When Alex Bogusky moved into a 1940s house six years ago, he was dismayed to discover his new dishes didn't fit in the cupboards. "I was thinking, 'What kind of idiot makes cabinets that don't fit a normal plate?'" he recalls. That's when it hit him: Today's "normal" plate is abnormally huge—about 30 percent bigger than it was 40 years ago—a point the Boulder-based ad exec, 45, drives home with powerful imagery (seen here) in his new book, The 9-Inch 'Diet.' Now Bogusky—who has whittled 3 inches from his waist since switching to 9-inch plates five years ago—is leading the revolution to downsize dinnerware. "The plate," he says, "is a really practical portion-control tool."
BIGGER ISN'T BETTER
"America has been suffering from a severe case of gigantism," writes Bogusky. To make his point, he chronicles the explosion of over-sized beverages that have popped up since the late '80s (as seen at right). Over the years, "the large became the medium and the medium became the small and the small became the child's cup," Bogusky continues. To stop this cycle of disingenuous labeling, Bogusky suggests killing the concept of, say, a "venti" coffee; instead, "name a drink after the number of ounces."
20 oz.
64 oz.
32 oz.
HOW WE MEASURE UP
As Bogusky points out in The 9-Inch "Diet," food portions in the U.S. are typically at least 25 percent larger than those in Europe.
[This article contains a table. Please see hardcopy of magazine or PDF.]
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