I’m having trouble finding, in grams, what one serving of leafy green vegetables is.
On podcast 105, Jordan explains that a serving of vegetables is somewhere between 80 and 100 grams, depending on the vegetable. The USDA gives serving sizes in cups (2 cups with MyPlate). So, using a food scale, I tried to measure 80 grams of kale, and it turned out to be over 5 cups. So, I feel like I’m missing something or measured something wrong, perhaps.
Any clarity you could provide I would really appreciate!
thanks for your time,
Tim
As far as what I am weighing, I really don’t know what is going on with my measurement… As I type this, I have 39g of Chopped kale from Trader Joe’s that I’ve smushed down to around 2 cups. My scale, an Ozeri, is on the “gram” setting and the measuring cup has been tarred.
Oh, my apologies… I see that one cup of leafy greens = one serving (please correct me if I’m wrong), and that each leafy green has different weights per cup
Right, which is interesting given than my cup of chopped kale is much less than 67g, and is even still less after I smush it down in there. I am beginning to wonder if my scale is off. I’ve verified my measuring method with two additional people now.
Not questioning you at all or what experts are saying, just weird that my measurements don’t match.
To provide another data point, the USDA database lists a cup of raw kale as 20-25g, depending on which entry you use. On the other hand, the serving sizes on the various packages of kale I see on my local grocery store website suggest that a cup would be between 35-45g.
Is there somewhere that we can find definitive information on serving sizes for different fruits and vegetables? I’m not too worried about whether a serving of something is precisely 100g or precisely one cup, but we’re talking about potential threefold differences in what a “cup of kale” is.
To be honest, I’m not really clear on on whether a serving has an exact definition. Is there a universally agreed upon value for exactly how many grams constitutes a serving of kale that gets used for nutrition/health research? I skimmed a couple studies, and I didn’t find any reference to where they get their serving sizes.
The USDA database is good for unlabeled food, but I’d use the label on food where it exists. A serving is defined as the portion of food used as a reference on the label of that food.
The current US Dietary guidelines actually recommends 2.5 cups of fruit and veggies (each) per day as their minimum intake.
The USDA database is good for unlabeled food, but I’d use the label on food where it exists. A serving is defined as the portion of food used as a reference on the label of that food.
To be honest, that’s kind of terrifying. I just checked my grocery store’s website to find the serving size of the baby spinach I like to eat, and they have three different serving sizes for “baby spinach”, “organic baby spinach” and “bulk organic baby spinach”. They’re not trivially different either; it seems like the largest serving is over three times the smallest. Carrots are not as bad; there’s only about a 50% difference between the largest and smallest serving sizes. Maybe this doesn’t matter for someone who eats a wide variety of fruits and vegetables, but it’s a big deal for someone who eats spinach and carrots for most of their vegetable servings. Any suggestions on how to square this circle?
Right, but how does that tie in to the idea of 10 servings per day? If I eat 10 servings of the spinach with the small serving size, presumably that’s not actually equivalent to 10 servings of spinach with the serving size that’s twice as big in terms of any real world effects of vegetable consumption.
Please re-read what I wrote. You can determine the serving size based on what you’re actually buying and consuming and then use that. I think that if you cannot find what you’re consuming on the FDA website or similar outlet, then I’d use a close estimate and not lose any sleep over it.
I would aim for consuming a wide variety of fruits and vegetables, ideally 6-10 servings (or cups). And no, there’s not a linear effect of fruit and vegetable consumption, though perhaps a dose-dependent effect particularly with respect to fiber.