The amounts of food many of us eat are out of control. When people learn that they should be eating 5 to 7 servings of vegetables a day many people are shocked. They claim they could never eat that much food. It's quite true that one couldn't eat 7 servings of vegetables a day if their serving size duplicated the portions in many restaurants. The FDA says that the standard serving of pasta, for example, is one cup. In most restaurants, pasta portions typically measure about three cups. That's about three servings! We'd be eating vegetables out of buckets if we extrapolated from restaurant portion sizes. I believe that many people have been discouraged from following very good dietary guidelines because they've come to believe that a serving is a huge super size amount. They believe that if they really ate that much, they'd gain a tremendous amount of weight.

When it comes to fruits and vegetables, getting the optimum number of servings isn't hard at all when you understand what a serving size really is. For most fruits and vegetables, it's a half-cup.

Here is the SuperFoodsRx breakdown of serving sizes in various food categories:

Vegetables

Fruits

Vegetarian Protein

Nuts

Fish & Meat

Whole Grains

High Calcium Foods

Fats