Irresistible Bliss

I never thought I would be happy having lunch at Panera without my trusty, emotionally involved roast beef sandwich. And then I tried the Strawberry Poppyseed & Chicken salad. You can see how HUGE that bowl is in the picture, right? You have been to Panera Bread and know what size those trays are? I have never seen a salad that big served anywhere. At least not anywhere that I have ordered salad before.

It is full of amazing things like strawberries, blueberries, mandarin oranges, pineapple, pecans, romaine lettuce, citrus & pepper chicken, and fat free poppyseed dressing. The chicken tastes great, and all of the flavors blend together well. The dressing is light and complements all of the flavors. The pecans added a shockingly good favor to this salad, I was really impressed by them, and at how many there were in my bowl.

So how does this salad measure up nutrition wise? 340 calories, and only 1.5 g of saturated fat. You can also order a half for even less calories if you want to keep it light or add a side item with it. As you can see, it came with a nice hunk of french bread. I don’t know for sure how many calories were in it, and it’s not on my diet (neither are the pecans for that matter), but I ate it and it was amazing.

This was a fabulous, filling, low calorie lunch. I didn’t feel sad without the roast beef and bag of chips. I was not even that sad that I couldn’t go grab a pastry on the way out. Finally, someone got the fruit in a salad thing just right. I will be back for this again. The portion was big enough that I shared quite a bit with my daughter at lunchtime, so a half may be better for lunch and the full salad as a dinner portion. Either way I’m seriously impressed. Now if they can just figure out how to make me a low calorie frozen mocha, I will be set.

I never thought I could ever eat bad chicken at Chickfila. All their chicken is good chicken, right? Apparently not. In my quest for healthy options when eating out, I decided to try the chargrilled & fruit salad. At only 220 calories and 3.5g saturated fat, it seemed like a smart choice. It comes with harvest nut granola for 60 calories and no saturated fat, and a packet of reduced fat berry basamic vinaigrette, weighing in at 70 calories and also no saturated fat. Pretty good, right?

First off, the pictures they show of this salad have tons of big, pretty strawberries, loads of apple chunks, tons of grapes and some mandarin oranges. Awesome, yes? They don’t really give you very much. You get a ton of lettuce and a tiny amount of shredded carrots and shredded cheese. No other veggies. That’s alright, but what really got me was the chicken.

This chicken tasted horrible. It did not taste like yummy, basic grilled chicken. It tasted like it had some hideous spices on it. The funny part is, they make a southwestern chargrilled salad that DOES come with hideous spices on it. This was the plain stuff, and it was not plain. The flavor of it didn’t mix well at all with fruit, granola and berry flavored dressing. The fruit was actually very good, although much more sparse than I expected.

It’s low calorie and a decent healthy option. But I don’t think I’ll order it again. Even Chickfila’s yummy fried chicken is surprisingly low in calories so long as you’re being good about portion sizes (so basically ordering a kid’s meal.) You may as well splurge and eat the good stuff if you’re going to eat there.

I’ve learned many fascinating things this summer taking nutrition. One of this week’s biggest discoveries for me is that we don’t really need protein supplementation. What? Then why is everyone always trying to talk us into protein shakes for after a run or a weight lifting session? We need that extra protein, don’t we?

No, we absolutely don’t. An athlete’s protein needs are only slightly higher than the needs of non athletes, and most people have no problem meeting, and usually exceeding, the amount of protein that they need. The RDA for protein for a non athlete is 0.8 g per kilogram of body weight per day. This number increases to 1.2 – 1.4 for endurance athletes, and 1.6 – 1.7 for strength athletes. (Vegetarian athletes need slightly more: 1.3 – 1.5 for endurance, 1.7 – 1.8 for strength.)

To calculate your needs, you first have to convert your weight to kilograms by dividing weight in pounds by 2.2. For me this number is 75.5. Next you need to multiply this by the amount of protein for your expected needs. I exercise a lot, but I’m no marathoner, so I’ll use 1.2 g. This makes my protein requirement 90.6 g per day.

Now let’s toss around the protein content of some foods. Chicken breast (3.5oz) ? 30 grams. A large egg? 6 grams. Peanut butter? 8 grams. Tuna (6 oz can) ? 40 grams. Cheddar cheese? 8 grams per ounce.

Do you see where I’m going with these? That list right there would satisfy my protein needs if I consumed them today. And since athletes who need higher protein than that also require higher intakes of energy (aka calories), they shouldn’t need a protein supplement most of the time either.

It should be noted that some athletes with low energy intakes (aka not eating enough calories to support the amount of physical activity they get), some vegetarians and vegans that are not getting enough protein, and young, growing athletes that may not be aware of their higher needs may not get enough from their diets. A protein shake might help them out. Or, they can just increase their consumption of protein rich foods.

When mentioning this whole thing to my 10 year old daughter, she brought up the best question to end this post with. “If I don’t really need extra protein, then why do I feel so good if I drink a muscle milk after exercise?” My best answer is that most protein shakes are also full of vitamins and minerals which make you feel good. Do you have a better answer? I’d love to hear your thoughts.

As I’ve been trying to eat healthy as much as possible this summer, I’ve found myself trying new foods on the menu when I eat out. I work hard to eat at home most of the time, but sometimes stuff happens and you end up in a restaurant or a drive through.

The recent holiday weekend brought a trip to Carl’s Jr. after researching what I could reasonably eat there and not mess up my diet. I ended up getting the original grilled chicken salad, with low calorie balsamic dressing. The salad is full of fresh greens and veggies, and only 270 calories and 3g of saturated fat. The dressing? Only 35 calories and no saturated fat. And both are low in sugar which really pleases me as someone who’s mostly not consuming any added sugars right now. Note: the salad also comes with some icky red onions which I removed and threw away before taking the picture. But if you like that stuff, it comes with.

I was extremely impressed with how fresh everything was. The amount of cucumber slices. Two big hunks of real tomato that likely equal a whole small tomato, rather than the typical couple of cherry or grape tomatoes thrown in most restaurant salads. Really yummy grilled chicken. Overall it turned out to be a great fast meal for someone who wants to eat healthy.

I’m determined to try more new healthy restaurant meals as I go along… sometimes there’s not much choice and you have to eat out. But that doesn’t mean you can’t get a healthy meal. You just need to know what to look for.