This is bonkers, but slightly less so once you realize that the author means "mouthfuls of food or caloric liquid" rather than literal bites (which you hopefully do many times per mouthful of food).
Ha, thanks for saying that. My mother had the same reaction and I assumed she was just being obtuse but now that a commenter on Hacker News has said it I'm going to assume there's genuine ambiguity there and add a little prescript to the post to clarify! ... and done. Thanks again!