Fast Food Follies

A couple of months ago, we put together a short tip series for our F-HEIT site. In case you don't know, F-HEIT is a Biotest site used to promote our Fahrenheit supplement for women. The info and articles on the site are geared toward females who are fairly new to training and good nutrition.

Anyway, I decided to include some info about what to order and what to avoid at fast food restaurants in F-HEIT's tip section. Of course, my best advice is to avoid the grease-peddlers entirely, but I figured a good first step would be to at least order more healthfully if you should tragically find yourself in line at one.

To make it fun, I also tried to find the single worst thing to order if your goal is fat loss and health improvement. It turned out to be an interesting little research study, even for non-newbies. Here's some of what I came up with:

Wendy's

Wendy's tends to offer more healthier items than other fast food restaurants, but you still have to be careful.

What Not To Order

The single worst meal to order is a Big Bacon Classic (580 calories) and a Frosty (430 calories just for the medium size.) Those chicken filet sandwiches aren't much better either, as both have over 500 calories each.

What To Order Instead

One of the healthiest items on the menu is the Mandarin Chicken Salad. Just skip the crispy noodles and go easy on the dressing. Like most salad dressing, this one can add more calories than the salad itself contains.

On the side, get the fruit bowl or the low-fat strawberry yogurt. A small chili is okay too, certainly better than the french fries. Order an unsweetened tea or water and steer clear of the soft drinks and milk shakes.

KFC

A couple of years ago, Kentucky Fried Chicken got into hot water with nutritionists everywhere when they tried to claim that their fried chicken was "healthy" simply because it was low carb (if you ate a very tiny amount.) The ads were later pulled because, well, promoting anything fried as "health food" is just wrong.

Still, the F-HEIT staff decided to checkout the KFC menu to see if there was anything there a body-conscious person could eat. Here's what we found.

What Not To Order

The highest calorie single items on the menu are the Crispy Twister (670 calories), the Triple Crunch Sandwich (650 calories), and the chicken pot pie (770 calories.) The unhealthiest side item is the macaroni and cheese (400 calories.)

The famous fried chicken itself is pretty bad too in terms of calories, but generally speaking, the Original Recipe isn't quite as bad as the Extra Crispy. Still, if your goal is fat loss, you should skip both.

What To Order Instead

No big surprise here, but given that just about everything is fried, there's not a lot of choices at KFC. The Roasted Caesar and BLT salads aren't too bad, but go light on the dressing. Another option is to order the fried chicken and simply peel off the skin and breading. This will remove a lot of calories. The healthiest sides are the green beans and the corn on the cob.

As always, we recommend diet soda or water. A large non-diet Mountain Dew will add 300 useless calories to your meal! (Note: Mountain Dew has more calories than Coke or Pepsi.)

Remember, you can download the nutritional info on any fast food restaurant's menu. Just bring up the restaurant's official website and click on "nutrition."

Taco Bell

Now we've accepted the ultimate challenge: find something healthy to eat at a Mexican fast food joint! Here's what we found at Taco Bell.

What Not To Order

The worst possible thing to order as far as total calories and "bad" carbs go is the Nachos BellGrande. This item contains 780 calories and 80 grams of carbs! Ouch. Now that's a diet wrecker.

What's almost as bad? The Grilled Stuft Burritos. Sure, they have the word "grilled" in their names, and sure, you can order chicken instead of beef, but these things still run you 680 to 720 calories. You could eat four tacos for that. (Not that we'd recommend it.)

What To Order Instead

Now for the tricky part: finding something, anything, healthy to eat here. Your safest bets are the plainer tacos ordered "Fresco Style." That means they remove the cheese and other sauces and replace them with salsa. This knocks off anywhere from 20 to 100 calories depending on the menu item.

So, if you're forced to eat at Taco Bell, order a beef or chicken taco "Fresco Style." These only have 150 to 170 calories and the carbs are usually under 20 grams each. Tacos aren't exactly health food, but they sure beat the nachos and burritos.

Starbucks

Remember, liquids contain calories too, and it's very easy to drink too many calories if you're not paying attention. Just for fun, the F-HEIT staff went to Starbucks to find the best and worst coffee drinks.

The Worst: The most diet-damaging drink offered by Starbucks is the Mint Chocolate Chip Frappuccino Blended Creme. The Venti size contains 820 calories, 25 grams of fat and 109 grams of carbohydrates. To put this in perspective, there are more calories in this drink than in any dessert item they sell. That's also over 200 more calories than in a McDonald's Big Mac.

The Best: We like Starbucks, but it looks like the only diet-friendly items they sell are the coffee of the week, caffe Americano, espresso, and most of the plain teas. All of their blended drinks, even with skim milk, are just too high in calories for us, except as a rare treat. The rest are liquid desserts.

Caffeinate wisely!

Popeye's

What Not To Order

The worst choice you can make at Popeye's are the fried chicken breasts. Truthfully, avoid all the fried items for obvious reasons (high calories, bad fats.) Also skip the apple turnover, the biscuits, and the fried seafood.

What To Order Instead

Order the chicken with the skin and breading removed. If they don't offer this straight off the menu, you can do it yourself. Or just get the "naked" chicken strips. Three strips will give you 170 calories, 29 grams of muscle-sparing protein, and only 2 grams of carbs. Order the green beans on the side.

McDonald's

What Not to Order

Surprisingly, the most fattening item on the menu isn't the Big Mac. It's the Chicken Selects Premium Breast Strips. This item has 1270 calories, 66 grams of fat and 92 grams of carbs.

Want a shake with that? (God, I hope not.) A large Triple Thick Shake has over 1000 calories. That's more calories than eating four Hershey Bars. Rather have breakfast? The Deluxe Breakfast contains 1220 calories, 60 grams of fat and 136 grams of carbs. Ouch!

What to Order

Get the Chicken McGrill and make sure they don't add mayo. Ask for extra vegetables so it'll be more nutritious and filling. Most of their salads are okay too, just go easy on the dressing (some can add 190 calories to your meal) and don't order the "crispy" salads with fried chicken on top.

Pizza Hut

As part of our continuing series about the best and worst fast food choices, we decided to take a closer look at pizza. One tiny problem: it's nearly impossible to order anything at a pizza restaurant that's physique-friendly! However, you can lessen the dietary damage by making a few smart choices.

First, order the thinnest crust you can get. Never get a "deep dish." This will reduce carbohydrates and overall calorie content.

Second, pile on the veggies! Anything goes here. Ask for double the normal vegetables, anything you like. Avoid sausage and other meaty toppings to reduced calories. If offered, get a grilled chicken and pineapple topping.

Third, hit the salad bar first. Fill up here and by the time you're ready for pizza, hopefully a slice or two will suffice.

Some restaurants, like Pizza Hut, do offer choices for those watching their carbs, but these can be tricky. While a Meat Lovers "Carb Tracker" pizza does have more fiber and fewer net carbs (26g), these tiny pizzas have 740 calories. Better to stick with the pepperoni and mushroom for 490 calories.

Burger King

What Not to Order

The Triple Whopper with cheese will give 1230 calories, 82 grams of fat (32 saturated), and 52g of carbs. Add fries for another 600 calories, 69g carbs, and 33g of mostly "bad" fat. Add a non-diet soda and, well, you'll pretty much fall over dead.

What to Order

The Low-Carb Angus Steak Burger, which comes without a bun, has 260 cals, 2g carbs, 18 grams of protein. Not bad. The Tender Grill Chicken Sandwich has 450 cals, 37g protein, but still 53g carbs (those buns are enormous). So the best bet may be the Tender Grill Salad: 230 calories (before you add dressing), 32 grams of protein, and 11 grams of carbs.


Now, keep in mind that I compiled this info for beginner women whose main goal is fat loss. I'd do things a little differently for a weight-training man whose main goal is muscle gain. However, I still wouldn't recommend crap foods. I maintain that you don't have to eat shit to gain muscle. You can still pack in the calories with mostly healthy choices.

I haven't had to eat fast food in a couple of years, but when I did I'd go for the grilled chicken sandwiches, order a couple, add veggies, cut the mayo, then toss one of the buns. Not perfect, but not bad either.

If I missed anything above, or if you have some experience ordering fairly healthy stuff from a fast food restaurant I didn't cover, feel free to reply below and drop that info on us!

Man those calorie numbers are huge..As a FFB(I like to say I was a whopper away from 3 hundred pounds) I can recall eating many of those foods.. Now those numbers make me sick. The biggest shocker I think is Starbucks 800 calories in a drink!!!Goddamn!!!

I have not had a fast food meal in around 2 years or so...but once in a while I do slip up and have to order something, this will make me think twice about what I order.

Thanks for the reminder Chris...
With help like this T-mag and your advice has helped me drop around 80 pounds of lard, get into shape and have more muscle than I once thought possible.

Thanks again
MIKE

A lot of the stuff mentioned in the article are not available in New Zealand's fastfood chains' menu.

But still, New Zealand is a fat country. I guess what we have here on the menu is just as bad.

Geek boy

At subway:

The worst:
footlong meatball sub

The best:
turky sub on wheat

Chris, do you have any ideas for packing in a lot of calories with healthy foods? I havn't eaten fast food in a year or so but it's starting to get REALLY hard to eat enough clean foods. The grocery bill is enormous.

As a bulker, I started looking at the "what not to eat" as "stuff I'm eating tomorrow."

My favorite is Chipotle. I get a salad with grilled Steak and/or Chicken (double the meat), Romaine lettuce, black beans, mild salsa (pretty much chopped tomatoes), and Guacamole. I don't use any of the dressing that comes with it. Its real meat (grilled Steak and Chicken) and the vegetables are fresh. You can't beat their Guacamole either. Good Stuff.

At Arby's I get the roast beef sandwich and nothing else.

When ever I have to travel for an extended time, I find that keeping a loaf of good whole wheat bread in the car helps when eating fast food. Just slap the chicken or burger and veggies on it and toss the white bun.

brand wrote:
My favorite is Chipotle. I get a salad with grilled Steak and/or Chicken (double the meat), Romaine lettuce, black beans, mild salsa (pretty much chopped tomatoes), and Guacamole. I don't use any of the dressing that comes with it. Its real meat (grilled Steak and Chicken) and the vegetables are fresh. You can't beat their Guacamole either. Good Stuff.

I do this like 3 to 4 times a week. its kinda cheap too for the quality.


One thing that struck me the other day that I was hoping to see here - Cafe Mocha post workout. Milk for protein, chocolate for fast carbs, and get skim milk if you want to do it P+C. Its not perfect and I wouldnt make it a habit, but it made more sense than I thought it would. Plus I am a caffiene junkie and need to rationalize my addiction from time to time.

At Burger King you can order the chicken breast patty by itself. Unfortunately the price jumped, twice, and not jut by a few cents. They are practically double what they cost me a couple of years ago. (At least here they are.) Still good for a lean protein.

I like to get the "Atkins approved" chicken bacon ranch wrap at Subway. I have them leave off the bacon, and the ranch dressing. Pile on the veggies, throw on some healthier olive oil and vinegar, and oregano for more flavor. Still leaves about 39 grams of protein total, after a loss of 3 grams with the removal of the bacon, along with the 3.5 grams of fat, and the 8g of fat from the ranch dressing, but I am gaining 5 grams of fat from the olive oil per tbsp, so avoid the olive oil if you want to keep the fat low.

I should note that the wrap does contain soy protein. (Those bastards.) Something to be aware of, but I don't worry too much since it is not a regular thing.

El_Animal wrote:

Chris, do you have any ideas for packing in a lot of calories with healthy foods?


That could be a whole article, plus it's a pet peeve of mine.

Basically, I suggest some calorically dense shakes between regular meals and snacks: Metabolic Drive, skim milk, natural peanut butter, healthy fats, all blended together. It's pretty easy to come up with a 900 to 1000 calorie HEALTHY shake.

There's not much of a need to eat garbage foods. Sure, that's the easy way to pack in calories, but the ease doesn't make up for the short-term physical damage and potential long-term behavior damage such eating can cause. See Berardi's last article about Dave Tate's struggles:
http://www.t-nation.com/...cle=06-042-diet

Let me think about this some more, could be a whole article.

If you redo the research for T-Men, you'll have to include the standard T-Man restaurants, Hooters and Wing House. Not actually fast food, but you don't go there for the food.

Chris, I'm now freaking STARVING and totaly craving junk!!!

Thanks for that. :P

On the plus side, there were some salads mentioned, which is one of my fave meals, so I think I'll whip one up here at home. :D And I'll put the thought of burgers out of my mind!

Very interesting. It always surprises me that some of the 'healthy salads' are worse, calorie wise, than the burgers themselves.
Check out the Hardee's website for their nutritional rundown on their various burgers. Very scary indeed.
http://www.hardees.com/nutriti...

Just one Monster burger, large fries and shake, which most people would eat quite easily esp. if they visit these places often.

2530cal
186g Carbs
81g Protein
162g Fat; 69g Saturated
7g Fibre

That is the average persons daily calorie intake in just one meal.
I know that it may be an extreme view for some people, but I see it all the time. Not at Hardee's because there aren't any in Australia (yet) but at McDonalds etc.
Anti-fat

El_Animal wrote:
At subway:

The worst:
footlong meatball sub


Oh, shit! I love that sub. One of my favourite cheat meals used to be a foot long meatball sub with extra meat, bacon and extra cheese, with salad and hot chilli sauce.

How did I get fat again?

ThatGirl77 wrote:
Chris, I'm now freaking STARVING and totaly craving junk!!!

Thanks for that. :P

On the plus side, there were some salads mentioned, which is one of my fave meals, so I think I'll whip one up here at home. :D And I'll put the thought of burgers out of my mind!

I actually don't think some burgers are bad; you just have to make them yourself.

Use extra lean, grass fed beef, a whole wheat bun (kinda hard to find, but they exist), tons of fresh veggies, and use a fat free mayo or mustard only. Go for fat free cheese to reduce the calories a little more and you end up with a pretty healthy burger - or at least better than the 1200 calorie health-killers at McDonalds and Burger King.

Have that with a salad instead of fries and a diet drink instead of a giant 400 calorie cola, and you can have your burgers.

I've even had a semi-cheat meal at Chile's like this. Sub the fries for salad, cut the mayo on the Big Mouth Burger, and have a non-caloric drink, and it's not too bad. Not great, but it's not going to wreck a hard training person once a week.

yorik wrote:
If you redo the research for T-Men, you'll have to include the standard T-Man restaurants, Hooters and Wing House. Not actually fast food, but you don't go there for the food.

"Naked" wings (no breading) are a better choice here. And Hooter's makes a good chef salad. As a bonus, there are lots of boobies around.

How about the toasted deli sandwiches at McDonald's?

I really like the Turkey BLT on Whole Wheat (without sauce). 370 kcal, 8g fat, 49g carbs (8g fibre), 28g protein.

Chris Shugart wrote:
El_Animal wrote:

Chris, do you have any ideas for packing in a lot of calories with healthy foods?


That could be a whole article, plus it's a pet peeve of mine.

Basically, I suggest some calorically dense shakes between regular meals and snacks: Metabolic Drive, skim milk, natural peanut butter, healthy fats, all blended together. It's pretty easy to come up with a 900 to 1000 calorie HEALTHY shake.

There's not much of a need to eat garbage foods. Sure, that's the easy way to pack in calories, but the ease doesn't make up for the short-term physical damage and potential long-term behavior damage such eating can cause. See Berardi's last article about Dave Tate's struggles:
http://www.T-Nation.com/...cle=06-042-diet

Let me think about this some more, could be a whole article.


I would like to see an article on this. As someone who has a hell of a time getting enough calories, McDonald's or Burger King can add a couple hundred easy ones.

I'd like more information on eating clean while bulking.

geekboy wrote:
A lot of the stuff mentioned in the article are not available in New Zealand's fastfood chains' menu.

But still, New Zealand is a fat country. I guess what we have here on the menu is just as bad.

Geek boy

fish and chips!

You know, reading this made me hungry.

Taco Bell is a two minute walk from my job (Radioshack), so I will eat there about twice a week. I always eat this:

Two Soft Steak Tacos:

No Cheese, no sauce

One Bean Burrito:

No Cheese, no onions, no red sauce

Tastes good since I like my food mostly bland.

Vash wrote:
Taco Bell is a two minute walk from my job (Radioshack), so I will eat there about twice a week. I always eat this:

Two Soft Steak Tacos:

No Cheese, no sauce

One Bean Burrito:

No Cheese, no onions, no red sauce

Tastes good since I like my food mostly bland.

I eat at Taco Bell a lot. 1 or 2 Zesty Chicken Bowls, no rice, no "dressing." Ask for extra salsa or use a few packets of hot sauce, instead.

Lost_Dog wrote:

I eat at Taco Bell a lot. 1 or 2 Zesty Chicken Bowls, no rice, no "dressing." Ask for extra salsa or use a few packets of hot sauce, instead.

Damn, never knew about those.

Might want to tell them to keep those crunchy red strips out of there too.

Drinks from Starbucks are the most insidious. I mean, everyone knows that burgers and fries are going to have a high calorie count, but the drinks at Starbucks - why, they're just coffee, aren't they? It's only when you realize that Starbucks serves milk drinks with a little bit of coffee that it becomes apparent they're a real danger in calorie terms.