Chains' meal calories found higher than stated

[steven johnson]

Just when I thought it was safe to eat out while dieting.

Dieters can't believe everything they read: The food at many popular chain restaurants and in the freezer section of the supermarket may contain a lot more calories than advertised.

A study of 10 chain restaurants, including Wendy's and P.F. Chang's, found that the number of calories in 29 meals or other items was an average of 18 percent higher than listed.

Researchers involved in the study said most of the discrepancies can be explained by variations in ingredients and sizes.

Chains' meal calories found higher than stated

[Cirque du So-What]

1. Researchers failed to mention

that the rest of the discrepancies were due to lying sacks of shit in upper management placing more value on their bottom line than any health consequences for their customers.

[DesertFlower]

2. olive garden is a chain. i was

shocked when i looked up spaghetti and meatballs. it has 50 grams of fat.

[dkf]

3. How standardized are portions anyway?

I've never worked at a restaurant but I imagine mayo squirts can differ from person to person.

[Travis_0004]

6. I worked at McDonalds, so my experience may be different than other places

Portion sizes should be almost exactly the same on every thing you make. The hamburger patties are pressed and exactly the same size, and the mayo, big mac sauce etc, each has its own cacuk gun type thing, so each time you put mayo on a sandwich it is exactly the same. Something like fries might differ a bit, but probably not by much.

If you go to a nicer restaurant, the hamburger patties might be formed by hand, and mayo spread from a bottle, so it may vary a bit more.

[Laura902]

4. Ya,

its easy to eat a panini sandwich from panera breads for dinner and not realize that they are up to 970 cals.

[Warpy]

7. I do a poor man's panini at home

It takes 2 cast iron fypans, spray oil, bread, and filling.

Just preheat both pans, spritz one side of the bread, build the sandwich on the unspritzed side, top it with the other slice, spritz the top, then transfer it into one hot pan and smack the other hot pan on top of it. Then walk away for about 5 minutes, heat turned off.

You don't get the grill marks but the result is a fantastically crispy toasted, pressed sammie.

You'll never eat that fast food crap again.

[Laura902]

8. good idea! n/t

[BanzaiBonnie]

5. I highly recommend "Cook this, not that"

Easy recipes that mimic or make even better meals than your favorite restaurants. And definitely ditch the restaurants and fast food places. The author also gives a cost for the replacement meals.

For example, one of the meals that costs about $8, you can make for $1.70. My husband really perked up his ears when I told him that.