Who makes the healthiest salads? You do, at home, of course. But when you eat out -- ever wonder what the best choice would be?
I was perusing a handly little infographic on eating at the wrong place and time when I came across some surprising information about the Chicken Caesar Salads we get when we eat out. If you had to guess, which salads do you think would be highest in calories -- the salad at a fast food restaurant or the salad at a casual dining restaurant?
If you're comparing the Chicken Caesar Salads at McDonald's, Wendy's, Panera Bread, Chili's, and Cheesecake Factory, the fast food salads come out the lowest in calories! Depending on your definition of healthy, it kind of looks like the fast food salads are healthier.
McDonald's: 330 calories
Wendy's: 440 calories
Panera Bread: 510 calories
Chili's: 630 calories
Cheesecake Factory: 976 calories
I guess the Cheesecake Factory calorie count shouldn't come as a surprise. Everything there is high calorie! I don't even know how they cram so many calories into one dish. But it still kind of defeats the purpose of eating a salad, don't you think?
But what if this is just a fluke?
I decided to take a look at the average calorie counts for salads at a few of these restaurants just to compare. I looked at McDonald's salads, Panera Bread salads, and Chili's salads:
Average salad at McDonald's: 227 calories
Average salad at Panera Bread: 486 calories
Average salad at Chili's: 718 (Quesadilla Explosion Salad clocks in at 1,300 -- yikes!)
Of course, the portion size at McDonald's is much smaller than the portions at Chili's. And Panera serves half-salads, which are probably closer to McDonald's size -- and which put them at the same level, calorie-wise. There's a whole lot more to nutrition than calories. Personally I'm a lot more worried about sugar and artificial ingredients. But there you go. Fast food lower in calories -- who knew?
Do you ever get a salad when you eat out?
Written by Adriana Velez on CafeMom's blog, The Stir.
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For the ultimate calorie, sodium, and sugar bomb, why not try a "healthy" BK Chicken Apple & Cranberry Tendercrisp Salad with two packets of honey mustard dressing, a couple of packs of croutons, and a 20 ounce Tropical Mango Smoothie - yep, folks, we're talking 1710 calories, 2045 mg of sodium, 193 grams net carbs of which 148 grams are pure sugar. All of a sudden, a Double Whopper, with 740 calories, 910 mg of sodium, 48 grams net carbs of which 11 grams are sugar, isn't sounding so unhealthy after all.
And yes, as a matter of fact, I do limit my consumption of fruit precisely because of the sugar.
Somehow humans managed to evolve over millions of years without access to refined grain products and modern high-sugar fruit cultivars (or, for much of the world, without much fruit of any sort for most of the year), so I don't understand how those foods are "necessary" for proper nutrition, unless you're suggesting that the human genome somehow underwent a radical change about 10,000 years ago with the invention of agriculture, requiring us to consume foods that were previously unavailable, or largely unavailable.
- Fruit is not the only source of fiber, vitamins, and antioxidants. You can get all of that from vegetables as well, in addition to getting vitamins and antioxidants from meat, eggs, and dairy products.
- I didn't single out the sugar in fruit. I also mentioned things like honey mustard dressing (added sugar) and tropical smoothies (more added sugar).
- My overall point was that you can't just rely on a word like "salad" to mean "healthy". I understand that words and phrases like "salad", "honey mustard dressing", and "fruit smoothie" SOUND healthy. But there's no getting around the fact that the "healthy" meal I described in the last paragraph contains 148 grams of sugar - that's not total digestible carbohydrate (that number comes out to 193 grams), but 148 grams of SUGAR. That's as much sugar as in FOURTEEN Reese's Peanut Butter Cups.
- Finally, I wasn't suggesting that you can't get a healthy salad at Burger King. If you choose the "Chicken BLT Garden Fresh Salad", opting for grilled chicken rather than breaded and fried, one pack of "Ken's Avocado Ranch Dressing", and nix the smoothie in favor of a diet drink or (even better) water, your meal still packs a healthy and satisfying 42 grams of protein and 33 grams of fat, zero transfats, plenty of fiber, vitamins, and antioxidants, and only 6 grams of sugar, all while coming in at a reasonable 510 calories.
Why the emphasis on salads? You can make a cheeseburger at home just as easily as you can make a grilled chicken salad, so I don't see where someone going to McDonald's and ordering the salad is being any more especially wasteful of their money than someone going there for a Big Mac.
If you can find a local market/deli that can answer your questions about their foods, ages, sources then you are dealing. No drive through but it is worth the effort for a good reasonably fast meal.