in that )
Or a large bowl of thick veggie soup - onion carrot and sweet potato ( I'd ad lentils there which would be protein but also extra veg) - 3 ( or 4 for Zoe variety purposes ) - one soup bowl isn't too much food for most people !

Dinner - peas, broccoli, sweetcorn and carrots ( just one portion of each so that still leave room for potatoes and proteins )

Small banana for pudding or 8-10 grapes

Are people Overestimating a portion size ? Brocilli - it's only 2 trees for a normal sized person - my kids ate more than 2 trees when they were small ( and eating veggies - they had phases !)

Sone apples can actually make 2 portions especially for childen ( yes you can eat a whole apple - it's for the people who could never find room in their tummies for all the veg)

Most carrots are bigger than a single portion

No I couldn't eat that much in a day and no my stomach isn't stapled anywhere and no I don't have an ED!

So are you saying you couldn't eat that even if you didn't have anything else ? Because that's slightly weird - have you actually tried

A bit if fruit only stays in your stomach about 30 mins ( veg might be 40) - so you could have one portion an hour during waking hours and the previous one has long cleared before the next one hits !

That why I think an apple is useless at staving off hunger - it's almost through your stomach before you have finished it !

Most of what you've listed is full of water, not sure how filling any of it would be either. Yes I guess if I ate that and absolutely that I probably could but I do a lot of ultra running and gym work, no way would a load of cucumber and celery sticks give me the energy and muscle repair I need!

Exactly! It's all water!

Mine isn't a recipe as such - just something I made up...I think there are probably better versions.

I first mix a serving of collagen into cold water, then add chia seeds, ground flaxseed, a tablespoon or two of double cream, a handful of frozen blueberries and a half teaspoon of cinnamon. Leave overnight and in the morning it's ready to eat. I follow that with eggs, sometimes bacon, and, if I have them, some cherry tomatoes. Then a small serving of nuts.

I don't always have full servings of each vegetable. But that doesn't matter - if I have cucumber, carrots, cabbage, onions and radishes that all together make two servings, it's still two servings.

It's also not some kind of hard and fast rule - it's just a general guideline to help people know how much they ought to aim for; really it's the quantity/proportion of diet that matters, not the ink on the rule book. For example potatoes are a vegetable but they didn't count it in the 5-a-day because they knew a lot of people would just eat extra potato products which isn't necessarily the best (although potatoes are very nutritious). So when I have potato, sweet potato or any other starchy vegetable, I still count it as a serving, because it actually is one. I don't stress over it all either since I also try to eat as many diverse plants/plant products as I can, so overall my diet is pretty nutritious.

Cost can definitely be an issue; remember that frozen fruit and veg also counts!

My quote for the above first paragraph has vanished! It was in response to this.

I find enchantments easier TBH. Bump it up with the odd hex.

Heh! Just caught that now.

If only there was a spell for 'firm, lifted bum and perky boobs of my youth, please!' 😆😆

I eat quite a variety of fruit/veg and just assumed I would eat enough but a few years ago it occured to me I didn't know what 80g of different fruit and veg actually looked like so for a week I prepared food as normal and then weighed it, I was surprised by how little 80g is. I can confidently say I eat a minimum of 10 portions a day. Some days it might only be 7 different varieties of fruit or veg but it will usually be more than 800g in total, most days it's 10-12 varieties. I'm vegetarian which I think helps.

Don't eat fruit and don't eat breakfast. But love veg and eat lots of it, so - yes.

Are people Overestimating a portion size ? Brocilli - it's only 2 trees for a normal sized person -

It's 7 florets for a portion?

I often only eat two meals per day - in some ways it makes it easier, not harder. Bigger portions less often.

A not-too-tightly-cupped handful is a great visual guide for most veg serving sizes.

Same here. I have suffered from IBS for decades. I am on the low fodmap diet but even low fodmap safe fruit and veg upset me. Really annoying as I love them and really worry about the long term complications of having so few in my daily diet.

yeah i have lots of health problems and terrible arthritis for my age, i think the lack of nutrients over my lifetime is ageing me early

I wouldn't worry too much. What's best for your body is to look after it in the way that best allows it to be well. Eat as much as you can of nutrient dense foods that your body can tolerate, and keep as fit and active as you can, and you'll very likely be just fine! I have to do some things that others don't, cut some things out that others don't, and eat in ways that others don't, because of my specific health needs. But that's what allows my body to be as well as possible, so I try to focus on that.

A portion of broccoli is 3 florets, on my scales.

(but I totally understand that it's frustrating! I think if I were unable to eat plenty of meat and other fatty foods, for example, my health would really suffer from the lack of nutrients)

Well I eat a lot of vegetables but I couldn’t afford to feed everyone 30 different types a week! It’s nonsense anyway. People have always eaten what was available locally. So we eat a lot of root vegetables in winter, berries and green salads in summer ( I grow both). I’d add citrus fruits from Spain in winter for vitamin c. As long as you eat some greens every day and plenty of fibre, it’s all
good. I can’t imagine counting and weighing, how utterly joyless.

I never weigh, and I only count as a bit of fun. It's not joyless at all; I enjoy food and cooking a great deal so it's just an extension of that, really. It's also not 30 different types of veg - it includes all things that are grown. So, veg, fruit, legumes, nuts, seeds, herbs, spices, chillies, onion & garlic, pickled or fermented foods. Etc etc. It's actually not that hard to do in terms of creating meals over the space of a week, although of course it's much easier if you have a bigger budget.

I totally agree with you, though. It's perfectly possible to eat really well and get all your nutritional needs without following 'rules'.

It includes other stuff though, 30 is easy and I don't always hit my 5 a day with just fruit and veg

Spices, herbs, grains, nuts, seeds all in there