This really has nothing to do with dieting, even though one of the best ways to eat right is to control your portions. Eat less, weigh less. No, this is about the involuntary portion control you encounter when you are a piggy and eat the whole freakin’ container of something, in particular, ice cream.
Now, this occurs with many prepackaged food products. Suddenly the quantity in a package of food you have bought forever goes down, but the price stays the same. This can be undetectable until you actually open the package, because often the packaging size remains the same. It’s just that there are one or two less items in the package, or the weight of the product has changed.
This is most obvious with ice cream. It’s hard to hide the change in the amount of ice cream in a container, since it makes no sense to keep the same size packaging with less in it. People would think they were cheated and didn’t get a full container. But reduce the size of the package and reduce the quantity of ice cream from 64 ounces per container (a full half-gallon) to 48 ounces (one and a half quarts) and you still feel like you are purchasing a “half gallon” of ice cream. In fact, I bet that if someone were to ask you to buy some ice cream, they would still say, “Pick up a half gallon of ice cream for me when you go to the store.”
This is not a recent change. It’s been years since they did this and there are kids today who have never seen a real half-gallon of ice cream. I guess this is just an oldfart’s rant against change. However, as the title says, this does result in portion control. If you are going to eat your troubles away with a half-gallon of ice cream, you are going to eat one pint less than you used to. (Yep, that 48 ounce container is only three-quarters of what it once was.) The consolation is that you cannot help but eat less ice cream, which is a good thing. Of course, even that 48 ounce container is supposed to be twelve servings, so theoretically you’ve eaten twelve times more ice cream than a “normal” person should, but I sure won’t judge. And of course, you could eat more than one container of ice cream at a time – if so, get help!
And don’t even get me going on how some “ice cream” is no longer able to be legally sold as “ice cream” and is now labeled a “frozen desert product,” or some such thing. You have to know it’s just one more way for the producer to reduce their costs but sell at the same price as real ice cream. And you probably aren’t even unaware of how much air you are paying for in your ice cream.
You know what? Homemade ice cream is starting to sound like a good idea. It may be a bit of a hassle, but at least you get whatever quantity you make and you know that it is real ice cream with an ingredient list that you understand. Time to see what an ice cream maker costs.