By Richard Doble

We Americans have gained a lot of weight in the last 20 years. And at the same time we are eating out at restaurants more often. According to surveys we are spending almost half of our food dollar outside the home.

Selecting a healthy meal has never been more important. Knowing which menu choices are low calorie or high fat may not be obvious. Salad dressings, for example, may have many more calories than you would think. Yet with the few following simple tips you can get a handle on belt busting dishes and instead stay slim and trim.

The first and most important consideration is portion size. Avoid getting the next bigger steak, super-sizing, or adding a combo dish that is more food than you want.

Don’t forget that your eyes are bigger than your stomach. People tend to order more when they are hungry. When you walk into a restaurant, you are probably starved. Order the smallest portion you can live with; later if you still want more food, get more.

Never buy just because it is a good deal. Save your bargain hunting for clothing stores. While I am a great believer in saving money, eating more food than you need is not a good idea. However, if you want to share a discount meal, dessert, or appetizer with a friend (see below), this could be smart.

Be careful when you select a salad dressing. These can range from 80 to 300 calories without there appearing to be much difference. Ask the wait person to give you details.

Keep an eye on condiments, dips, sauces and spreads. These include tasty extras such as onion dip, tartar sauce, mayonnaise, syrup, jelly and gravy. These can add a huge number of calories to a sensible meal. For example, McDonald’s restaurant suggests that you order one of their hamburgers without the special sauce to save 100 calories.

You might consider sharing. You should never feel embarrassed or self-conscious. Most restaurants will not object and the waiter will not look at you cross-eyed. This is an easy way to cut calories and portion size by fifty percent.

Don’t get talked into ordering a dessert or an appetizer that you don’t want, even though the food is a good deal. Waiters and waitresses are often trained to suggest more food. If you are full, don’t do it.

Get detailed nutrition information from the restaurant. The business may have handouts, for example, to help you make intelligent choices. Also most major chain restaurants have nutrition facts and calculators online. Most web addresses will be quite simple such as the company name dot com; for example, the address for the Wendy’s chain is http://www.wendys.com. Most also have printer friendly pages on the web that you can print out and take with you the next time you go. To get you started, go to the NutritionData Internet site which is a good general web site with detailed nutrition and calorie information for over 30 chain restaurants.

Richard Doble, M.A. is editor of Savvy-Discounts.com, a ten year old frugal living web site. Information from his Internet site has appeared in Reader’s Digest, Woman’s Day (6 times) and ABC-TV’s TheView. He was interviewed on the MSNBC cable channel. His simple, down-to-earth strategies can save thousands of dollars every year. His tips cover finding discounts for groceries, telephone costs, clothing, automobile expenses, utilities and travel. He is author of the book, Savvy Discounts, published by a division of Penguin Books. Read his article with more links and calculators for fast food restaurants. Find more money saving tips at http://www.savvy-discounts.com

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