To think the current advice of eating 10 portions of fruit and veg a day is unrealistic?

[BooseysMom]

I thought it was current advice but I read the attached info in the Women's Health Bible dated 2004. So it seems this is old news. But just how realistic is this? I can just about manage five portions.. but 10?! The first issue is cost. What if you are on a low income and have a family to feed? And how about really fussy eaters? I can just about get my 5 yo to eat half an apple a day! What do fellow mumsnetters think?

Though fuck me if 2 spears of broccoli is s portion this is a lot less difficult that is previously thought.

MissAi wrote
I don't even eat ten different things a day grin

I have to say neither do I. It's just not possible on our income and with a small fridge/freezer.

MitziK wrote..
.. but it's really not that hard to have a lot of veg/fruit if you focus your meals on veg plus something, rather than something plus veg - if you can afford to get lots of different things at once or build up a stock of things in the freezer ...

Impossible for us. (See above)
I have tried being exceptionally good and piling on the veg in bigger amounts than the carb and protein but I'm sitting there in agony only able to eat a third of it! I hate most green leafy veg. Think kale.. that stuff is evil, pure evil. If something tastes that horrendous it has got to be good for you. I wish you could just switch off your taste buds temporarily..problem solved

2-3 tablespoons seems like a hell of a or more than a portion to me. Or is that uncooked? Most stuff shrinks...

@LaurieMarlow just weighted mine. It could be 6 cherry tomatoes.

I encourage everyone who thinks they can't do it to go and weight some random fruit and veg. Half an asda cucumber is 210grams.😁 I was curious. This is fun!

I don't find it difficult to eat between 8 and 10 portions a day. The majority being veg. I only usually eat berries or the odd banana when it comes to fruit,
Most days I will have either a poached or scrambled egg with mushrooms, tomatoes and often spinach. The mushrooms are usually half a standard button mushroom pack so around 80 grams. The tomatoes would either be 8 to 10 cherry or 1 large. Spinach half a large pack wilted down.
If I don't have eggs then it is overnight oats with frozen berries I make a recipe that has 100g berries per portion.
Lunch is usually always a protein like chicken or fish such as salmon, tuna or mackerel with a large salad. I put around 3 to 4 portions in the salad as I usually have a large chunk cucumber, leaves, a tomato, half a pepper, a carrot grated, spring onion, radish. I don't count each of these as a total portion hence only 3 to 4 portions.
Dinner can be just about anything for example today roast chicken breast with 5 different veg, brocolli, carrots, peas, sweetcorn and parsnip.
A snack later on may be some houmous with pepper strips.
I think it is about changing the amount of the other food on the plate. I only usually have around 100g of whatever chicken or fish with the rest of the plate being veg. I may have 2 or 4 small baby potatoes or around 70g cooked weight of rice or pasta.
If I have curry I will have it with roast veg rather than rice. It will always be harder to eat the required amount of veg if you are eating 250g of chicken and 6 roast potatoes or half a plate of rice with your curry.
It is about changing the way we look at what we eat. It doesn't have to be expensive I eat a lot of frozen veg that is less than £1 for a large bag.

We could also share pics to give people a better idea. I myself didn't know until I checked things so I could work out better eating plan to lower my weight and with that heart disease and diabetes risk.

These are giant grapes from Asda and this is 1 of your 5 a day.

I can easily eat more than five but I think rarely would hit ten.
Today has been fruit and veg heavy and I had frozen cherries on my porridge this morning, picnic lunch that included a small mountain of carrot sticks, celery and cucumber sticks with hummus, loads of cherry tomatoes and blueberries. Then dinner I did a root veg curry with sweet potatoes, normal potatoes, more carrots, parsnips (and chickpeas which may count?) and a saag paneer with frozen spinach.

But today was quite exceptional and trying to use up lots of bits from the fridge and our weekly veg box (which I find is the best way to do it- as I start thinking about how I can build a tasty meal around veg, rather than making them an add on), and I'm still not sure I necessarily hit ten in portion sizes!!

It’s done by approximate weight. Some cherry tomatoes might be slightly bigger in which case it won’t be exactly equivalent. But yes, a sphere holds more volume than you might think - I can see seven smallish cherry tomatoes ‘filling up’ one large tomato.

These things are a guideline, it’s not some hard and fast science.

Another easy guideline is an amount that fills your loosely cupped hand (this obviously doesn’t work with very light things like salad leaves).

@LaurieMarlow A tomato or 7 cherry tomatoes is really not much different. I just weighed a normal size salad tomato and it was 82 grams. I then weighed 7 cherry tomatoes and it was 79 grams so really nothing in it. Try weighing 80 grams of different veg out you might be surprised it really isn't a lot in most cases.

Circa 80g of cucumber And I am done because I am full
Ignore the bite. It was quite a bit over and knife went into a sink already...

Well I’m heartened that it’s not as difficult as billed.

A couple of examples of what my lunches look like - I try to eat lots of raw veg with my lunch. Dinner tends to be the cooked ones -cabbage, cauliflower, broccoli, mushrooms, courgette, aubergine, kale or other greens, etc etc.

I can eat 10 a day if I am mindful and purposeful about it.

I don't eat much fruit but I really like greens and vege.

@LaurieMarlow That's good! It does sound near to impossible until you really look at the portion sizes. I was struggling to imagine eating 5+ a day as well at the beginning. Eventually you do it without even thinking about it so to answer 1 pp. No we don't spend all day measuring and thinking about the food It becomes very much normal and automatic.

Ninkaninus 10 radishes is one portion. 10! I’m not sure what happens if you eat 10 radishes in one go. Maybe you get bunny ears.

Op have you ever had roasted kale? I roast it in cider vinegar, EV olive oil and salt. So good. I’m not sure I’ve ever eaten it any other way.

@MiddleClassProblem that's a classicfrench snack or starter:

www.rivercottage.net/recipes/radishes-with-butter-and-salt

I've eaten loads today:

B: Large tomato on toast - 1
L: large spinach salad with tomato, onion, cucumber - 4/5
D: falafel, mixed leaves, herbs, tomato, hummus - 4/5

TheClitterati ah! That’s the answer! Smear butter on everything!

I read a tip once which is 'look at your meal and think "how can I make this better?

For me, that would be to remove most of the fruit or veg from the meal. Let's face it, a lot of people only eat their greens because they have to. I don't mind fruit but I could easily live without a load of veg on my plate.

@Siameasy I love kale roasted with peri peri salt added after it comes out the oven
I think I ate half a bag a day for months

A spoonful of butter helps the vegetables go down 😀

Adding it up I eat quite a lot.

Had porridge with mixed berries for breakfast.

2 Clementines and a wedge if cucumber mid morning.

Home made Carrot and lentil soup for lunch.

Dinner was salt and pepper belly pork, with peri peri chicken wings, sweet potato wedges and a large salad (( mixed leaves, cucumber, cherry tomatoes, olives ))

Fruit salad for pud.

Which was one large slice of pineapple, 1/4 of cantelope melon, handful of strawberries, 1/4 grapefruit.

I'm guessing that comes in at roughly ten portions without even trying.

The recommended helping size is 80g. If you weigh that out for every helping of vegetables & fruit it is not a huge amount and completely realistic.

We certainly don’t eat 5 portions a day, let alone 10. Just added into my online shopping account enough fruit and veg that a family of 5 should eat in one week. It would cost me £40! That’s nearly 3/4 of my weekly shopping budget!
My children get 3 maybe four a day (except the eldest who is autistic and says all fruit and veg is poisonous) but me and the husband very rarely have any. Occasionally we will have a portion once or twice a week.