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For dieters, eating out can be very stressful and frustrating. Nutritionally, you never know what you’re getting. But it’s even more difficult for those of us trying to cut back on calories; in most instances, we just have no idea how many calories are in the meals that we consume unless we prepare them ourselves. Some restaurants are getting better about making their nutritional information available but most are still woefully behind the times. The other day, CNN.com posted a list of the top 10 healthiest chain restaurants. They also gave us a little bit of information about what we should order, and what we should avoid when dining in them. I’ve summarized their list in the table below.
Top 10 Healthy Chain Restaurants
| Restaurant | What's Good | Try To Avoid |
|---|---|---|
| Uno's Chicago Grill | Penne Bolognese | Anything "Deep Dish" |
| Souplantation & Sweet Tomatoes | Tomato & Spinach Whole Wheat Pasta | Overeating |
| Mimi's Cafe | Chicken & Fruit | "Comfort Classics" |
| P.F. Chang's China Bistro | Vegetarian Lettuce Wraps | Lo Mein Beef |
| Bob Evans Restaurants | Healthy Kids Menu | BREAKFAST! |
| Ruby Tuesday | Veggie & Turkey Burgers | Chicken Pot Pie |
| Romano's Macaroni Grill | Italian Sorbetto and biscotti | Spaghetti & Meatballs with Meat Sauce |
| Chevy's Fresh Mex | Fresh Fish of the Day | Too Much Sodium |
| Olive Garden | Capellini Pomodoro | Non-Olive-Branch Entrees |
| Denny's | "Fit Fare" dishes | BREAKFAST! |
I couldn’t believe some of the names that made this list. It reminded me of when our local paper published the “Best of the Willamette Valley” restaurants and Taco Bell made the list for best Mexican! Unfortunately (maybe) for me, the only restaurants on the list that Salem has to offer are Denny’s and The Olive Garden. If I want to try one of the other restaurants, I have to drive for an hour up to Portland. And if I’m driving for an hour, there’s no way I’m setting foot inside Sweet Tomatoes. Nope, I think I’ll pass on the restaurants on this list. If I’m going to eat out, I’m saving my calories for an amazing dining experience…like Sonic!
J.D.
12 responses so far ↓
1 Saxtor // May 21, 2008 at 7:44 am
When I was in the airport, I ran across a book entitled “Eat This, Not That”. I was intrigued enough to pick it up, and was sorely disappointed by what I saw inside.
On each gate-fold (ie. pg 3 & 4) you had on the left “Eat This” and a bunch of photos from chain restaurants with a blurb about why it’s okay to eat each item, and on the right “Not That” and the so-called bad foods from the same restaurant, with an explanation why each was bad. The book covered popular chains, chains I have never heard of in my life, food genres (ie. BBQ, Thai, baseball game, store-bought snacks, etc). and so on. Most people without a proper sense about how to eat right would think the book is an amazing tool. I saw something completely different.
For starters, they had no respect for portion control, beyond what was provided by the chain restaurants. On the McDonald’s page, for example, the “Eat This” was an entire BigMac. On the “Not That” page it was some other burger at McDonalds. No sensible eater should scarf down a whole BigMac with fries, drink, etc. Worse yet was that the “Eat This” page was cluttered with several items suggesting that ALL of this is okay to eat, perhaps in one sitting, were a “healthy-minded” person so inclined, since the book said it was okay to eat each item. Click here for a pic of the Wendy’s page displaying exactly what I mean.
The worst offense I witnessed, however, was on the pages for snacks, packaged ice creams, candy bars, etc. As we all know, foods in those categories should be eliminated or at least highly regulated. But each page was absolutely cluttered with countless items, all with the same style of packaging that have no indication that one might be “healthier” than the next. You might have a “healthy” Hershy’s bar on one page, and an “unhealthy” Hershy’s bar on the opposite page, both with the same block letters. It would be so very confusing for anyone who tried to take the book seriously to navigate the grocery aisles trying to dodge the confusing mess the book tries to parse.
Anyhow, any of us could have written the book on one page. “Don’t eat crap food!”
2 MizFit // May 21, 2008 at 8:14 am
ahhh sonic.
your tater tots are so NASTY and so (once a year) fabulous.
M.
3 Gooniette // May 21, 2008 at 8:47 am
Hmm, being on the east coast, I haven’t heard of a few of those places.
But, it’s surprising that they don’t recommend the Salad Bar at Ruby Tuesday!
And I’ve never had a healthy meal at a Denny’s. I don’t think that’s what the place is really for.
It’s a very strange chart to me…
4 macdaddy // May 21, 2008 at 9:04 am
5 Andrew is getting fit // May 21, 2008 at 10:35 am
The only one of those we have here in New Zealand is Denny’s and the only thing I like there is the breakfast…oh well…I haven’t been there for about 3 years so I’m not missing much.
6 Red // May 21, 2008 at 10:40 am
The only good thing sonic has to offer are commercials.
7 Brigid // May 21, 2008 at 1:34 pm
My advice for eating out has always been order what you wnt but eat half or less. I’ll ask for a to-go container before the food arrives and portion it out before I dig in.
The chart’s a little weird - for Macaroni Grill, the “good” food are desserts. Not helpful if you are there for dinner plus I have a hard time believing they don’t have something similar to Olive Garden’s Capellini Pomodoro. It’s been awhile since I’ve been there, but I seem to recal they had some good marinaras and a “create your own” pasta dish.
Cheers!
Brigid
8 TripleE // May 21, 2008 at 2:02 pm
We have most of those where I live, although I’ve never heard of this Sweet Tomatoes or Mimi’s at all.
I wonder if they weren’t including fast food for a reason, because it’s absurd that Subway is missing from that list. For that matter, while I’m not a huge fan of the restaurant, Applebee’s is very good about keeping Weight Watchers and possibly a couple other diets’ entrees on the menu. You don’t *have* to order ribs.
Also, not sure what the “healthy kids’ menu” entails at Bob Evans, but the *only* good thing in that restaurant is the breakfast. I tried to take the high road and order a salad once, and everything on it was either subpar “fresh” ingredients, or flavorless processed crap. It really is better to just enjoy the fat-tastic breakfasts there and simply nosh on healthy stuff the rest of the day.
And while I can’t speak for P.F. Chiang’s specifically, most Asian restaurants of that “caliber” (i.e. ones that try to kick it up a notch instead of feeding you fried lard and MSG) have plenty of healthy options for normal people. Suggesting vegetarian lettuce wraps to an audience of people who want junk food isn’t productive, considering that the meat filled alternative is tasty and still relatively healthy.
~EEE~
9 Beth // May 22, 2008 at 11:25 am
Ruby Tuesday’s has a whole menu section devoted to Weight Watcher friendly foods with the points listed. Their mashed cauliflower tastes very similar to mashed potatos with much fewer calories. And they have a pretty good salad bar.
10 Joshua // May 22, 2008 at 12:20 pm
Saxtor, the point of the book is not really about making healthy choices, its more about making less unhealthy choices. For alot of us here, we know that Ice Cream and Hershey bars, with their oh so beautiful siren songs, should be kept to a minimum, but the overweight shlep out there who travels alot for business or the bachelor who couldn’t cook to save his life, literally, could use something that helps them make choices that are atleast not as bad as they were before, then maybe they can throw in something green here and there. I agree with you, but again, the book isn’t really geared towards us.
11 Marc // May 27, 2008 at 12:21 pm
Read Michael Pollan’s “In Defense of Food”. It could possibly change the way you eat. Also, read “The Metabolic Typing Diet” by William Wolcott and Trish Fahey. Very enlightening. The Western diet is killing us … quite literally.
12 Memorial Holiday Weekend Roundup and Weight Ladder on AllTop | Health, Fitness, Exercise, and Weight Loss (47 pounds in 7 weeks) // Jun 9, 2008 at 12:14 pm
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