I definitely sympathize. If I don't take my Friday and Saturday night dinners out with my friends, I start to feel stir-crazy. In the past two months, I've developed a habit of looking up the menus for each of the restaurants before going out. I pick out the healthiest option and know what I'm going to order before I get there. The Daily Plate at
www.livestrong.com has a lot of popular restaurants on there with the caloric breakdown of their dishes.
Also, it might be helpful for you to check out beachbody's guide to eating at restaurants:
http://teambeachbody.com/about/newsletters/-/nli/119
It basically says the following:
The first thing you need to do is use common sense. Here's a quick list of things that'll help you survive any restaurant.
1. Go for the chicken or fish.
2. Avoid fried food.
3. Unless it's veggies, salad, or fruit, skip the side dish.
4. Pasta? Avoid cream sauces and just eat half your portion.
5. No bread, except if you're having a sandwich. And get whole wheat.
6. Ask for the salad dressing on the side and use it sparingly.
If you do this, you'll probably find yourself with a remarkably stripped-down meal that'll be easy to judge. Here's how to do that.
1. Piece of meat = 2 protein portions.
2. Side of veggies or salad = 1 veggie portion per side dish.
3. Salad dressing can count as 1 condiment portion if you limit the serving to 2 tablespoons.
4. If you ignored my extra side dish advice, count that as 1 carb portion.
5. If there's any kind of sauce or marinade on your meat, add 1 condiment portion.
6. Add 1 fat portion. Restaurants are notorious for sneaking fat and sodium into food. That's why it tastes so good.
7. In the event that you are 100 percent, categorically certain that there's no hidden fat in your meal, skip step 5 and add 1 condiment portion, simply because I don't trust those restaurant guys. I'm certain they snuck something in there. Trust me. I'm paranoid so that you don't have to be.
