Eating out
 

What do you do about calorie counting when you go out to eat and the cals arent listed? I know try to eat light or go to the light portion of the menu? but how to log it? Know any calorie counter friendly restaurants?

I'm like you -- I choose healthy items and do not get an appetizer or dessert.

I'm not sure how you're tracking your calories, but I use FitDay. So I will enter each item that I ate.

For example, I went out to lunch today and had a big salad with grilled chicken on it. When I got home, I entered all the individual items and amounts -- lettuce, tomatoes, cucumbers, chicken, dressing -- into FitDay. I had to kind of fudge it on the salad dressing (it was a balsamic vinaigrette and FitDay didn't have that in its database).

There is some guesswork to it, but I tend to err on the side of extra calories.

Good luck!

I find its usually better to round up & guestimate high on resturant foods- they sneak fats & sugars into everything they can, even the the healthy stuff. Plus the serving sizes are rediculous- there is no way a healthy adult could eat the amount of food they serve at most places. Another trick for calculating calories later is to find a similar type of resturant that does have nutritional info available- its going to more accurate most of the time then anything else. And don't be afraid to ask for things the way you want them- dressing on the side, 2 vegies instead of a roll & vegie, etc....but don't get so carried away that you don't enjoy the meal either- occasionally eating out is okay, everything is okay in moderation.

I've been trying to go to chain resturaunts. Most have the calories listed on their webpages. I feel more comfortable knowing what i'm eating and not trying to guess.

Originally Posted by mdudas:
What do you do about calorie counting when you go out to eat and the cals arent listed?

Nothing. I just make sensible choices and then put it behind me. No way am I going to come home and sit in front of my computer (in fitday) trying to figure out every little amount I ate and how many calories it was.

Originally Posted by christineu:
... occasionally eating out is okay, everything is okay in moderation.

Totally agree. This is how I'll have to eat for the rest of my life if I don't want to gain the weight back so I have to be realistic and know that there will be plenty of times I won't know the exact amount of calories that I'm eating. Moderation and enjoying it are totally key to successful weightloss.

calorieking.com has a database of restaurants and the nutrition for parts of their menus. but i agree with what others are saying- it is best to round up.

I think that for ME, eating out once in a while isn't too tough. I like going to Applebees and I normally get that Tango Chicken Sandwich off the Weight Watchers menu. The whole plate of food is 370 calories.

Now, what I do find difficult is eating out while traveling. We just went to Minneapolis on Thursday and returned on Saturday night. My aunt passed away last Saturday (she was having an angiogram and they nicked her aorta and she bleed to death). Anyhow, her memorial service was on Friday.

• Thursday supper: Applebees - chicken and broccoli fettucine - I didn't make a good choice, but I knew that going into the meal
• Friday breakfast: Perkins - ham & cheese omelet (egg beaters), pancakes, fresh fruit (no hashbrowns)
• Friday lunch: church - I was good in the sense that I didn't fill up my plate with every sort of casserole available. I did have a piece of cake.
• Friday supper: Olive Garden - I ordered the linguine marinara - VERY GOOD, but the breadsticks were calling my name.
• Saturday breakfast: hotel - A blueberry bagel
• Saturday lunch: D.MichaelB.'s - grilled chicken sandwich with the mayo on the side and raw veggies with fat free ranch dressing as a dip. Excellent meal!
• Saturday supper: home!

All in all, I think I did fairly okay with the food I ate. I know it could have been better. We had only planned on staying one night and coming home on Friday. Then my DH said that as long as we were there, we should stay another night to go shopping, etc. The only "down" side of this was that I hadn't planned on doing any shopping so I wasn't sure where I wanted to go. We did end up at the HUGE outlet mall in Albertville. AND... we bought a new bed! We've been sleeping on John's queen size bed that is some sort of Sealy back care or something like that. It's way to hard for me. The new bed is a king size and has more of a plush top, but still firm underneath. I guess a plush top with memory foam and cashmere. It won't be delivered until March 9.

Back to the eating out thing. We will be going on our honeymoon this summer. Once we figure out where we are going, I can do a little research as to what is available. I think the last we talked about it, we were going to drive to Glacier National Park. I'm hoping they have food similar as to what is available in Yellowstone - I worked there two summers ('89 and '90). I feel more in control if I know what I am "going into." Even if the restaurants aren't much more than fast food joints, I still order better when I plan it out. Like ordering a kid's meal instead of the double or triple whatever. (Well, skip the fries and just get a hamburger and a pop.)

Kimberly

Eating at ethnic restaurants is harder, but I do it! Like the others, I try to guesstimate when I return (and eat reasonably there). I'm not trying to get it perfect, but see how I can fit it in my life! Make good choices and hopefully good guesses and move on. I'd worry more if I weren't losing.

I've been impressed by the number of chains in nutridiary's extended database!

I usually get the exact information off the internet and make it a custom food on my Fitday. Or, like Jill, enter something as a bigger serving that is close to the calorie counts I found online. Fitday will tell me a large hamburger is something like 600-800 calories, when actually most restaurants will tell you online that they are about 1,000 so I will enter a generic food on Fitday but mess with the servings so it matches the calorie count I get online. It is very important to me to religiously count everything and underestimate nothing. I tend to eat out at least twice a week and while I'm sure it's not good for me, it's not something I see myself stopping anytime soon purely for health reasons. I fit it into my calories when I can (Chili's has some healthier options) because I know soon the $$ will get tight and I'll have more impetus to stop eating out as much.

I eat out *alot* on the weekends and I haven't had too much trouble counting calories. My restaurant staples are things like clear broth soups (pho, miso, hot & sour) sushi, steamed spring rolls, fahitas, grilled meats etc. For breakfasts I tend towards multigrain pancakes, oatmeal and poached eggs. When you stay away from sauces and fried things calorie estimating is pretty easy.

I definitely like the way I feel when I've selected the right foods eating out - both mentally and physically. Even today, I had lunch with my DH at Subway and ordered a ham sub on Italian with spinach leaves -- and fat free Ranch dressing. (And baked chips.) No cheese. I didn't even MISS the cheese. I did see a little girl eating a chocolate macadamia nut cookie and I wanted to take it from her, but I restrained myself. ;)

Kimberly

Tani -- I love a lot of the same foods you do -- if you use fitday, when you eat pho, what values do you enter?

I love applebees too but we don't go there anymore, know some folks there that are too rude. But I try and cook more now that I'm dieting but am eating out tonight, I think the cracker barrel as a grilled chicken salad and I will eat that with a low fat dressing.

Is anyone in to the book Calorie Queens? I just got it and I'm loviing it, makes so much sense!

How has everyone been doing?

wyllenn-
fit day has a listing for 'pho'-- i was surprised when i found it:

Beef and rice noodle soup, Oriental style (Vietnamese Pho Bo)


Nutrition Facts

Amount Per 1 cup
Calories 174.13
Calories from Fat 35.13

% Daily Value *

Total Fat 3.9g 6%
Saturated Fat 1.38g 7%
Polyunsaturated Fat 0.267g
Monounsaturated Fat 1.45g
Cholesterol 42.32mg 14%

Sodium 666.43mg 28%
Potassium 333.6mg 10%
Total Carbohydrate 16.72g 6%
Dietary Fiber 0.973g 4%
Protein 16.87g 34%
Alcohol 0g


Vitamin A 4 % Vitamin C 7 %

Calcium 2 % Iron 12 %

Vitamin D 0 % Vitamin E 0 %

Thiamin 4 % Riboflavin 9 %

Niacin 15 % Folate 4 %

Vitamin B-6 14 % Vitamin B-12 31 %

Phosphorus 17 % Magnesium 10 %

Zinc 25 % Copper 7 %

i just typed 'pho' into the search engine. i know that the amounts will vary depending on what type of pho you get and at least for me a serving of pho is more like 3 or 4 cups... pho is one of my favorite rainy-day lunches! hope this helps

punkrockgyrll -- Wow! Thanks! I know nutridiary doesn't have pho, but I will check out fitday for some of these other foods. That is really cool! I thought fitday and nutridiary used the same database, but I guess not. Learn something new every day!

The good news is the info in fitday matches the research I did online fairly well.

Can someone tell me exactly what fitday is and where to find it?

go to fitday.com, its free register, it hlps you tally up calories and other things like proteins fats etc. If you go to the calculator on this site that tells how many calories it takes you to maintain your diet and subtract 500. that will be what you should be taking in in calories per day. Ive lost 5 # in 10 days with it. At first its a little strange to use but the more you use it the more you will like it.!

thanks, I'm going to go check it out. I was just asking someone else what were the daily totals we should be eating.

youre welcome
 

I am losing weight despite the consdturive criticism form other fc.

well I'll be eating out, but eating in too. I'll be staying days and nights with my father in the hospital. I'm glad I have some Nutrisystem meals to take with me, and tonight I'll pick up some fruite to take over there. I'm going over Wed for a couple of days and maybe longer but not sure.

Littleegg, we are close in our weight loss stats, but I need to lose to 140 pounds. I have 26 pounds to go and I'm eager to get them off but more eager to keep them off, and still trying to figure out how to get my brain and food attitude to help me.

I'm hoping that I can get a life time program situated in my head to help me get off the merry go round.