Wolf in sheep's clothing

sleepl8s
sleepl8s Posts: 37
edited September 20 in Food and Nutrition
So, I just got the Bejesus surprised out of me when I logged in my lunch and found out that an Olive Garden Lunch Salad with dressing has more calories than one and a half of their buttery breadsticks!!!! EVIL!!! Anyone else find out something they were sure would be alright for them in calories turn out to be a gut wrenching diet mistake???? Now I gotta log in a minimum of 1 hour hardcore elliptical in order to eat a freaken modest dinner =(.

I'd love to hear about it so I know which "looks good for you but is in fact dietary evil" foods to avoid.

Replies

  • Mamakatspokane
    Mamakatspokane Posts: 3,098 Member
    Salads in general tend to be deceiving! You think, it's a salad, how bad could it be?
    The Olive Garden is VERY hard to stay within cals!
  • MadWorld
    MadWorld Posts: 200
    chicken caesar salad... i use to think those were healthy. wrong. haha.
  • JoyousMaximus
    JoyousMaximus Posts: 9,285 Member
    I always get the dressing on the side with salad then dip my fork in it before I get a bite of the salad. It saves a TON of calories.
  • TByrd1325
    TByrd1325 Posts: 920 Member
    They should have low-fat italian dressing. You just have to ask for it. (At least they did when I worked there two years ago)
  • courtney_love2001
    courtney_love2001 Posts: 1,468 Member
    How about sushi? I got one roll that was made with tuna and I was floored when I found out it had like 500-600 calories. What the crap!? I thought I was doing good :p
  • keiko
    keiko Posts: 2,919 Member
    Salads in general tend to be deceiving! You think, it's a salad, how bad could it be?
    The Olive Garden is VERY hard to stay within cals!

    I actually like eating there because I can go online and plan my meal ahead. The pasta fagoli soup is great. I either split an entree or take half home.
  • JoyousMaximus
    JoyousMaximus Posts: 9,285 Member
    How about sushi? I got one roll that was made with tuna and I was floored when I found out it had like 500-600 calories. What the crap!? I thought I was doing good :p
    I avoid all sushi that is has any tempura, sauce, or crab. The "crab" is generally imitation and mixed with mayo.:sick:
  • sleepl8s
    sleepl8s Posts: 37
    SHUT UP!! SUSHI TOO?!?!?!? A tuna roll none the less?????? Wow!! 500 calories??? THat's crazy!!
  • jzbaby626
    jzbaby626 Posts: 466
    I made a salad at home before and it ended up being about 500 or 600 cals. Salad dressing is a killer and the croutons and mozzarella cheese topped it off! I'm much more conscious when I make salads now!
  • LittleSister
    LittleSister Posts: 207 Member
    Well, this is just me being stupid, but . . . one of my favorite foods of all time is nachos! I like to melt cheese over tortilla chips - it's heaven! So it was a few weeks ago, and I was only a week into this whole calorie counting thing, so I was clueless. I was craving nachos like a madwoman, so I made myself a platter. I did measure the cheese & count the chips before I made them, but I didn't record it first! I recorded it AFTER I ate it. I almost fell out of my chair when I realized I'd just eaten over 1,000 calories!

    so now I make a teeny tiny plate of them with just a teeny tiny bit of cheese if I really must have them.
  • RedHotRunner
    RedHotRunner Posts: 850 Member
    How about sushi? I got one roll that was made with tuna and I was floored when I found out it had like 500-600 calories. What the crap!? I thought I was doing good :p
    Yeah, sushi's a big one. I only eat it now on cheat days. It always sends me over my calorie limit.
  • sleepl8s
    sleepl8s Posts: 37
    yeah, it's amazing how those calories can creep up on you. I did the soup and salad with breadsticks and I thought to myself, "Ok, just one breadstick, the dressing is vinagrette so it should be ok, and one soup. I consumed like 850 calories on a freaken soup and salad!!!! What a waste!
  • raleigh
    raleigh Posts: 87 Member
    Olive Garden's minestrone soup is only 100 cals! (supposedly)
  • littlejazzbird81
    littlejazzbird81 Posts: 17
    Chicken burgers! Even the grilled ones! I always thought if I got a chicken burger at Red Robin I was doing pretty good. Turns out with everything they end up putting on them, some are worse than the hamburgers. I also use to order the whiskey river bbq chicken wrap. Sounds not too bad, right? 1200 CALORIES! I am so thankful that restaurants post their nutrition facts online. Now whenever I am going out to eat, I look it up first. Olive Garden actually has so pretty healthy meals, you just have to look for them.
  • April0815
    April0815 Posts: 780 Member
    I made a salad at home before and it ended up being about 500 or 600 cals. Salad dressing is a killer and the croutons and mozzarella cheese topped it off! I'm much more conscious when I make salads now!
    [/quote

    I read that instead of using croutons you should use walnuts.
  • courtney_love2001
    courtney_love2001 Posts: 1,468 Member
    Also what they do at restaurants is put butter/oil on your steak to make it more appetizing :grumble:

    I am amazed at the calorie content of restaurant foods. Why are there so many calories in their food? Take Red Robin, for instance. One of their burgers is like 1000 calories and you add fries and you're pretty much done for the day. If I made that same stuff at home, it wouldn't be that way. How do you cram 1000 calories into a cheeseburger!??! I would even get it with no mayo and it's still like 900 calories. :tongue:
  • littlejazzbird81
    littlejazzbird81 Posts: 17
    I know! How to they stick so many calories in there? I hope now that some of these larger restaurant chains like Red Robin, Macaroni Grill, etc. have actually had to make their nutrition information public, they will taking nutrition into consideration. I know I don't want to eat at Red Robin anymore, because the only thing I can get there is soup. And then my sodium is through the roof...
  • anika_marie
    anika_marie Posts: 8
    How about smoothies!! you think just because there is a lot of "fruit" in them they should be pretty healthy, but in reality it's fruit juice and sorbet. After learning all the nutrition facts I stopped ordering large sized smoothies because they have more calories than a regular meal I would usually eat. Obviously not all smoothies are high cal, but just be careful when you order because you could be getting a lot more calories than you bargained for!!
  • weaklink109
    weaklink109 Posts: 2,831 Member
    I agree, restaurants are minefields. I do like Olive Garden, and their salads can easily be amended to lower the calorie count. Tell them to hold the croutons and serve the dressing on the side. I ask for lemons and squeeze a little lemon juice on salad and don't use dressing. I like cheese, so I let them put just a smudge on it. Then I have minestroni soup. The sodium will be a little high, but I offset that w/ some extra water. And I treat myself to one breadstick, which is about 150 calories, according to the MFP data base.

    Applebee's has some good Weight Watcher options. The chicken lime salad is excellent.:heart: and I like the spinach and shrimp salad, dressing on the side of course.
  • weaklink109
    weaklink109 Posts: 2,831 Member
    I agree, restaurants are minefields. I do like Olive Garden, and their salads can easily be amended to lower the calorie count. Tell them to hold the croutons and serve the dressing on the side. I ask for lemons and squeeze a little lemon juice on salad and don't use dressing. I like cheese, so I let them put just a smudge on it. Then I have minestroni soup. The sodium will be a little high, but I offset that w/ some extra water. And I treat myself to one breadstick, which is about 150 calories, according to the MFP data base.

    Applebee's has some good Weight Watcher options. The chicken lime salad is excellent.:heart: and I like the spinach and shrimp salad, dressing on the side of course.
  • maxtout_parrothead
    maxtout_parrothead Posts: 3
    How about sushi? I got one roll that was made with tuna and I was floored when I found out it had like 500-600 calories. What the crap!? I thought I was doing good :p

    Not only that....the rice has a bit of sugar mixed in to make it stick together! All the time I was eating sushi I thought I was doing good too!
  • JoyousMaximus
    JoyousMaximus Posts: 9,285 Member
    Not only that....the rice has a bit of sugar mixed in to make it stick together! All the time I was eating sushi I thought I was doing good too!
    The roll I get is 150 cals.
  • crazyjkgirl
    crazyjkgirl Posts: 123 Member
    Wraps kind of surprised me. Sometimes, you're better off getting your sub or sandwich in a roll than a wrap. I didn't really expect that.

    As far as Red Robin goes, the size of those burgers is ridiculous! That's probably a large factor in the amount of calories.

    Also- I mean, I knew they were horrible, but looking into milkshakes- WOWSA! Never again, I suppose willk I drink a Coldstone milkshake. Even once the weight is off and I'm maintaining, they will be so much more than a day's worth of calories.
  • iplayoutside19
    iplayoutside19 Posts: 2,304 Member
    I remember when I first started this whole thing I remember making myself a lunch salad. Then I added up everything I put in. I remember saying outoud to no one 'Whaddya mean there's 200 calories in 2 table spoons of ranch dressing? and there's more than that on the salad, WTF!" Learned that lesson. Right now I make a lunch salad that comes in at 270 with turkey, cheese, and peas mixed in.

    I was appalled to learn that my chicken sandwich and chips that I got at Quizno's 1700 calories!!! I mean no wonder I was 100 lbs over weight.

    Now if I go out to eat it's to splurge. My wife and I went to one steak house, and I almost threw up when she looked up that 1 dinner roll was 400 calories! I'm a card carrying libritarian, but should that even be legal to have a 400 calorie dinner roll?
  • jzbaby626
    jzbaby626 Posts: 466
    I made a salad at home before and it ended up being about 500 or 600 cals. Salad dressing is a killer and the croutons and mozzarella cheese topped it off! I'm much more conscious when I make salads now!
    [/quote

    I read that instead of using croutons you should use walnuts.

    Thanks for the idea! :wink:
  • jzbaby626
    jzbaby626 Posts: 466
    .
  • msh0530
    msh0530 Posts: 1,675 Member
    Here's a place to get your eyes opened:
    http://health.yahoo.com/experts/eatthis/21278/americas-worst-and-best-salads/

    A salad at over 1600 calories? I could hardly believe that!
  • sleepl8s
    sleepl8s Posts: 37
    ON THE FLIP SIDE. Today I had chinese food for dinner and I'm thinking, Holy Crap, considering lunch, when I log in my calories tonight, I'm gonna be suicidal. Well, I got the kids portion of beef and broccoli, brown rice, one spare rib, and an egg roll. I was amazed to find out that the beef and broccoli is actually very low in calories. I ate just enough rice to complement my beef and broccoli. When I logged in my calories, I found out that I'd only consumed HALF the calories of what I ate in soup and salad at Olive Garden. Let today be a lesson to never take anything you eat for granted.
This discussion has been closed.

Categories