How Not To Leave A Buffet Totally Stuffed
It’s almost summer which means resort vacations which means buffets which means potential weight gain. Here are 10 ways how not to leave a buffet totally stuffed.
Make a large salad
Make your first stop the salad bar. Stay away from premixed salads like Caesar salad as these will be drenched in dressing. Oh and a macaroni “salad” is not a salad. Instead, load up on watery vegetables such as lettuce, tomatoes, cucumbers and celery. These fill your tummy up but contain low calories, so you’ll already feel pretty satisfied when moving on to other areas of the buffet and will be less likely to binge.
Watch your veggies
If you load up on the vegetable dishes, you don’t get a medal just yet. Many of the vegetable dishes are seeped in butter, oil, creamy dressings or high-sodium sauces. Stick to just steamed vegetables.
Pass by each station twice
Even though every station looks tempting at first, walk by every station without stopping, and then go back around a second time to get food. That way, you’ll know what’s ahead and what you want to save room for, instead of accidentally loading up on one type of pasta only to discover your favorite type was around the corner! And then of course, you’ll just eat both pastas.
Use salad plates
Part of feeling full is just a trick of the eye. When you see your plate is empty, you perceive yourself as full. So eat off the smaller salad plates and you should feel just as satisfied as if you’d eaten off the full-size plates.
Separate your food categories
Force yourself to be conscious of how many carbohydrates and empty calories you’re eating. Put all of your starches (like that tempting mac ‘n cheese and pizza) on one plate, all your meat and fish on another plate, and all of your vegetables on another.
Just fill the ladle
To avoid over-serving yourself, just fill the serving utensil provided at the buffet and stop there. That’s usually enough to let you feel that you experienced every food, but not so much that you feel stuffed.
Bring a sweater
According to EveryDayHealth.com, there are several reasons feeling cold could drive us to eat more. So bring a sweater to the buffet because they tend to crank up the A.C.
Skip the tray
If you forego the tray, you have to make several trips to the buffet, getting up each time you want a new plate. This makes you extra conscious of how much food you’re getting. Laziness might save you and you could get too tired to go back again.
Visit a chef station
Usually the chef stations where you can get a made-to-order pasta dish, stir fry or omelet offer fresher dishes, less drenched in sauces and butter, than the giant trays sitting under heat lamps. Not to mention the chef station naturally enforces portion control. The chef can only fit so much spaghetti into that pan!
Keep your plates
Don’t let the server clear away the plates you’re done with. Keeping the dirty plates on the table reminds you how much you’ve already eaten.