How Many Servings Do you Eat a Day?

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  • How many servings of fruit and vegetables do you eat per day (in general)?

    I am thinking about putting up a checkbox chart for my fruit/veggie servings but undecided how many I should aim for. So how many do you eat??

    I get about 7-8 a day.
  • I'm usually 2-4 servings of fruit, and around 8 servings of veggies. (I LOVE Veggies! So few calories for SOOO much food). I get my veggies at lunch and dinner (around 4 servings at each), and my fruit as snacks.
  • I usually eat a large amount of veggies with my dinner and I tend to have salads for lunch so I have a large intake probably 7+ of veg daily

    Fruit I eat with breakfast i.e. porridge with banana and blueberries or this mornings weetbix topped with banana or sometimes apples cut up with grapes and topped with yoghurt etc. My fruit serve is probably a good 4-5 a day
  • 2 servings of fruit and 5 to 8 servings of veggies is typical for me.
  • I try to get in 7 total fruit/veggie servings a day minimum.

    One thing to keep in mind is what we mean by a serving! I think I still underestimate my veggies as most of the serving estimates involve "cups" and I weigh my veggies!

    I think the plum I just ate is one serving of fruit, but that huge peach in my fridge is probably 2!

    I guess my point is that "servings" are often a lot smaller than many people think they are, so it's not too hard to get a lot in.
  • I eat a lot more fruit than I do veggies, but for me to get any veggies in at all is pretty good LOL!

    I have 3-4 fruit servings and 2 veggie servings.

    The veggies are almost always one cup of steamed broccoli florets - I love broccoli, and as long as I don't get tired of eating it every day, I will.

    Fruits depend a bit on how close I am to the last shopping trip. 1 cup of strawberries per day, or 1 cup of blueberries (sometimes both!), applesauce and mandarin oranges are staples for me daily. My hubby calls me a fruit hoover, because if he doesn't eat some right away, it will be gone! I have been known to polish off a whole pint of blueberries in an afternoon fairly frequently (ooops).
  • Ummm, let's see, how many servings of veggies & fruits a day?



    I could not even begin to count the number of veggie servings I have per day. The first thing I eat in the morning is cucumber salad. My lunch as of late is either an ENORMOUS MEGA BOWL full of salad (with a protein - either turkey or chicken breast or tuna) with who knows how many servings of veggies in there - 7? 8? More? My other lunch is just as hard to figure out. A protein with an ENORMOUS MEGA BOWL full of roasted green beans, carrots & cauliflower. Again - I don't know how many servings. 5, 6? More??

    Dinner is more veggies or salad. Tonight for instance was a HUGE stir fry with mushrooms, garlic, onions, zucchin, broccoli , sugar snap peas & carrots. Snacks are more veggies - a LARGE amount of red cabbage slaw, more cucumber salad, baby carrots, grape tomatoes...... Then there's the string beans I munch on almost mindlessly quite often. Not to mention the couple of servings of fruit I have. Sometimes it's a couple - sometimes it's more. Depends on what berries are around. How good the grapes and cherries are.

    Ummm, let's just say - LOTS and LOTS and LOTS.

    And in case you were wondering, ummm, I know - TMI - I never, ever, EVER have bathroom - issues .
  • I eat 5 -8 (or more) servings of fruit and veggies each day. Sometimes more veggies...somtimes more fruits. Just depends. I too weigh my fruits and veggies to get an idea of ounces and calorie counts.
  • I try to a minimum of 10 servings a day, I think I do more fruit, especially in the summer. Everything is so fresh and SO yummy! I ate a cup of cherries on the way home from work today - I'd count that as 1 serving.. so I might be having more than I think as well..

    rockinrobin - I have LESS bathroom issues the more fruits/veggies I eat! Gotta be something to that!

    -Aimee
  • I eat 5 - 6 cups of veggies a day, measured raw and chopped. Usually 1 fruit, occasionally 2.
  • I have IBS, so it varies a LOT. I love fruits and vegetables, and do pretty well up to about 8 servings if I'm careful but every once in a while (especially in the summer, when there's so much good fresh produce to choose from with farmers markets and such), I eat far more, and then get sick.

    I have IBS and so I have to be careful with produce as too much or too much of some types will cause a painful flare. For example, lettuce tends to give me problems (especially because I love mega salads). Watermelon does too (because I eat too much of it). Cooked seems a little gentler on my system than raw (for veggies, for fruits it's the reverse. I avoid cooked fruits all together). And if I severely overdo, I often have to cut out or minimize the fruits and veggies for a few days until my system settles down.

    Summer is especially difficult for me, as I want to eat TONS of fruit and veggies. My ideal summer meal is watermelon, garden lettuce salad with a light vinaigrette and sweetcorn (and nothing else), but too much of that and I get sick. Summer is the only time that I naturally maintain my weight or lose without trying because of eating so much produce (and probably also the repeatedly getting sick as a result).

    In essense I eat as much plant foods as as I can without getting sick. In the summer I tend to push the limits with painful consequences.

    If you're wanting to exceed the amount you're eating now, I'd suggest doing it gradually if you don't have a cast iron stomach. Some people have no problems at all, and others (even without IBS) tend to have digestive issues when they increase fruits and veggies drastically.

    Otherwise, if you're eating 7 or 8 and happy with that, then use that as your baseline. I know the current guidelines of the FDA is either 5 or 7 (I think they just increased it from 5 to 7, but I'm not sure) and I recently read that 10 or more is actually shown to have the most significant health benefits.
  • I have to be careful with the fruit...so, 1-2 servings a day.
    Veggies - getting better. I'm up to 5 servings a day.
  • Quote:
    I could not even begin to count the number of veggie servings I have per day.
    Same here. For example, for lunch I had a HUGE salad from Sweet Tomatoes - romaine, spinach, beets, celery, bell pepper, zucchini, carrots, radish ... all topped with a little olive oil and red wine vinegar and 1 oz of blue cheese (real cheese, not blue cheese dressing). I probably had 4 cups of veggies or more in this one salad.

    This morning I had the equivalent of 2 servings of fruit in my yogurt (the bag serving is 1 cup = 70 cals, but the USDA says 1/2 cup of fruit is a serving).

    This evening I plan to stir-fry mushrooms, cabbage, carrots, broccoli, sugar snap peas, and a few other things and serve it over brown rice. I'll probably eat another 2 cups of veggies then.

    I have no idea how much that comes to in regular USDA servings. I just know it's well over the minimum!

    .
  • I try for a minimum of 8 but usually hit around 10. I work at a restaurant (pizza and italian food, it is a killer lol) and often design my own salads. And it seems that I am incredibly fond of grabbing a handful of celery on the go...who knew if someone else cut it up I would be so hooked, lol.

    amy
  • Although my tastes have been reformed, my appetite hasn't changed in the last 93 pounds! So, a TON of veggies. Scads. I know I eat more veggies in a day than my hubby does in a week (which I'm working on with him, slooowly).

    Fruits, not so much. I eat them, just not daily, and juice them more often than not.