We all know that restaurant food can pose problems when you're trying to lose weight. Restaurants have much larger portions, and you don't always know what's going in the food. Calorie and fat content is way higher in a meal from a restaurant than when you can make that same meal yourself. Does that mean you shouldn't ever eat at a restaurant? Of course not. Here are some helpful hints to eating at restaurants and staying within a diet.
Punk Rock Pikachu's 5 tips for Smart Restaurant eating:
1. Just because it's on the plate doesn't mean you have to eat it: Restaurant portions are large. No question about that. Usually they're too large for any reasonable person to eat. But what do we always do? We eat it anyway. The first tip I have for you is simple in theory but difficult in practice: don't eat everything on your plate. You can either take your leftovers home, and make two meals out of one (saving some money), or you can leave them, whichever you prefer. But at the end of the day, you don't need to (and you shouldn't) eat everything on your plate.
2. It's always lunchtime (or, it's always time for appetizers): A lot of restaurants offer some of their entrees in smaller portions, either as appetizers or as a lunch portion. If possible, you might want to consider eating the smaller portion. It's less food, and usually less money. So you save yourself some unneeded calories and some extra money. It's win-win!
3. Read the menu, thoroughly: Make sure you're reading the menu in depth. Know what's in the food that you're ordering. This is just in general a good practice. Especially if, like me, you have a food allergy. But apart from making sure your dinner doesn't try to kill you, it's good to know what you're eating. Surprise ingredients can drive up calorie and fat content.
4. Salads aren't always healthy: A lot of restaurants have salads. People see salads and think 'Oh, it's a salad. Salads are healthy!' THIS IS NOT ALWAYS TRUE. Salad dressing is full of fat and calories and can be worse for you than many other items on the menu. This ties in to tip number 3: read the description of the salad, find out what type of dressing is on it, and what other toppings are on it. You can sometimes ask for lower fat dressing options, particularly when you can choose your dressing. Also, ask for the dressing on the side. That gives you the ability to control how much dressing you're actually eating. I personally feel that restaurants put way too much dressing anyway, so having it on the side lets me to drastically reduce that.
5. Don't be too afraid to special order: I know a lot of people don't like making special orders. But, speaking as someone who's had to do it numerous times so my food doesn't try to kill me, you shouldn't be too scared to ask for something altered. I'm not saying you should try to order your macaroni and cheese with alfredo sauce instead of cheese sauce. I'm talking about things like asking to see if you can get your vegetables steamed instead of sauteed in heaps of butter. Or asking to leave out an ingredient. The worst that can happen is that the waitress says that the chefs can't do what you would like, and you have to figure out something else to order.
Well, there you have it. Some quick and easy tips to help make the daunting task of staying on a diet while eating at a restaurant a lot more doable. I hope I've been helpful.
Until next time,
Punk Rock Pikachu.
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