Eating out at non-chain restaurants
 

Wondering what your strategies are for eating out in a restaurant where you can't get a calorie count for menu items. I'm trying not to eat out very often, but we have some family coming in to town and they want to eat out at least once this weekend (tonight). I try to order salads, but then the next thing I do is a 'best guess' on calories for something, entering in portion sizes and base ingredients. I left myself a hefty 800 calories for dinner tonight by eating light throughout the day so far.

Anyway, not sure what anyone else does? Any other strategies?

In the past, I've tried to find a similar dish at a chain restaraunt where the calorie info is available. I then use that as my guide.

Also, a lot of places are very accomodating if you request no cheese, sauce on side, etc. You can also request your meal be cooked with no butter, light oil.

I usually eat lightly as well and leave plenty of room if I know I'm going out to eat. Like Mollewogg I look up a similar dish.

My default strategy is to just eat half or less of whatever they give me.

Either that or I stick with what I know is low calorie and healthy: grilled meat and veggies, salad (no dressing), etc.

I usually end up staying away from beef, steaks, burgers that sort of thing because they are always high cal. Same with starches.
Most of the time i'll just get something with chicken and grilled vegs, and salad(dressing on side so I can dip). And automatically ask for a to-go box so you can limit/split your food :)
And that :P

Yep, I guess. It's not an exact science anyway, and if it's not on a daily basis, being off by a few hundred in either direction isn't going to make or break!

My standby is a house salad add chicken, or any grilled fish/chicken with grilled veg (no oil/butter).

I guess, and I try to be reasonable. Might I end up a bit over? Maybe. Will it kill me? No.

That being said, this does mean I do drastically limit the number of times I go to non-chain places.