How to Use Hand Portions to Reach Your Macro Goals
LISTEN: APPLE PODCASTS | SPOTIFY | STITCHER
I get it, counting your macros every single day can get exhausting...
ESPECIALLY when you are taking the time to measure and weigh everything.
For some people, it doesn’t bother them. But for others, it feels like a huge bother. And if it does feel like a huge bother for you, then it’s probably not something you will stick to doing long term.
And you know how I feel about developing habits…I only want you to develop habits that not only you can stick to long term, but you actually enjoy sticking to long term.
With that being said, whether you like measuring and weighing your food or not, the amount of each macronutrient (carbs, fat, protein) you are eating daily matters a lot if you are striving to build the body you want.
So if you don’t like counting your macros, how can you see results with macro counting without actually counting your macros?
Seems impossible right?
Not quite!
There is a tactic I want to teach you that will make your life so much easier. Are you ready?!
P.S: There’s so much information out there on how to eat and how to fuel your body that it can be hard to know where to start. That’s why I created this free ebook – to teach you everything you need to know about macros and how they impact your health. In this free tool, I show you step-by-step how to calculate your own macros, so you can feel empowered and in control of your own health. Click here now to download my free ebook!
TRANSCRIPT:
Hey there beautiful human. You're listening to Embrace Your Real with me, Julie Ledbetter, a podcast where I empower you to just be you. With each episode, I dish you a dose of real talk and actionable advice for building your confidence, honoring your body and unconditionally loving your authentic self. Stay tuned if you're ready to embrace your real, let's get in and let's go.
Welcome back to another episode of the Embrace Your Real Podcast, how to use hand portions to reach your macro goals. I've gotten this question so many times over the years, and I never really had a resource to point people to. So I was like, I need to make a resource that people can bookmark and go back and listen to because I get it. Counting your macros every single day can get exhausting, especially when you're taking the time to measure and weigh everything. For some people, it really doesn't bother them, but for other people, it is a huge bother. And if it is something that is bothering you, then you're more likely not going to stick with it long term. And you guys know how I feel about developing habits. I believe that the only habits that you should focus on developing are the ones that you can stick to long term.
So with that being said, whether you like measuring and weighing your food or not, the amount of each macronutrient, the carbs, fats, and protein that you're eating daily, do matter if you're wanting to build the body that you want. So if you don't like counting your macros and measuring and weighing every food, how can you still see results with macro counting without actually counting your macros? Like without actually tracking them and weighing them? It seems impossible, but it's not. There is a tactic that I want to teach you that can make your life so much easier.
But before I do, I wanted to share this super sweet review. It comes from AGIZMO1801, they say, "Favorite podcast. I started listening to you during lockdown when my mindset needed a shift and have been listening ever since. I loved your most recent episode about what we need to stop doing as women in the episode about the letter to your younger self. Girl, both of these episodes spoke to me so deeply. I love how you bring everything back to our relationship with our creator and to be better stewards of this amazing body that he has given us. Thank you for being a breath of fresh air to so many." I love this so much. Thank you so much for your review. I appreciate every single one of your reviews. And if you haven't tuned into the latest episodes of the podcast, I wanted to just briefly share some of the most recent episodes that we have so that you can go back and listen to them once this episode is over.
Some of the most recent episodes on the podcast, episode 212, my thoughts on body acceptance, episode 213, 9 things I wish I could tell my younger self, episode 214, 5 things we need to normalize, episode 215, 5 mental shifts for better body results, and episode 216, how to skip a week of workouts without messing up your results. So be sure to go to either Apple Podcasts or Spotify, type in Embrace Your Real, first make sure you're subscribed so that you never miss an episode. And then just go through and start binge listening. We have over 215 episodes waiting for you, with tons of education, encouragement, and empowerment.
Okay. So let's dive into today's episode. So how the heck can you count your macros without actually counting your macros? Let me explain. It has everything to do with your hands. That's right. Your hands. It's called the Hand Portion Method. And there's a lot of reasons why this can be helpful. Maybe you are just starting out and the thought of counting everything overwhelms you, or you're not going to be able to track everything using a food scale. Maybe you're on vacation or you're just super busy, but you still want to prioritize hitting your daily nutrition goals. Make no mistake. Hand portions aren't as accurate as macro tracking, but they are accurate enough to help you consistently track your food and reach your goals. And that's ultimately what really matters. Hand portion tracking really works well for people with busy, messy, and complex lives, which is basically everyone. Compared to the scales and tracking apps, hand portion can make it far easier to consistently gauge how much you're eating.
I will say though, based off of personal experience, as well as working with thousands of women over the last few years, if you have a base knowledge of what portion sizes look like through tracking with a food scale and a macro tracking app, it can truly make hand portion tracking even easier long term. So that's kind of my two cents and my personal experience. But first I'm going to explain what the different portions are. And then I'm going to give you a real life example of it would look like to apply the hand portion method to my personal customized macros on a daily basis.
So first let's break down the hand portion method, first starting with protein. So one portion of protein is the size of your palm. So if you hold your hand out in front of you and look at the size of your palm, that's roughly one portion of protein. For example, if you are going to eat a chicken breast or ground Turkey or a piece of steak, you would select the size that is approximately the size of your fist if you're going for one portion. 1 serving size of protein, the size of your fist typically would be around 25 to 30 grams of protein if the protein source is coming from meat. Ultimately this hand portion works best for meat, fish, eggs, cottage cheese, Greek yogurt, tempe, or tofu. So that is kind of the hand portion method for protein. So it's the size of your palm.
What does the portion size look like for carbs? To clarify the portion size I'm about to describe is relevant for rice or other grains, potatoes, fruit, and beans. While many vegetables are considered to be a carbohydrate source, vegetables actually have a different hand portion that I will discuss next. So if you were to cup your hand and imagine filling it with the carb source I just listed, that would be a serving size of carbs. Again, this is relevant for rice, other grains, potatoes, fruit beans, not vegetables. It's important to note though, that this is typically after cooking, like one cupped hand of uncooked rice is going to be a lot different than one cupped hand of cooked rice.
So remember that this is relevant for after you've cooked the food. Cupping your hand and filling it, let's say with white rice would be about a half a cup, and it would give you around 25 to 30 grams of carbs. If it were beans, it would be around 20 to 25 grams depending on the bean. And if it were a potato, it would be a little bit lower sitting anywhere from 15, 17 or 20 grams of carbs. So just keep that in mind when using this method for carbs.
Okay. So like I mentioned above, what about vegetables? Even though vegetables are a great carb source, they actually have a different hand portion size because they can be eaten in more abundance, AK, they are a more voluminous food, they are more nutrient dense. So the hand portion size is equivalent to the size of your fist. So if you were to make a fist and hold it out in front of you, that's what one portion of vegetables would look like. Whether that's cooked broccoli, or spinach, or cabbage, or Brussels sprouts, you name it, you're going to want to aim for one fist size per portion for veggies. And again, if you are cooking your veggies, it would typically apply to this after it's cooked. Obviously you don't cook all of your veggies, so it's fine to apply it to uncooked veggies, but that's just kind of a rule of thumb.
And then lastly, let's talk about fat. When it comes to hand portions for fat, you want to think of this like it's the size of your thumb. So stick your thumb out in front of you and imagine each fat serving equating to the volume of your thumb. This hand portion method is applicable for nuts, seed butters, regular butter, [inaudible 00:07:51] or any kind of oil. So avocado oil, olive oil, you name it. I would say one thumb is about the size of one tablespoon. So if you regularly would measure a tablespoon or if you weigh it on your food scale, what the grams would be for a tablespoon of peanut butter, let's say, you can imagine your portion size being the one thumb size of peanut butter.
You might be thinking about cheese as that's typically a food that a lot of people also get fat from. And so one ounce serving of cheese is about the same size as your outstretched thumb. So put your thumb in front of you and then stretch it out a little bit. That would typically equate to one ounce serving of whatever cheese you are eating. Does that make sense?
Now there are many different ways to figure it out, including trial and error, which is why I personally think that if can learn what portion sizes look like by weighing and tracking your food, even if it's for a few months, you'll be way better off long term, simply because you already have a good idea of what the portion size is and what the macros are to that. I also always suggest that you need to figure out what your macros are, because you can be using the hand portion tool but if you don't know what your specific macros are, it's still likely that you might be under or overeating in a specific macronutrient. So I always recommend getting them calculated. That's honestly the simplest way, it takes all the guesswork out of it and it just honestly makes your life so much easier.
One other thing that I want to say about this method is that it's an estimate, it's not exact, which is okay. But just note that your results might be a little bit slower. Again, totally fine, because if this is something that you can stick to long term, or if this is something that you can switch back and forth to, whether you're on vacation or you're just not going to be around a food scale, that's all that really matters. Doing something that will give you faster results, but you can't stick too long term is honestly useless. So find what works for you for the long haul, even if the results might come a little bit slower, because you will actually maintain the results for longer, if you are doing it longer and if it's sustainable for you.
Okay. So let me quickly recap these hand portion sizes. A portion of protein equals one palm. A portion of carbs equals one cupped hand. A portion of veggies equals one fist. And a portion of fat equals one thumb. With that being said, when I say one portion of protein, carbs, and fats, and veggies, I don't mean that you only eat one portion of each at each meal and call it good because you will for sure be undereating and that can cause yourself a whole other set of metabolic problems. So please figure out what your macros are before utilizing this method to avoid undereating. And you know what? Undereating will also prevent you from building the body that you want, it's going to result in so many other things that I've talked about on so many other episodes here.
But I want to now give you an example of what it would look like in hand portions for my specific macros. So my specific macros that I'm following right now are 150 grams of protein, 270 grams of carbs and 65 grams of fat. So let's say I have three meals a day just to make it simple for this example. This would be about four to five palm size portions of protein a day. So again, examples of protein: chicken, tofu, fish, Greek yogurt. That would typically be about one and a half palms per meal.
And for me, for veggies, it would be about four to six fist size portions of veggies per day. Again, examples of veggies: spinach, carrots, tomatoes, cauliflower, which would be about one to two total fists per meal. Again, this is on three meals a day just to make this example super simple. It would be about nine cupped handfuls of carbs per day. So beans, blueberries, sweet potatoes, oats, which would typically be about three total handfuls per meal.
And then lastly, it would be about six thumb size portions of healthy fats per day. So examples: olive oil, coconut oil, avocado oil walnuts, any sort of nuts, butters, guacamole, flax seed, which would equate to two total thumbs per meal.
I know that this is kind of technical, especially on a podcast, because you're not visually seeing it. But again, you can always pause this, rewind, listen to that and write it down. I will say that every single person's macros are different. So please remember that when it comes to figuring out your own customized macros and what your body needs based on where you're at and what your goals are. And the hand portions, like I mentioned before, really only work if you know how to properly fuel your body with the proper amount of protein, carbs and fats. And I believe that you deserve to know the truth about how much food you should properly be fueling your body. There's so much information out there on how to eat and how to fuel your body, it can be hard to know where to start, which is why I created this free ebook.
So inside my Macro Counting for the Everyday Women free ebook, I teach you everything that you need to know about macros and how they impact your health. I also show you a step by step guide as to how to calculate your own macros so that you can feel empowered and in control of your own health. Because I know that there are so many free calculators out there and every single calculator is telling you something different and it can feel super conflicting and confusing. So I personally wanted to create something that had everything there for you in one thing, and one source that had everything in there for you. So that it can be super simple and you can know exactly how to do it instead of just typing in numbers into a calculator and having numbers be spit out and you not knowing how it's actually calculated. I believe there's a lot of benefit into showing you step by step, how to do it. There's no gatekeeping here. I love just teaching and empowering women, how to take ownership of their health.
So if you want to download that free ebook, you can click the show notes to easily go download that free ebook. Again, it is a 39 plus page free ebook. It gives you step by step, how to calculate your own macros completely free. Or you can go to juliealedbetter.com/free-ebook. Again, that's www.juliealedbetter.com/free-ebook. I hope this helped you. I hope that this gave you some better insight as to how to use hand portions. Again, I personally think that hand portions work best when you have at least a small base knowledge of what portion sizes look like. If you are starting out brand new and you don't know any sort of portion sizing, maybe the hand portion will be beneficial for you or maybe it would be overwhelming. So again, that is up to you to decipher. We are all different. We all have different backgrounds and we all see things differently.
So if this is going to help you, I hope that you implement it. I would love to hear kind of what came from this. If you do start implementing it and it does start working for you, I would love to hear it. So be sure to send me a message on Instagram. If you're not following me on the Gram, it's Julie A Ledbetter. Yes. It's with an A in the middle. Thank you so much for tuning in to today's episode and I'll talk to you in the next one.
All right sister, that's all I got for you today. But I have two things that I need you to do. First thing, if you are not already following me on the Gram, be sure to do so, Julie A Ledbetter. Yes, it's with an A in the middle, for that daily post-workout real talk, healthy tips and tricks and honest accountability to keep your mind and heart in check. The second thing, be sure to subscribe to Apple Podcasts to never miss an episode. Thank you so much for joining me. It means the absolute world and I'm going to leave you with one last thought. The most beautiful women that I have met in my life are the ones who are completely confident and secure in being authentically themselves. Remember that beauty goes so much deeper than the surface. So go out there and embrace your real because you're worth it.