I asked a similar question when I was recently in hospital. The meals had the meat/fish/whatever you could order, if you wanted vegetables you ordered those as “extras” and they didn’t put them on the plate with the main meal, you got them separately. So, if you ordered them, you got like 3 times as much. I was having discussions about my eating because I’d lost a lot of weight and I asked the dietician how anyone could eat 8 potatoes as well as the main meal (that’s what I got, 8). She said that people really do eat that much. (and this wasn’t crazy food, it was nice healthy food). Substitute a portion of main, 8 potatoes and a bowl of green beans with fatty greasy calorific food and greasy chips and grilled cheese and you’d be ingesting a lot of calories.
Because I’m a small eater (even before the health issues) I ask them to go easy on the portions they give me so they don’t get wasted. Nobody can do it. There’s this inherent “more is better” and they still pile it on. Even if I’m standing there and go “that’s good”, the spoon will add more…
As for overstuffed burritos, the other day when I got mexican, I went for a bowl instead. It did me for about 3 meals, and I didn’t have to contend with the soggy tortilla for the successive meals. I got some corn chips instead. They do a “mini” sized burrito, but that’s huge by my stomach’s standards.
I am “strange” in that I can’t eat a lot, but when ‘regular people’ start saying that portions are nuts, they must really be getting ridiculous.
(oh, and as for mcdonald’s chips in Paris, you can get mayonnaise with them. yum.)