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 by: Diana Keuilian

Tips on how you can avoid weight gain caused by your cafeteria

College weight gain is at an all time high, and as students continue to pack on the pounds at an increasing rate, we naturally want to know where the blame lies for this growing epidemic. Since food consumption contributes significantly to weight gain, is it safe to assume that cafeterias are responsible for the expanding waistlines of our students? Read on for three reasons why the cafeteria food you eat is making you fat, and tips to help you stop the weight gain.

1. All You Can Eat

When was the last time you were given a tray and let loose in an all-you-can-eat buffet? Although most people only experience this phenomenon while either onboard a cruise ship or visiting Las Vegas, college students often have the buffet going experience three times a day, seven days a week. That comes out to twenty-one opportunities to overeat each week. Students are handed the serving spoon, and the sky is the limit!

Let’s do some simple math together to help explain the damage done by the all-you-can-eat cafeteria. One must consume roughly 3,500 extra calories in order to gain a pound. This may seem like a large number, but when broken down between twenty-one meals, one pound can be gained each week by simply eating 170 extra calories at each meal. These 170 calories can take on the form of an extra helping of cheesy spaghetti, a salad drenched in creamy dressing, or a small, innocent-looking dessert. College cafeterias are lurking with excess calories that are on a mission to end up on your unsuspecting tray.

Cafeteria Weight Loss Tip #1: Ditch your tray. Instead of loading up an entire tray with multiple plates of food, desserts and beverages stick with just a simple plate. This will prevent you from overeating, since more food than can fit on one plate is probably more food than you need.

2. Main Dish Mayhem

College cafeterias are notorious for serving main dishes that are less than nutritious. Cheese covered pizzas, pastas and casseroles often dominate the lunch menus while fried meats, potatoes, and fat laden roasts turn up at dinner. Any direction that you turn to, in a cafeteria, will find you staring straight into the pot of something fattening.   (continued...)

Cafeteria At Fault for College Weight Gain
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About The Author Diana Keuilian, Certified Personal Trainer, and author of “Avoid The Freshman Fifteen”, has a proven method for avoiding college weight gain. Visit http://www.AvoidTheFreshman15.com to learn more. She is also the head Fitness Trainer for the nation’s leading online fitness site http://www.HitechPersonalFitness.com and board member of http://www.HitechTrainer.com. diana@avoidthefreshman15.com