Portion Control With A Bento Box

September 24, 2007 by 8 Comments

Bento BoxThe Japanese never cease to amaze me. I know this may be old news but I think the Bento Box is a great invention. If you don’t know, a Bento Box is like a plate but in the form of a box that is divided into sections. If you’ve ever eaten at a Japanese restaurant they provide Bento Box meals that have rice, your meat, veggies and sauce, as well as anything else that comes with the specific meal.

I think that with a Bento Box we can all consume meals in a portion controlled way! A regular plate is just trouble because you can pile your plate with food, but a Bento Box restricts you from doing so.

The cool thing is that there are actually a lot of Bento Boxes to choose from, from cute ones to the straight up traditional Bento Boxes. They also come in many different sizes, but the idea stays the same. Portioned food prevents overeating, and not overeating prevents gaining more weight. Not to mention you can use them over and over which is not only good for the environment, it’ll help you eat in portions every day!

To see some of my favorite looking Bento Boxes…

Check out some more Bento boxes here.

Filed Under: Everyday Healthy
  • http://news.runtowin.com Blaine Moore (Run to Win)

    What’s to stop you from overloading the bento box in the same manner as you would a plate, other than that there are dividers? You can still go up and over…

  • http://news.runtowin.com Blaine Moore (Run to Win)

    What’s to stop you from overloading the bento box in the same manner as you would a plate, other than that there are dividers? You can still go up and over…

  • zell

    Haha. Weird. I just recently discovered this as well.

  • zell

    Haha. Weird. I just recently discovered this as well.

  • monica

    You cannot overload a bento box because they have lids. Presumably you take them to work with you. Also, the boxes themselves tend to be very small. Like about as big as a sandwich. Even if you crammed it with food, still half or less than half of a restaurant portion. Besides, if you pack your own lunch, you are less likely to pile on garbage (hopefully).

  • monica

    You cannot overload a bento box because they have lids. Presumably you take them to work with you. Also, the boxes themselves tend to be very small. Like about as big as a sandwich. Even if you crammed it with food, still half or less than half of a restaurant portion. Besides, if you pack your own lunch, you are less likely to pile on garbage (hopefully).

  • http://www.noelfigart.com/blog Noel Lynne Figart

    RE: Overloading a bento box.

    I suppose you could fill a bento with M&Ms or something and have a bad meal. But the thing is, a bento box is small — you’re looking at about two cups of food, tops.

    They’re supposed to be packed quite tightly, but if you follow the basic bento design aesthetic (3:2:1 — Three parts rice, one part protein, one part veggies and/or fruit) you can pack that thing as tight as you like, and your calorie count for the container is going to be roughly equivalent to the milliliter capacity,

  • http://www.noelfigart.com/blog Noel Lynne Figart

    RE: Overloading a bento box.

    I suppose you could fill a bento with M&Ms or something and have a bad meal. But the thing is, a bento box is small — you’re looking at about two cups of food, tops.

    They’re supposed to be packed quite tightly, but if you follow the basic bento design aesthetic (3:2:1 — Three parts rice, one part protein, one part veggies and/or fruit) you can pack that thing as tight as you like, and your calorie count for the container is going to be roughly equivalent to the milliliter capacity,