My Saturday Lunch Date(s)

Here are my ‘inner circle’ of boot campers. These incredible ladies get to camp 5 days a week and have committed to a year of  my torture..er…fun.  I thought it would be nice to treat them to lunch so I bribed them with food and no push ups. It was so nice to see everyone with combed hair and real clothes on.

I sort of ruined the whole thing though because I went to the website of Joey Tomatoe’s and got some info on the calorie count for the foods on the menu. I mean I really spoiled everyone’s lunch because I think everyone ordered plain lettuce with a side of boring. I’ll bet they all got together after I left and went to McDonald’s (just kidding).

It was actually quite enlightening to look at that nutritional analysis of the menu foods. If you’re one that has to eat out a great deal, you really have to be careful out there. It was surprising to see that even the side of vegetables contained 21 grams of fat. One of the lowest calorie items on the menu was the hamburger. Most wouldn’t pick a hamburger over a salad, but the salads had almost double the fat count. There are a few things that you can do when eating out so that you can pack a nutritional punch without sabotaging your whole nutritional program.

I’ll be doing a video blog soon with some extra tips on eating out. But here are a few things to keep in mind:

  • avoid liquid calories
  • decline the bread basket
  • order salads with dressing on the side
  • ask for your veggies to be steamed
  • avoid cream sauces on pastas and choose tomato based sauces instead
  • ask for a half order or split an entré
  • split a dessert (one of the tempting choices was a whooping 1130 calories!)

Of course I may not be the best lunch date with my sobering food facts, but I know that my dedicated ladies probably would have made the same healthy choices that they made even without me staring them down.