Eating healthy and eating out can be the same thing

Maybe you have a meeting with a business associate over lunch. Or your day has been so stressful that you don't have time, or desire, to prepare dinner. Or, let's take a positive spin and say you and your spouse just want to go out for a leisurely dinner and enjoy yourselves.

It is possible to eat out and eat healthfully.

Local dietitians Lea Anne Lambert of Southeast Hospital and Janet Anders of Saint Francis Medical Center offer suggestions for eating out without ruining your diet.

When placing your order with the waiter, ask for a "to-go" box to be brought to the table with the meal. Then when the meal is served put half of it into the box to take home for another meal.

"A lot of times restaurants bring out three or four times more food than what we need," said Anders.

People often put too much faith in a salad as a healthy lunch -- along with too much salad dressing and too many fat-laden cheeses and meats -- and in some instances pieces of fried chicken.

"Some salads can have as many as 600 or 700 calories," Lambert said. "Salads can have heft."

Lambert and Anders both suggest asking for dressing on the side and dipping your fork in it prior to taking a forkful of salad to avoid eating too much dressing. They also suggest avoiding hard-boiled eggs, croutons, cheese and meats, as well as the pasta salads and other prepared salads that often appear on the salad bar. Anders says she advises people who go through a salad bar to stay on the side where the fresh vegetables are.

Salads can be a good choice when ordering in a fast-food restaurant, as long as you use only half the dressing and keep it as fresh as possible. So can sub sandwiches, as long as they're loaded with lean meat and vegetables instead of cheese and mayonnaise. A six-inch sub sandwich made with ham and vegetables, no cheese and no mayonnaise, has 290 calories, Lambert said, 300 calories less than a Big Mac.

If all you have time for is a quick run through a fast food drive-through and you're going to gobble it down in the car, then choose a small hamburger and have only a few french fries, the dietitians say. A small order of fries has 210 calories, compared to 450 for a medium-sized order. Lambert said by eating smaller orders, you can save quite a few calories and fat grams than if you succumb to the temptation to super size your meal.

But if you have a little more time and you're sitting down to lunch, avoid anything fried. Grilled lean meat, such as turkey, chicken or fish, is a healthful choice. Ask for butter and sour cream on the side so you'll put less of them on your baked potato. Grilled vegetables on the side are also a good choice, but some restaurants will spray them with butter or oil after they come off the grill. Ask the waiter to request that the chef avoid that.

"Restaurants try to please and make sure customers return," Anders said. "They will honor dietary requests if they can. Ask for what you want and how it should be prepared."

It's also possible to enjoy dessert, Anders and Lambert said. Fruit based desserts, such as freezes and sorbets, are good choices. So is a fruit cup, or even a small scoop of ice cream.

If you know ahead of time that you're going to eat out and have desert, Anders said you might eat less earlier in the day and exercise more to make up for the added calories. Or consider sharing a dessert with your dinner companion, she said.

"Make sure you're picking good choices" she said. "That way you're not getting too much, but still getting a taste."

Except mabye double fudge chocolate cake. Both Anders and Lambert mentioned that as a temptation that might be too much.

"Some things can be pretty high in calories even if you split it," Lambert said.