Conscious Decisions Before Eating Out

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  • annacole94
    annacole94 Posts: 997 Member
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    The easiest thing is to decide on a "normal" order for yourself that fits your usual diet. It might mean you make a rule like "no fries, broth-based soup or salad with vinagarette on the side". Or "no pasta" (because the serving size is usually enormous and I always want cheese sauce).

    Take a look at the menu for the places you go the most. Decide that every meal out is NOT a celebration where you should just cut loose. One meal doesn't ruin a person, but several meals a week really do add up.
  • jamszy
    jamszy Posts: 123 Member
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    annacole94 wrote: »
    One meal doesn't ruin a person, but several meals a week really do add up.

    This couldn't be more true! Thank you for your insight!
  • Francl27
    Francl27 Posts: 26,371 Member
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    If you really have no idea how many calories are in dishes... look it up and LOG IT BEFORE you order. Even if that restaurant doesn't have nutrition information, you can find an estimate in the database.

    Also, you can pretty much expect that anything fried or with sauce is going to be a lot of calories...

    Ok I admit I'm just confused about how you can 'forget' to make better choices when you're trying to lose weight.
  • jamszy
    jamszy Posts: 123 Member
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    Francl27 wrote: »
    Ok I admit I'm just confused about how you can 'forget' to make better choices when you're trying to lose weight.

    I'm only speaking from personal experience, but it's easy to get caught up in the moment and go completely in the wrong direction regardless of nutrition goals. If that hasn't happened to you, I congratulate you and your self discipline!
  • __TMac__
    __TMac__ Posts: 1,665 Member
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    It's all about habits. We don't eat out spontaneously anymore. It just leads to bad decision-making for us. We usually eat out on Sundays, since it's a busy day and it makes life easier.

    Tonight is a special occasion date night for us. This morning, we decided on the restaurant while checking the menu. (Thank you, Yelp.) I've prelogged my choices. It's not a chain, so I chose entries that were from chains known for high-calorie recipes. I'm eating an appetizer, another appetizer for my entree, a light-ish dessert, and two glasses of wine. I'm also eating a little less during the day today, and did my usual cardio workout. I'll end up about 400 calories high for the day, but still about 200 under goal for the week as a whole.

    For our usual Sunday take-out, I usually just get the tasty grilled chicken salad from our favorite place. Easy peasy.

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