How to Break the Habit of the "Clean Plate Club"

Do you have the habit from your childhood around the “clean plate club”? Do you feel you have to finish everything on your plate? Do you get anxiety around waste or around the money you associate with food left uneaten?

Here are tips for working through this habit both emotionally and logistically:

1) Work through this habit emotionally. The compulsion to finish everything on your plate is the result of fears and belief systems from your childhood. Who taught you that you have to finish your plate? Why do you feel you have to? If your desire is to stuff yourself every time, why is that? What emotions are you avoiding by stuffing yourself?

2) No amount of food is too small to save for later! One of the ways I broke this habit for myself was to say to myself, "You can save even just a few tablespoons for tomorrow. It is not pointless to do so." And then I would do that! If I became full and there was only a small amount of food left but that I didn't want to throw away, I'd put it in a container for later. Even if it was just a few tablespoons.

3) If you can't save food for later and/or still feel compelled to finish the food that's there, take a pause and ask yourself the cost of the food that's there. In other words, maybe there is a cup of food left. How much monetary value does that really represent? Is it $1? $5? 50 cents? Often the actual monetary value of the portion we are afraid to throw away is minimal. Is your health really worth that 50 cents or dollar? Surely your body is more precious than money?

4) Reduce food waste at the front-end of your habits. It's not efficient nor practical for your health to try to reduce food waste by eating everything on the plate. Food waste is best reduced by planning your meals ahead of time using recipes, generating grocery lists from those recipes, and avoiding grocery shopping without a plan. When you make food, consider how much you really need to make for the people involved and have a plan for leftovers if there are any.

5) Create a composting system at home. It can help in being less wasteful if you have a compost system where you can toss extra food, which then goes back to nourishing the soil and microbiology and feeding your garden if you have one.