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Tag: fat

Did They REALLY Serve That?

As if the food they serve up at the State Fair isn’t bad enough, at least it is only available for a very short period of time.  However, the restaurant industry has decided to enter into an unholy competition to see who can come up with the most disgusting, artery-clogging, calorie-busting fiasco ever to grace a plate. 

If you’ve never picked up a copy of “Eat This, Not That” you really should browse through the lastest edition.  Honestly, it will help you make better choices when dining out.  Some foods are actually totally unhealthy, but disguised as “good for you” and those you need to watch out for.  But here, for your reading enjoyment, are the top 5 scariest restaurant foods:

See, even the most well-established restaurant chains can’t rest on their laurels, serving the same old standbys that we’ve loved since we were kids. They have to keep us interested and attracted with shiny new bells and whistles. And since no one has invented, say, a new kind of vegetable, they’ve got to go with the next best thing: gimmicky entrees with terrifyingly obsene nutritional content and rapidly expanding serving sizes. It wasn’t enough that pizza makers started putting cheese inside the crust! Kentucky Fried Chicken saw that and ramped up its own destructive powers, by making a sandwich in which the bread is replaced by slabs of fried chicken.  Seriously … do people really that this is is a GOOD idea?  Then a few major league ballparks started serving their burgers on doughnuts instead of buns.  I’m afraid to find out what will come next.

Scary Meal #5
Denny’s Fried Cheese Melt with wavy fries and marinara
1,260 calories
63 g fat (21 g saturated, 1 g trans)
3,010 mg sodium

CALORIE EQUIVALENT: 18 T.G.I. Friday’s Frozen Cheddar & Bacon Potato Skins

Apparently, Denny’s deemed the classic grilled cheese too boring for our novelty seeking taste buds, so they fixed it by driving four deep-fried cheese sticks into the core of the sandwich. So what you end up with are cheese sticks with extra cheese between slabs of buttered bread and a pile of fried potatoes on the side. If Denny’s was serious about improving the grilled cheese, they would have skipped the novelty and brought in big-flavor ingredients like sautéedmushrooms or sliced figs. But, of course, if they did that, they might not be able to sell this entire meal for $4. Here’s to cheap food and expensive health care!

Eat This Instead!
Denny’s BLT with Hash Browns
730 calories
47 g fat (10.5 g saturated)
1,270 mg sodium

Scary Meal #4
IHOP New York Cheesecake Pancakes
1,270 calories

CALORIE EQUIVALENT: 28 McDonald’s Chicken McNuggets

Further blurring the line between dessert and breakfast, IHOP has infused their fluffy flapjacks with gooey hunks of cheesecake. Next thing you know they’ll be serving breakfast with big scoops of ice cream and chocolate syrup. The best breakfast is one with protein and fresh fruit, but if you’re going to go for the carb-heavy indulgence, there’s a better way to do it. Don’t make it a habit, but IHOP’s Chocolate Chip Pancakes will save you 660 calories.  And it sounds better to me, anyway.  But then, I think most of you already know how I feel about chocolate!!

Eat This Instead!
Chocolate Chip Pancakes
610 calories

Scary Meal #3
Friendly’s Grilled Cheese BurgerMelt
1,500 calories
97 g fat (38 g saturated)
2,090 mg sodium

CALORIE EQUIVALENT: 15 Snickers Kudos Granola Bars

Is this a joke? Because it should be. Where a normal hamburger has buns, this one has grilled cheese sandwiches. Yes, that’s two grilled-cheese sandwiches with one hunk of ground beef wedged between them. Other iterations of this sandwich have been dubbed “fatty melts”—for obvious reasons. They have twice as much cheese and bread as a regular cheeseburger.  This is just plain GROSS.

Eat This Instead!
Grilled Cheese
790 calories
37 g fat (12 g saturated
1,280 mg sodium

Scary Meal #2
Uno Chicago Grill Lobster BLT Thin Crust Pizza
1,530 calories
87 g fat (30 g saturated)
3,480 mg sodium

CALORIE EQUIVALENT: 51 Nabisco Ginger Snap Cookies

On its own, lobster is sweet, healthy, and loaded with lean protein. Yet, for some reason, restaurants never seem to know what to do with it. Case in point: Lobster BLT Pizza, an amalgam of foods that don’t quite fit together: One is seafood, one is diner grub, and one is an Italian-American hybrid. We’re all for trying new things, but not when the toll is 75 percent of your day’s calories and 1½ day’s worth of sodium and saturated fat.

Eat This Instead!
Lobster Wrap with side of roasted vegetables  (YUMMY!!!!)
570 calories
30.5 g fat (4 g saturated)
1,660 mg sodium

DRUM ROLL PLEASE ………………………

Scary Meal #1
Applebee’s Provolone-Stuffed Meatballs with Fettuccine
1,550 calories
97 g fat (46 g saturated)
3,910 mg sodium

CALORIE EQUIVALENT: 148 Whoppers Malted Milk Balls

Yes, America has a cheese fetish, but this is just excessive. Cheese-filled meatballs? It’s like a beef-based Gusher, a sort of meaty water balloon of fat. Especially problematic is the fact that said meatballs are served on a bed of fettuccine Alfredo, which is basically flat noodles basting in oil, butter, and—yes—cheese. Cut more than a thousand calories by switching dishes. A smart swap like this one (and the hundreds of others in Eat This, Not That!)  a couple times a week and you can lose 2½ pounds a month without ever dieting! 

Eat This Instead!
Spicy Shrimp Diavolo
500 calories
10 g fat (3.5 g saturated)
1,910 mg sodium

Lucky for me, nothing in the top 5 even remotely sounded tasty to me … but several of the “Eat This Instead!” options did sound good and were reasonable in the total calories, fat and sodium.  This is just the tip of the dining out iceberg, and there are so many more items and options in the book.  From time to time I will share more in my blogs and on our website to help you become smarter, savvier and slimmer diners!  It will be an uphill battle, but if people don’t order this crap, restaurants won’t serve it!  It’s almost like eating your last meal, because any one of these could just place another nail in your coffin.  Sorry to be such a downer, but I’m not the one cooking this stuff, I’m not the selling it, and I’m not the one eating it … Just sayin’….

Posted by Laurie Puckett at Remmel Wellness Center, a full service wellness and chiropractic center located in beautiful St. Petersburg, Florida. 

Be sure to listen to my weekly radio show beginning Monday, September 10th at 2:00 pm Eastern Time at www.LifeImprovementRadio.com for more health and wellness information and to chat with me on the topics I cover.

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1 Comment by Laurie Puckett on August 30, 2010
filed in Heart Health, Weight Loss, Wellness
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What Does Your Waist Say About Your Health?

The Battle of the Bulge wasn’t just fought in Europe during WWII, is is being fought every day in America!  But this modern day battle isn’t being fought on the ground – this fight is taking place at our midsection … our bellies, and losing this battle can be deadly.  Read more in this story that came off the AP News Wire:

If your pants are feeling a bit tight around the waistline, take note: Belly bulge can be deadly for older adults, even those who aren’t overweight or obese by other measures.

One of the largest studies to examine the dangers of abdominal fat suggests men and women with the biggest waistlines have twice the risk of dying over a decade compared to those with the smallest tummies.

Surprisingly, bigger waists carry a greater risk of death even for people whose weight is “normal” by the body mass index, or BMI, a standard measure based on weight and height.

“Even if you haven’t had a noticeable weight gain, if you notice your waist size increasing that’s an important sign,” said lead author Eric Jacobs of the American Cancer Society, which funded the study. “It’s time to eat better and start exercising more.”

Other research has linked waist size to dementia, heart disease, asthma and breast cancer.

Bulging bellies are a problem for most Americans older than 50. It’s estimated that more than half of older men and more than 70 percent of older women have bigger waistlines than recommended. And it’s a growing problem: Average waistlines have expanded by about an inch per decade since the 1960s.

To check your girth, wrap a tape measure around your waist at the navel. No fair sucking in your bulge. Men should have a waist circumference no larger than 40 inches. For women, the limit is 35 inches.

The new study, appearing in Monday’s Archives of Internal Medicine, is the first to analyze waist size and deaths for people in three BMI categories: normal, overweight and obese. In all three groups, waist size was linked to higher risk.

About 2 percent of people in the study had normal BMI numbers but larger than recommended waists. Jacobs said the risk increased progressively with increasing waist size, even at waist sizes well below what might be considered too large.

The study used data from more than 100,000 people who were followed from 1997 to 2006. Nearly 15,000 people died during that time.

The researchers crunched numbers on waist circumference, height and weight to draw conclusions about who was more likely to die. Study participants measured their own waists, so some honest mistakes and wishful fudging could have been included, the authors acknowledged.

Four extra inches around the waist increased the risk of dying from between 15 percent to 25 percent. Oddly, the strongest link – 25 percent - was in women with normal BMI.

People with bigger waists had a higher risk of death from causes including respiratory illnesses, heart disease and cancer.

The study was observational, a less rigorous approach that means the deaths could have been caused by factors other than waist size. But the researchers did take into account other risk factors for poor health, such as smoking and alcohol use.

Some older adults gain belly fat while they lose muscle mass, Jacobs said, so while they may not be getting heavier, they’re changing shape - and that’s taking a toll.

A tape measure, or a belt that doesn’t buckle the way it used to, “may tell you things your scale doesn’t,” Jacobs said.

Fat stored behind the abdominal wall may be more harmful than fat stored on the hips and thighs. Some scientists believe belly fat secretes proteins and hormones that contribute to inflammation, interfere with how the body processes insulin and raise cholesterol levels.

But Dr. Samuel Klein, an obesity expert at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis, is skeptical about that theory. Removing belly fat surgically doesn’t lead to health improvements. That may mean it’s simply a stand-in for some other culprit that is causing both belly fat and poor health. Klein wasn’t involved in the new research.

Klein said the new study, while showing a link between waist size and mortality, doesn’t pinpoint exactly how much belly fat is dangerous for normal, overweight and obese people. The 40-inch for men and 35-inch for women cutoff points are irrelevant for many people, he said.

What can be done to fight belly fat? It’s the same advice as for losing weight. Eat fewer calories and burn more through walking, bicycling and other aerobic exercise. “Sit-ups are useless,” Klein said.

****

Ok, I will have to take issue with what Dr. Klein says about sit-ups.  I agree that you have to eat fewer calories and burn more through aerobic exercise, but sit-ups build muscle tissue, and increased muscle increases your metabolism.  Doing both aerobic exercise and sit-ups (and other strength training) is a win-win combination.  If you are looking for help in reducing your caloric in-take, call 727-525-1141 to schedule a consultation with one of our weight loss coaches at Remmel Wellness Center to develop a program that will work for you.

Posted by Laurie Puckett at Remmel Wellness Center, a full service wellness and chiropractic facility located in beautiful St. Petersburg, Florida.

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No Comments by Laurie Puckett on August 21, 2010
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When Your Grocery Store Helps You Shop Smarter

The interior of the largest Whole Foods in the...
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I love Publix, but boy do I wish we had Kroger grocery stores down here in Florida.  The grocery chain is piloting a program ranking the nutritional value of foods on their shelves on a scale from 1 to 100, with one being the lowest nutritional value and 100 being the highest.   Admittedly, many of the food manufacturers are less than pleased with the ranking system – probably because they aren’t scoring very high.  But the scores can help the consumer by processing the information found on the label for them.  Read the excerpt from a Wall Street Journal article about this and similar ventures being launched by other grocery retailers. 

“Myra Vanderpool for years regularly bought her local supermarket’s store-brand wheat bread. This spring, she switched brands.

What prompted Ms. Vanderpool’s move was a new nutritional-scoring system being tested at her Kroger Co. grocery store in Lexington, Ky., that ranks thousands of foods on a scale of 1 (low in nutrition) to 100 (really healthy). The results, posted next to items on the grocer’s shelf, were eye-opening: Her regular bread scored a 23, the same as Häagen-Dazs coffee ice cream.

So the 67-year-old substitute teacher started buying one of Nature’s Own wheat breads, which has a score of 81, partly because it contains more fiber and protein than her former brand. Ms. Vanderpool said her husband complains at times that he misses his old bread, but she tells him: “This is healthier for you.”

Kroger’s scoring system is part of a nationwide move by grocery retailers to get pushier about offering nutritional advice. Other chains, such as Hy-Vee Inc. in the Midwest, are hiring dietitians to advise shoppers on how to select healthier food and, in some stores, walk the aisles offering personalized recommendations for a fee. Some grocers, like Safeway Inc., are mining data gleaned from loyalty cards on their customers’ purchasing habits to recommend healthier alternatives to the foods they buy. Wal-Mart Stores Inc., the country’s biggest food retailer, plans to announce details of its own “nutrition program” later this summer, said a spokeswoman, who declined to elaborate.

Supermarkets are hoping to increase their shoppers’ loyalty, and perhaps win back some customers who have turned for at least some of their purchases to specialty stores such as Whole Foods Market Inc. and big-box retailers like Wal-Mart. Sales of natural and organic foods jumped 72% to $31.9 billion in the five years ended 2009, while functional, or fortified, foods rose 44% to $37.3 billion in the same period, according to Nutrition Business Journal. And big food makers have been rolling out more options that are lower in salt and saturated fat and higher in fiber and whole grains.

“It’s not our responsibility to tell shoppers what to eat, what not to eat or how to eat,” said Ric Jurgens, chief executive of supermarket chain Hy-Vee. Still, “we need to provide them with as much information as we can, to help them make good decisions and provide as many options as possible.”

Some food makers object to their products being scored for nutrition. They say shoppers consider a variety of factors when buying food. And they say that relying on a single nutritional score can make it difficult for consumers to understand how the foods they buy fit into a diet. It also can result in surprises, like the wheat bread Ms. Vanderpool bought that scored the same as an ice cream. A spokesman for the nutritional-scoring system, called NuVal, said calcium and vitamin A boosted the ice cream’s score, while added sodium and low-fiber content hurt the bread’s ranking.

Kellogg Co.’s Kashi brand in a statement said it tries to provide minimally processed, organic-certified food free of artificial flavors and other additives. “Many of the current nutrient-profiling systems don’t take these values into account, which results in an incomplete picture,” it said.

Kroger, the second-largest food retailer by revenue after Wal-Mart, recently began testing the NuVal scoring system in some Kentucky stores and is considering using it nationally. The system, developed by health experts from Yale University and other institutions, uses nutrition data on food labels and other public information to calculate how well a product helps meet federal dietary recommendations. High levels of saturated fat, for example, can pull down the score while calcium can help raise it. Foods are ranked from 1 to 100; the higher the number, the greater the nutritional value.

The scores can influence shoppers’ choices. Ron Gill, a 44-year-old insurance salesman in Lexington, Ky., keeps an eye on the NuVal scores posted at his local Kroger store. On a recent shopping trip, in the processed-meat aisle, Mr. Gill passed up his usual Ball Park brand hotdogs, made by Sara Lee Corp., with a score of 7. Instead, he picked up Johnsonville Sausage LLC.’s smoked turkey sausage, which had a score of 10.

“It’s a little difference, going in the right direction,” Mr. Gill said. …

Personally, I think if you are going to chose to eat a food with so little nutritional value that it receives a score of 7 or 10, you might as well eat what you like or buy what is on sale.  But I do like the idea of having all that nutritional information from the label condensed into a single score for me.  It makes shopping that much easier and faster.  If you agree, suggest that your favorite grocery store do something similar.

Excerpts from the Wall Street Journal: http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748704229004575371010407610760.html?mod=rss_Health

Posted by Laurie Puckett at Remmel Wellness Center, a full service chiropractic and wellness facility in St. Petersburg, Florida.

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No Comments by Laurie Puckett on August 12, 2010
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Xtreme Eating – Restaurant Style

Blue crab on market in Piraeus - Callinectes s...
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The restaurant industry has ruined our notion of what an appropriate portion or serving looks like.  Has this ever happened to you?  You go out to eat some where, and they serve up an enormous amount of food on your plate.  You start eating, and it looks like you’ve barely touched your food.  The waitress stops by to ask if everything it alright.  You say yes, and feel guilty that you haven’t eaten very much, so you eat some more.  You keep on eating, until you have consumed way more than a single portion.  Then, when you are served up a proper portion, you feel cheated, because you aren’t getting very much food for your money.  :-(

Here is just one instance that I keep referring back to in my dining out experiences.  There was a little, hole-in-the-wall crab shack on the beach in Pinellas County that had the best crab in town – king, dungeness, snow, blue – and a great price.  The first time I went there, I ordered the blue crab cooked in a white wine, garlic sauce.  When it arrived, I had a heaping bowl that contained an entire box of cooked spaghetti noodles and 6 whole blue crabs – all for $11.99!  Definately a great deal, but it was clearly not a single meal!  In fact, I had my dinner, took home the leftovers, fed myself and my two daughters the leftovers for dinner the next night and still had enough for lunch the following day.  I have no idea what the calorie or fat content was, but this is an example of extreme servings. 

Read more about extreme dining in the following article from www.FoodConsumer.org:

We’ve heard it all before; Americans eat too much.  While many of us have already heard this grim news ad infinitum, the Center for Science in the Public interest wants us to realize just how serious the situation is.

That’s why they’ve just announced the winners of their annual “Xtreme Eating Awards”, a list of chain restaurants that offer the most calorie dense offerings in the contiguous forty-eight.

Some of the winners:

 PF Chang’s Double Pan Fried Noodles Combo, (1820 calories)

The Cheesecake Factory’s Pasta Carbonara with chicken, (2500 calories)

Bob Evans’ Cinnamon Cream Stacked and Stuffed Hotcakes, (1,380 calories)

In looking at the numbers, the Center’s nutrition director, Bonnie Liebman, contends that these meals are so huge and have such an enormous amount of fat that even splitting them wouldn’t be that much of an advantage, in the overall scheme of things.

In addition to the caloric overload these entrees boast, the number of fat grams in each of them is absolutely obscene, especially when you consider Liebman’s directive for the average American:  2,000 calories per day, and no more than 20 grams of fat.

Obesity rates notwithstanding, we can still consume way too much fat, even if we manage to keep our caloric intake down.  The goal, according to nutritionists, is to pack as many healthy nutrients as possible into those 2,000 calories, not too merely focus on calorie counting.

For example, if a person ate 7 Little Debbie blueberry muffins and nothing else all day, he or she would remain well below the 2, 000 calorie limit at 1.330.  However, the number of fat grams consumed in such an instance is a whopping 56 grams.

Some of the chains named on “the list” have issued statements; PF Chang’s reminds patrons that their meals are served family style with the notion that families will “share” a variety of appetizers, entrees, side dishes, etc.

A spokesman for The Cheesecake Factory asserts that many of their meals are perfect to take home for a second meal later on.

Of course, we must concede that the Xtreme list is a bit inflammatory, but the purpose of it is to shock us all into realizing what we’re doing to our bodies, and more importantly, what we’re doing to ourselves as a nation, collectively.  For the sake of our future, let’s hope it works.

Posted by Laurie Puckett, Remmel Wellness Center – a full service chiropractic and wellness facility in St. Petersburg, Florida.

1 Comment by Laurie Puckett on June 2, 2010
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