I think the primary reason that regular exercise is supposed to make such a huge difference in fighting obesity is not the direct energy expediture of the exercise itself so much as the boost to your metabolism. So walking 30 minutes a day is far more effective for weight loss than walking 6 hours twice a month, even if the total energy cost is the same. Thus if you walk regularly, you’ll end up burning off a lot more than 100 calories/mile.
I have just got back from a week trying to drink New England dry - well, mainly Boston and Portland (Maine). The egregious Jez and I tended to eat mainly in bars and brewpubs and I would say that the portions in most places were significantly larger than those offered by similar establishments in the UK and Ireland.
Special mention, however, must be made of $3Deweys in Portland, not only for the quality and quantity of beers available but also for the reasonable sizes of the food portions (the food was excellent, too).
But I tend, like jiimm, to return from the USA significantly lardier than when I arrived, and I am not one whose weight normally fluctuates by more than a few pounds either side of the 10 stone/140 lbs mark. And I walked a hell of a lot last week, despite the snow.
You’re supposed to drink Canada Dry. 
I fully agree with all this…the one time I’m guaranteed to eat a full English, no matter what time of day or night, plus a gallon of tea, is after returning from the continent.
$.30 for a bag of chips from a machine?
You must be a time traveler from the 1970s.
I’ve heard the argument that diet soda contibutes to overweight because some drinkers of it think that ‘entitles’ them to consume more calories from other sources, and generally overcompensate. Perhaps that’s the basis of EuroMDguy’s claim here, though only he can tell us for sure.
I was in Germany for a year, admittedly a long time ago, and my impression was that restaurants served about as much over there as they did over here at the time. This was mainly in the sorts of places where you could get a whole plate of food and a glass of wine for, like, 7 or 8DM in the 1970s.
Judging by my experience with higher-quality Italian and French restaurants over here, where the meal is usually ordered and served in several courses, the individual portions do tend to be quite small, but then you’re probably getting four courses including salad and desert, so it seems to even out more or less.
I go to France fairly often and my wife has been at least once a year since she was little. I never experienced anything like you report.
Actually once I did. Did they seat you in an restaurant area with other Americans and English menus some of the time? Paris has a number of huge ripoff restaurants where they segregate Americans and give them “special” food and prices. We got seated in the American section of the restaurant once and we asked to be moved midway through. It had high priced menus, mediocre food, and less then authentic french cuisine. Even though that was the only time that we got chosen to be seated in one of those, I have seen it happen to other Americans as they got picked out of line and led off to their special treat.
My wife speaks French fluently and knows the culture as well as her own but Parisians can be both accommodating and condescending at the same time.
My experience in France a few years ago was that the portion sizes in good restaurants were definitely smaller, but the portion was perfect. I’d get served a plate of food and think, oh, wow, I’m gonna be really hungry later. When I’d finished leisurely completing the meal, I’d realize that I really was not hungry any more. Or that maybe I could enjoy a small portion of fruit or other dessert. In contrast, here in the U S of A, I find that most of the time I have to really watch it in order to stop eating at the right time. As long as there’s tasty food on the plate, I tend to want to finish it, even if some objective thought would tell me I am not really hungry any more.
I also agree that many (certainly not all) Americans eat too fast. Especially my husband, who spent his youth starving in Europe after WWII. Also, many (certainly not all) Americans will tell you how great a restaurant was, and their main praise is the huge size of the portions.
Not from a machine but those lunchbox size ones that according to albertsons.com are 8.99 for 24 bags. (.37, sorry).
The same size bags were 2-3 euros. Even chips out of an airport snack machine in the US aren’t anywhere near that expensive.
If anyone thinks that portion sizes in France and England are too small, try taking a trip through Eastern Europe. When I traveled to Prague in 2001, I was amazed by how small the portions were. They cut out a steak or fish fillet that’s about three square inches, and give you a spoonful of choppped vegetables on the side. Then again the meals are remarkably cheap, so I suppose you get what you pay for.
So, how’s your French toast?
Someone’s gotta get this one, I just know it
My arteries just slammed shut in horror. Breakfast for me is a couple of pieces of toast, two or three cups of coffee, and a piece of fruit or two.
I was living in Germany for awhile a year or so ago and I noticed I tended to take home leftovers about as often as I do in the States. If you go out to dinner, it’s definitely a meal. You aren’t going to go home hungry. I’ve had many a plate of pasta I couldn’t make it half way through.
But you’re right, I don’t think they eat out as often. Or at least when they eat out, it isn’t always a full-on meal the way American’s tend to expect every meal to be. Germans seem to spend a lot of time at cafe-type places, but they aren’t always having a full course meal while they’re there. They might just be having coffee or a beer, and socializing with friends. Then go home and cook dinner.
Going to a Denny’s for breakfast and getting a Mega Meat Lover’s Grand Slam Skillet Scramble Supreme is something you just don’t see much in Europe.
Which brings us neatly on to the only guaranteed method for weight loss: eschew your food properly. 
I’m probably alone in this.
When I eat dinner out at home I probably won’t be hungry the next day, so usually skip breakfast and lunch the day after a big meal.
On holiday I try to eat like the locals, and I usually don’t put on weight, but that’s because we do a lot of walking.
In Italy it means a cappucino and a roll for breakfast, something light (a slice of pizza, a salad) for lunch and a full dinner (3 courses- skipping either antipasti or pudding, depending on my mood) eaten over about 2 hours.
In France that’s a coffee and croissant, half a baguette with cheese for lunch and 3 courses for dinner, again if I’m not hungry I’ll skip pudding or a starter…
I’ll probably leave something on my plate at each course. Fizzy soft drinks with food is a no-no. Water, fruit juice, tea, coffee, wine or beer only.
My experience of American food is restricted to 4 hours waiting in LAX. I ordered a small portion of french fries, and was only able to eat half of it. The waiter was terribly concerned that I might not be feeling well or that there was something wrong with the food. There wasn’t, the portion was just too big.
I grew up in Canada, where, when eating at just about any restaurant, the portions are sufficiently small that you had room for dessert at the end. Since I moved to the US nearly eight years ago, I have not been able to have dessert even once. There is a massive amount of food served here for meals in restaurants. We bring home the other half that we couldn’t possibly eat, all the time.
Here’s an interesting article from the Observer Food Monthly on the ‘French Paradox’ i.e. Why Les Frenchies can pack away the calorie-laden food, while still slipping into their teeny sized Chanel. It goes into comparative eating habits of the US/UK including portion size, eating out etc.
Some of the points is raises are that the French/Europeans…
A) Prefer to prepare unprocessed foods - therefore avoiding e-numbers, hormones, GM foods, additives etc.
B) Spend a greater amount of time eating and discussing the food they eat - it is a national pastime.
C)Prefer quality over quantity - one square of dark real chocolate over a bar of processed ‘milk’ chocolate, for example.
D)Have smaller portion control (quote from the article) "Mean portion size in Philadelphia was about 25 per cent greater than in Paris. Philadelphia’s Chinese restaurants served 72 per cent more than the Parisian ones. A supermarket soft drink in the US was 52 per cent larger, a hotdog 63 per cent larger, a carton of yoghurt 82 per cent larger. "
Well worth a read.
Just take a quick jaunt up to Canada to get a sense of the large quantities of food served as part of an American meal. Even, for example, a single Tim Horton’s doughnut seems small. All of my colleagues commented on how much smaller the serving sizes were at the restaurants we went to.
Nope - no two ways about it. We are big fatties here in America and we love us some super sizin’.
It’s also down to individual choice in the same restaurant. Just the other day in BK in Phuket, Thailand, our eat-in order got mixed up with the take-away order of the American couple in front of us. mrs jjimm had ordered a cheeseburger and I a regular Whopper. The Yanks had already left when we picked up their order in error. mrs jjimm ended up with a double cheeseburger, while I ended up with a double Whopper cheeseburger with bacon. Since we were hungry and the error diddled them not us, and they hadn’t returned, we decided not to complain, and eat the big stuff instead. mrs jjimm just about forced hers down, while I managed about half of my burger before I had to give up due to stomach ache.