[pluckypear]

I love to eat out with my DH or close friends. And I love to challenge myself to find yummy but points plus or just overall healthy eating meals out. I love Chinese but have not gone since starting my new journey as I would not know what to eat. Same with Indian.
If fine dining or fast food what do you eat when going out. Please name the establishment too. Maybe we can help eachother.

For fast food I get a Turkey sub sans cheese at Subway. I have mustard on it.
I do well at steakhouses like the Keg with the top sirloin 8 ounces and get the veg side. The shrimp cocktail is also very low as are the lobster tails. I use lemon instead of butter.
I often choose the veggie burger at a pub and do not eat the whole bun or have no bun with salad. I get dressing on the side and end up using very little.
Of course I love fresh seafood and oysters or sashimi are fairly low and healthy.

Any other ideas?

[joefla70]

I'm not sure which restaurant chains you have in Toronto. But here in Florida I go to Ruby Tuesday's. They have low-carb friendly meals, including sides of grilled veggies, spaghetti squash, mashed cauliflower, etc. At Outback Steakhouse I get there 6 oz sirloin with grilled asparagus and a side salad.

For fast food we have a chain of restaurants called Pollo Tropical which is a Caribbean style restaurant that serves grilled meats (mostly chicken) with things like black beans & rice, plantains, etc. Suffice to say I don't eat the black beans, rice or plantains. However, I often go there to get their boneless chicken breast with a side salad.

We also have a chain called Miami Subs. They serve gyros. Once in a while, as a treat, I will get just they gyro meat and eat it with some tzatziki sauce.

We used to have a restaurant that served Portuguese style piri-piri chicken (some call it peri peri). I know that there are such restaurants in Canada. I believe one chain is "Nandos". I've never eaten at that particular chain, but the one we had in Florida was great. I used to eat there all the time.

I try to avoid Chinese restaurants because the amount of oil and salt in the food -- plus I am trying to avoid carbs so I can't eat the rice.

[MarjorieMargarine]

I think you can do ok at Indian restaurants if you can resist the delicious, delicious creamy dishes. Tandoori chicken/shrimp are basically just grilled with spices and not a lot of oil. Raita is a thinned yogurt/cucumber sauce that is delicious on the chicken. Stay away from the naan bread. Sooo good but sooo dangerous. Add a little white rice and it's a pretty decent meal. My husband and I do low carb, and some of the creamier dishes, like saag paneer (creamy spinach and cheese) are actually ok for that (though I'm leery of some things like chicken tikka masala because it has sugar in it a lot), just with no rice or bread.

Vietnamese is also a great way to get an Asian fix. A lot of the vermicelli bowls or pho soups they serve are very low calorie and filling, with grilled meat and lots of veggies. If you're watching carbs, most of them serve lettuce wraps that you can get with the sauce on the side. I've had a lot of success getting them to substitute steamed veggies for the rice that usually comes with dishes.



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[kelijpa]

If we go out for pizza, we have started getting an antipasto or garden salad or some kind of salad before the pie, amazing sometimes there's pizza left to take home...lol

If we're at Uno, I might get 2 sides of roasted veggies, or veggies and that brown rice dish (not a huge huge fan, but it's better than smashed potatoes with cheese, etc.)

At Taco Bell for lunch we got the cantina bowl, it was really good, not sure about the nutrional info, but it seemed better than getting that burrito with the fritos inside or crunchwrap thing...

I also try and order at least at some point a glass of ice water with my meal, so I get some of my water in...

also, if you find yourself at a chinese buffet, if you look around there are quite a few veggies there, you can load up on them and not so much of the batter dipped things and still very tasty, I always make sure I get some soup, too. that way by the time it's dessert time I'm too full..

I find myself actually looking at the "light" entrees and seeing if something there interests me, at a greek diner I had a fabulous grilled chicken salad with dressing on the side, I mean fabulous...

best of luck...

[fatgiraffe]

I usually will look up the menu on the Internet before I go to a restaurant because sometimes they will have nutrition info (like how many calories are in each dish). I feel like it helps to decide ahead of time before you go so you can decide how you want to tweak your meal to make it healthier or less calories (sometimes this takes some time and creativity!) and it also helps me resist to order something I see at a different table or what my friends/ family are going to have.

[mnemosyne]

I usually will look up the menu on the Internet before I go to a restaurant because sometimes they will have nutrition info (like how many calories are in each dish). I feel like it helps to decide ahead of time before you go so you can decide how you want to tweak your meal to make it healthier or less calories (sometimes this takes some time and creativity!) and it also helps me resist to order something I see at a different table or what my friends/ family are going to have.

I do this too, for chain restaurants. If it is a fine restaurant I don't worry as much about the food/calories, since those are rare treats. If you have a more casual local restaurant that you frequent regularly, you can work with them to get what you need, I am sure. I went to a sandwich shop recently that offers "asparagus fries" - which were not fried, just grilled strips of asparagus, and answered nicely my desire to have some sort of side with my sandwich.

I love Panera, as they post the calorie counts on their board menu, and I can make a healthy meal with a bowl of low calorie soup and 1/2 sandwich.

Taco Bell is my favorite for drive-through lunch - which I do rarely - as they have the Fresca menu. Pay attention to calorie counts, but you can do fine there. The hard tacos are, funnily enough, one of the healthier, lower-calorie choices.

Fazolis has some baked 400 calorie dishes, but the amount you get is so small it feels absurd. But they do offer whole-wheat pasta options and you can add a lower-calorie sauce and a side salad. Just beware the breadsticks.

[SoMuchFattitude]

With Chinese food - I order it steamed -sauce on the side w/ brown rice.

[pluckypear]

Thanks for the tips. I am going with family to an all you can eat asian style buffet Saturday night. So I will be using some of these tips. Wish me luck.