How often do you eat out during weight-loss phase?

Every once in awhile should be fine. But if your doing it that much it's not healthy. Even trying to choose the healthier options has loaded calories in places you would expect as well as other non healthy ingredients such as your sodium intake you noticed. If your daughter needs to gain weight there is a much healthier way to do it then to eat out. A person that weighs 150 pounds on a diet of lean meats proteins , vegetables. Is way more healthy than a 150lb person on a diet of McDonald's. Just because it fits into your macros does not make it healthy.

I only eat out maybe 5 or 6 times per month total. Couple of date nights per month with my wife and usually a Sunday lunch with my boys.

This is regardless of my weight control goals. In my experience, eating out a lot makes both losing weight and maintenance difficult.

k2mexox wrote: »

Every once in awhile should be fine. But if your doing it that much it's not healthy. Even trying to choose the healthier options has loaded calories in places you would expect as well as other non healthy ingredients such as your sodium intake you noticed. If your daughter needs to gain weight there is a much healthier way to do it then to eat out. A person that weighs 150 pounds on a diet of lean meats proteins , vegetables. Is way more healthy than a 150lb person on a diet of McDonald's. Just because it fits into your macros does not make it healthy.

^^^What she said

I'll go out to eat once I meet a short term goal for my weight loss. Right now I'm tring to get under 200lbs (25lbs to go) Once I reach 199 I'm going to Olive garden to celebrate, it's my favoriteeee! Next will be 175, then 150. I don't really have the need to go out to eat like that but it is tastey.

I eat out once a week. mostly out of neccesity, on night when we run low on time after taekwondo. i solo parent two young boys (6&7) cause dad works out of town 20 days a month.

4-5 days a week is alot! you need to cook more at home that you both can eat. not to mention while your daughter may be underweight now, your not really setting her up for good eating habits in the future when unfortunatly eating habits do catch up with us.

I usually make something for my boys that they will eat that and that is higher calories or fat for thier skinny bottoms. They like bean and cheese burritos, homemade personal pizzas, tuna fish sandwhich and chips etc.

I eat roasted veggies and eggs, or something else that fits my plan. I also make extra veggies for them.

I eat out once a week.
If my dd doesn't like what I cook she has a sandwich, yogurt, cereal or fruit.

I eat out at restaurants (the ones I go to have no nutrition information) once or twice a week and have since I started. (It's part of my social life and something we do before going to a play or concert or to try new restaurants/old favorites.) I usually consider those my more indulgent meals--I try to order wisely (most of the time) and keep in mind that restaurants add more butter and have larger serving sizes and act accordingly, but eating out as much as you are would make this a lot harder. (I did this when my calories were 1250, but used exercise calories, sometimes from earlier in the week too, to cover the meals then, because it's really hard to account for most restaurant meals with those calories alone and still eat reasonably the rest of the day).

I also from time to time end up buying lunch when I'm at work, which might be more similar to what you are talking about. I go to places (like Pret a Manger) where I have calorie counts and can choose options that aren't that different from what I might make at home in calories and ingredients. I think this is okay (if more expensive than I'd recommend) and shouldn't affect your diet. But warning bells are set off by the statement about portion size and being tempted by what your daughter eats--it sounds as if you are probably going to end up consuming more calories than you want and that it would be easier to reduce the number of nights you go out for a while.

several times a week.

still losing consistently.

berlynnwall wrote: »

My daughter is 10 and is an extremely picky eater. No matter what I cook for her, which is usually something she has picked, she takes 2 bites then hates it and asks for something else. When we go out, she doesn't do that, so we started eating out 5x a week,

1. Have you discussed this with your pediatrician? Did you ask for a referral to a specialist?

2. Can you learn how to cook tastier foods from what she's eating when you're out? E.g., perhaps they're using 85% lean ground beef and you're using 98% lean ground beef.

3. Are you eating at places with published calorie counts? If so, you know what she's getting, and hitting your targets should be easy. There will always be some variation in portion sizes of real food, and that's okay, so long as there isn't a consistent pattern of oversizing portions.

3. Cheese. Is. Amazing. It can make broccoli palatable.

4. Peanut Butter. Is. Amazing. It can make carrots palatable.

It must be frustrating, going through a phase where she won't eat your cooking. I've had kids sometimes refuse a meal, but never to the point they lost extreme weight.

Once or twice a week. It may be a healthy choice one day and not so much another day. It all depends if I know I'm working out that day and to see if I can eat it.