Many dieters shun places like McDonald’s and other fast food restaurants.  They do this with good reason.  Fast food is processed, full of fat, high-starch-high glycemic index carbs, and tons of preservatives, etc.  These restaurants also average at least 800-1200 calories per meal.  For example, at McDonald’s a Big Mac combo with a medium soda and medium fries has 1130 calories!  This is not even super-sized.  If you were being health-conscious and drank diet soda with this meal you could reduce it down to 930 calories.  I think we would all agree that avoiding fast food is the best option especially during any kind of fat loss program.

While this advice may be all good and fine there are still those of us who live down here on planet earth.  I have 2 small kids and McDonald’s is their favorite place to go eat.  (I am getting them to like Subway too)  They love to go there and play on the playground after they eat.  Adding playgrounds to their restaurants was an ingenious marketing tactic.  I’m sure it brings them tons of revenue.  We’ve all been driving home at 7:00pm with screaming kids in the back of the car, and no one’s eaten yet.  We swing into McDonald’s or some similar place and grab a quick meal-to-go.  Everyone is happy and fed.  The best part – no dishes!

The downer here is that we just blew any chance at fat loss today!  That means we’re not only missing our weight loss goals, but we knew we ate too much bad food. Now we’re slightly depressed as well.  It seems like getting those six-pack abs is for single people or movie stars who don’t have our crazy lives and families to contend with.

Hold on a second.  There’s a way to do both.  We can remain diligent to our fat loss programs and still eat at a fast food restaurant on occasion.  I must hand it to McDonald’s and the other guys.  They have started to jump on the health band wagon in America.  You can now find semi-healthy food options at these restaurants.  Here’s how to pick the best one.

When I walk into a place like Taco Bell for example I go straight to the nutritional information.  This nutritional information is  usually either posted on wall off to the side of the front counter somewhere, or it’s on a little pamphlet.  Sometimes you might have to ask an employee for it.  They’ll have it somewhere.  The FDA passed a law (Section 4205 of the Affordable Care Act signed into law March 23, 2010) that requires certain restaurants, coffee shops, delis, movie theaters, bakeries, ice cream shops, and vending machines to provide nutritional information for items they sell.  These labels contain much of the same information that is on food packaging labels.

It’s really simple once you get those nutritional facts.  Most of the items will have a ton of fat and calories, but thanks to the efforts of fast food restaurants to be healthier we can now find a couple of items that will fit into our caloric budget.  This is also helpful if you are craving a nice greasy burger or something.  You can find one with less than 500 calories.  This is obviously not the healthiest choice, but it satisfies that craving without eating too many calories and blowing your diet!        

So the next time you’re in a rush and everyone’s hungry don’t fret.  Just look for the nutritional information guide and keep your fat loss efforts on track!

I’d love to hear if this helped anyone so please send in any comments or questions about this ok?

Graphic from Jenn Cash.

What a great visual representation of some of the stuff we should be instilling in the lives of our kids.  Any other suggestions to add to this list?

There are several things you may be thinking about that would keep your kids healthy and strong.  However, the best thing a parent can do for their kids’ health is to get them plenty of exercise.  Today there is an out-of control epidemic of obesity in America.  People are dying left and right from obesity and the associated health problems this disease causes.  Yes, it is a disease.  However, it is one that can be controlled through a healthy lifestyle.  The worst part of this epidemic is that is has infiltrated our pediatric population.  With our fast-paced instant lifestyle that we live in the United States it’s no wonder we have this problem.  Most households are set up with either a dual-income or single parent set-up.  I’m not bagging on that situation.  My family is of the dual-income type.  We both work full-time and then try to raise a strong healthy family which can be quite challenging at times.  The whole point is that we (families) must make a conscious effort to be good examples of a healthy lifestyle for our kids.  I understand we may not always have the option of eating an organic-home-cooked meal every day.  In fact, getting your kids to eat something that good for you is usually a challenge in its own right.  However, the most important thing that we do have control over is how much activity/exercise our kids get each day.  The epidemic of childhood obesity largely correlates with the large increases in technology over the past decade or so.  Please, just get your kids moving.  More to come. . . . .