Food Rules #51-55

Here are the next 5 Rules in part 3 (How Should I Eat?) of Pollan's book Food Rules, along with some of my comments on said rules:

Food Rules #51: Spend as much time preparing the meal as you took to prepare it. One of the big reasons why I enjoy dining out is because I can often make the mealtime last longer, lingering over each course and savoring each plate. However, eating out gets expensive, so I'm cooking a lot more at home. Cooking for me is cathartic, so I enjoy the ritual of it. Now I'm challenging myself to enjoy the eating part of it just as much, in terms of the time it takes to eat meals I prepare. Still working on that, especially since eating more slowly makes me eat less because I'm more aware of when I'm getting full.

Food Rules #52: Buy smaller plates & glasses. This works! I have started to use a salad plate at home for my meals instead of the larger dinner plates and I do eat less. I will often choose the larger wine glass though. Don't know if that will ever change...

Food Rules #53: Serve a proper portion and don't go back for seconds. I am getting better at this and it's easier to do so following the 2 rules above. Pollan suggests if you are going to go for 2nds, wait a few minutes before doing so because you may find you are not as hungry as you thought and you may actually eat less that way.

Food Rules #54: "Breakfast like a king. Lunch like a prince. Dinner like a pauper". This is a REALLY hard rule for me to follow, since I am usually getting ready in the mornings with little time to get to work and because I have so much to do before actually opening the shop. And because I skip meals and eat dinner late at night. I do find that eating breakfast, even if it's a smoothie, puts me less hungry later in the day than if I don't. If I had a lunch hour I might be able to follow this more easily. And I'm going to try, as Pollan says front-loading eating early in the day helps us consume fewer calories over the course of the day.

Food Rules #55: Eat meals. Ah yes, mealtime. What's that? One study showed 20% of American's eating took place in a car. We are stretched for time, plain & simple. Even on road trips, we're encouraged more to eat in the car as opposed to dining in somewhere. But getting further and further away from the Big Three (breakfast, lunch & dinner) pushes us more towards unnecessary snacking, drinking (sodas, etc)...usually on the unhealthy side of things.

These rules sound so simple and there was once a time, in my life at least, that they were very easy to follow. But we're busy, cash-strapped and we don't make time, quite honestly. I try to make up for it for cooking well later in the day, but again, it's usually a late dinner.

What about you? Do you make sure you take the hour for lunch? Do you always have time to eat a good breakfast? What about dinner - mostly take out or cooking at home? Do you make a big batch of something early in the week and freeze it or have leftovers the rest of the week? And what are any tricks you can share?