Post 'em here. All those disappointing meals you thought were healthy but are really high calorie

aeloine wrote: »

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French_Peasant wrote: »

aeloine wrote: »

HardcoreP0rk wrote: »

French_Peasant wrote: »

aeloine wrote: »

French_Peasant wrote: »

HardcoreP0rk wrote: »

aeloine wrote: »

HardcoreP0rk wrote: »

Most of these high calorie meals have outrageous calorie counts because of added fat, typically in the form of cheese, sauce or dressings. You can cut so many calories on restaurant salads by omitting any croutons or tortilla strips and getting the dressing on the side. Dressing on the side allows you to have more control over what you consume and you can better estimate how much is eaten.

ETA: there is something fundamentally flawed about your calorie counting practices if you thought anything with 1/4 cup of dressing would ever be low calorie. Unless your balasmic is 100% vinegar, that's an enormous amount of calories. Personally, I don't like to eat a meal where 75-90% of the calories in the meal come from...dressing

Yes, that's what this post is about.

1/4 cup is what cooks on the line will put in for a salad when the dressing is not on the side. To them, it's just one ladle. Clearly, we know better than that now. In the past, salad seemed like the healthy choice but now we know it's packed chock full of bad things.

It's helpful to remember that vinaigrette has a ratio of 3 parts oil to 1 part acid. So if you have 1/4 cup, that's 4 tablespoons. 3 of 4 tablespoons is likely pure oil...so you're looking at roughly 360kcal from the oil in that dressing.

I hear some people make a vinaigrette that is 2/3 thick, aged balsamic and 1/3 oil. And that they carry it in their purse in a fine tip squeeze bottle and weigh it out to the gram. Of course, I would not know anyone like this.

Is that like reduced balsamic? I know you cook it down for caprese salad....

A high quality aged balsamic will be fairly viscous as far as vinegars go--the grape just is reduced, fermented, then aged for 12 or 18 years or so. So on a Caprese, you can use a fine balsamic out of the bottle, or if you just have a thinner balsamic, you can reduce it.

How's the sugar content compare? Because reduced balsamic is incredibly sweet. What's driving the viscosity of the aged balsamic? Is it sugar? Or something else.

Serious question: are you supposed to put sugar in vinegar when reducing it? The BF loves caprese salad but I think I goofed up when making the drizzle last time.

The only time I have reduced balsamic is when I am making a pork tenderloin or some such, and I am deglazing the pan. I haven't ever thought about putting sugar in it because it is grape juice and is already naturally sugared. For a Caprese, I am using home-grown, organic, heirloom tomatoes, and believe in showcasing the literal "fruits of my labor" with the very best balsamic--not the kinds that you would find at most grocery stores. You might want to seek out one of those shops where you can taste-test different olive oils and balsamics before buying a bottle--they will be on the more expensive side, but for a Caprese or really any kind of salad or veg, if it's good enough you just need a very slight drizzle. The quality of tomatoes is equally crucial.

For a vinagrette, you need really good ingredients, and you also need a tsp or so of Dijon to emulsify it. (And such a vinaigrette can also be used for Caprese).

I'm a total pleb and use JUST balsamic vinegar in my salads. Not even oil.

Walked into Oil & Vine store once, realized that I could buy a car for the cost of the infused oils there, and left.

LOL. I hope you tasted everything before walking out, and at least got a snack out of it! I bought a set of olive oil and balsamic in a cute wooden box from Williams Sonoma a) at a steep going-out-of-business discount, and b) with a gift card. The original price was $100, and it is shocking to think there are people who actually pay that for wee l'il bottles. It can get crazy.

This is the place that I stock up on every year when we go to the Traverse City area in Michigan: https://www.fustinis.com/

It's still quite expensive, but think of it from the perspective that balsamic is like wine. Sometimes you need the Two-Buck Chuck, and sometimes you need something a lot better. I use mass-produced grocery store balsamic for deglazing, because it will be reduced and take on the flavor of the crispy meat particles and fat, and then the nicer stuff when it really needs to stand out. It doesn't spoil, and you can certainly stretch it with judicious use.

If I'm going for a salad, I use salsa for dressing. I don't do salads much though, because they just don't satiate me unless they have tons of protein added.

French_Peasant wrote: »

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aeloine wrote: »

French_Peasant wrote: »

aeloine wrote: »

HardcoreP0rk wrote: »

French_Peasant wrote: »

aeloine wrote: »

French_Peasant wrote: »

HardcoreP0rk wrote: »

aeloine wrote: »

HardcoreP0rk wrote: »

Most of these high calorie meals have outrageous calorie counts because of added fat, typically in the form of cheese, sauce or dressings. You can cut so many calories on restaurant salads by omitting any croutons or tortilla strips and getting the dressing on the side. Dressing on the side allows you to have more control over what you consume and you can better estimate how much is eaten.

ETA: there is something fundamentally flawed about your calorie counting practices if you thought anything with 1/4 cup of dressing would ever be low calorie. Unless your balasmic is 100% vinegar, that's an enormous amount of calories. Personally, I don't like to eat a meal where 75-90% of the calories in the meal come from...dressing

Yes, that's what this post is about.

1/4 cup is what cooks on the line will put in for a salad when the dressing is not on the side. To them, it's just one ladle. Clearly, we know better than that now. In the past, salad seemed like the healthy choice but now we know it's packed chock full of bad things.

It's helpful to remember that vinaigrette has a ratio of 3 parts oil to 1 part acid. So if you have 1/4 cup, that's 4 tablespoons. 3 of 4 tablespoons is likely pure oil...so you're looking at roughly 360kcal from the oil in that dressing.

I hear some people make a vinaigrette that is 2/3 thick, aged balsamic and 1/3 oil. And that they carry it in their purse in a fine tip squeeze bottle and weigh it out to the gram. Of course, I would not know anyone like this.

Is that like reduced balsamic? I know you cook it down for caprese salad....

A high quality aged balsamic will be fairly viscous as far as vinegars go--the grape just is reduced, fermented, then aged for 12 or 18 years or so. So on a Caprese, you can use a fine balsamic out of the bottle, or if you just have a thinner balsamic, you can reduce it.

How's the sugar content compare? Because reduced balsamic is incredibly sweet. What's driving the viscosity of the aged balsamic? Is it sugar? Or something else.

Serious question: are you supposed to put sugar in vinegar when reducing it? The BF loves caprese salad but I think I goofed up when making the drizzle last time.

The only time I have reduced balsamic is when I am making a pork tenderloin or some such, and I am deglazing the pan. I haven't ever thought about putting sugar in it because it is grape juice and is already naturally sugared. For a Caprese, I am using home-grown, organic, heirloom tomatoes, and believe in showcasing the literal "fruits of my labor" with the very best balsamic--not the kinds that you would find at most grocery stores. You might want to seek out one of those shops where you can taste-test different olive oils and balsamics before buying a bottle--they will be on the more expensive side, but for a Caprese or really any kind of salad or veg, if it's good enough you just need a very slight drizzle. The quality of tomatoes is equally crucial.

For a vinagrette, you need really good ingredients, and you also need a tsp or so of Dijon to emulsify it. (And such a vinaigrette can also be used for Caprese).

I'm a total pleb and use JUST balsamic vinegar in my salads. Not even oil.

Walked into Oil & Vine store once, realized that I could buy a car for the cost of the infused oils there, and left.

LOL. I hope you tasted everything before walking out, and at least got a snack out of it! I bought a set of olive oil and balsamic in a cute wooden box from Williams Sonoma a) at a steep going-out-of-business discount, and b) with a gift card. The original price was $100, and it is shocking to think there are people who actually pay that for wee l'il bottles. It can get crazy.

This is the place that I stock up on every year when we go to the Traverse City area in Michigan: https://www.fustinis.com/

It's still quite expensive, but think of it from the perspective that balsamic is like wine. Sometimes you need the Two-Buck Chuck, and sometimes you need something a lot better. I use mass-produced grocery store balsamic for deglazing, because it will be reduced and take on the flavor of the crispy meat particles and fat, and then the nicer stuff when it really needs to stand out. It doesn't spoil, and you can certainly stretch it with judicious use.

LOVE Traverse City! I miss Michigan. (The west side of the state anyway). I'm not a huge fan of Oklahoma

thegeans wrote: »

I got a cauliflower "steak" at Mom's Organic recently. Come back to MFP and find it's 691 calories. Not "unhealthy," but a reminder that estimating calories is sometimes impossible!

What the heck did they do to it to make it that high calorie? I ate a real steak the other day which was lower calorie than that.

Every dinner salad I ever ordered at a restaurant

LiveLoveFitFab wrote: »

Breakfast burritos from McDonalds. I thought two was 308 calories, nope that's just one. They come in groups of two and now I have to throw one out the car window for the wildlife to enjoy. Don't worry, I unwrap it first. I'm not about littering. I just hope the local raccoon population enjoy it.

I've always felt like 2 of those was just too much at breakfast and one wasn't enough. Whether I was eating whatever the heck I wanted, or counting calories. It's frustrating!

I was going to try something healthy and go for an Asian Chicken Salad. Based on the description, I never would have guessed it had almost 1200 calories in it!! (Asian noodles, mixed field greens, snap peas, carrots, bean sprouts, red peppers, and mango salsa tossed in a light Asian sesame vinaigrette, topped with sweet chili-glazed battered chicken, crispy wontons, cashews and blackened sesame seeds).

LilacSnow wrote: »

I was going to try something healthy and go for an Asian Chicken Salad. Based on the description, I never would have guessed it had almost 1200 calories in it!! (Asian noodles, mixed field greens, snap peas, carrots, bean sprouts, red peppers, and mango salsa tossed in a light Asian sesame vinaigrette, topped with sweet chili-glazed battered chicken, crispy wontons, cashews and blackened sesame seeds).

IKR? Half the time the salads are the worst thing on menus!

(Bold for the words that ring calorie-bells in my head!)

cs2thecox wrote: »

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LilacSnow wrote: »

I was going to try something healthy and go for an Asian Chicken Salad. Based on the description, I never would have guessed it had almost 1200 calories in it!! (Asian noodles, mixed field greens, snap peas, carrots, bean sprouts, red peppers, and mango salsa tossed in a light Asian sesame vinaigrette, topped with sweet chili-glazed battered chicken, crispy wontons, cashews and blackened sesame seeds).

IKR? Half the time the salads are the worst thing on menus!

(Bold for the words that ring calorie-bells in my head!)

And the noodles, lol. Don't forget the noodles.

You do have to think about it though... dressings have calories, anything battered/fried will have a bunch of calories, anything bready will have calories, nuts and cheese will have calories...

I very rarely order salads because they always add calorie bombs I don't care for (but without them you end up overpaying for just grilled meat and lettuce).

The hot chocolate from Starbucks 165 in the small size ... without the cream

Tacklewasher wrote: »

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LiminalAscendance wrote: »

I don't get all the Subway hate.

Speaking only for myself, their commercials are stupid and an insult to peoples intelligence. So I don't eat at Subway as a result.

I dont have TV whats the commercials like ? @Tacklewasher