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January 16, 2006
Don't Be A Wimp!
I was supposed to be off today, but I ended up doing some work because as often happens, a situation arose that had to be dealt with immediately. I wrote a draft of a leaflet last night, and was planning to meet with my executive director at the office today to edit it and discuss our grand plan.
But as it turned out, our office was being re-painted and carpeted today, due to that flood of a few months ago. So my boss suggested that we meet for lunch. I said sure, and when he called me back to fix a time he said he didn't really feel like going to the RT (home of a calorie-controlled menu) and could we go to Houlihan's instead. I said sure.
As soon as I got off the phone, I started to regret my easy agreement. I looked up Houlihan's online and saw that there is no nutrition info anywhere on their website. Ugh! I sat becoming more and more resentful as visions of sitting watching someone else eat while I sat sipping a diet coke and eating nothing danced in my head. Finally, I decided that I was being a passive aggressive wimp.
So I picked up the phone, called him back, and said, "Do you mind terribly if we go to the Applebee's just down the street from the Houlihan's? They have a calorie-controlled menu, so I could eat."
He said sure. No problem.
That was easy.
I felt better. In fact, I felt empowered, a tower of CR strength, a pillar of self-discipline. I felt like I was going to eat some really good 150 calorie onion soup.
For lunch, I had the Weight Watcher onion soup for 150 calories and the shrimp skewer salad for 210. I considered eating the 230 calorie raspberry chocolate cake, but decided that would be a silly indulgence bereft of nutrition, and that I'd rather have a post-gym yogurt and almonds snack instead.
Lunch meeting went well, and my boss even ate off the calorie-controlled menu! He's been working on eating healthier, and I think that my insisting on places with calorie-controlled menus is helping.
After that I went to the gym, then dropped by my mother's house to visit her cat Amber. We had a chat while I ate my fruit on the bottom yogurt (my Trader Joe's and Whole Foods don't have either nonfat organic cottage cheese or yogurt! It's so irksome. I will make a request, and point out that other WF's and TJ's carry the items -- thanks commenters!) and 11 g almonds. Now I'm home and taking a short break before returning to work on my flyer. It has to get to the graphic designer tonight so it can get to the printer tomorrow morning.
I continue to be amazed at how good I feel when I go ahead and stand up for my little calorie-controlled self. I hate to inconvenience others, but the fact is, most of my friends don't much care if they eat at Houlihan's or Applebees. It's important to me, and if I just have the guts to voice my preferences without fearing that I'll be perceived as evil and selfish, it's usually a non-issue. Still, life would be easier if every restaurant published their nutrition info. I almost feel like not publishing nutritional information is similar to putting out a menu with no prices. You don't know how much this meal is going to cost you, so how can you budget? If people paid as much attention to their calorie counts and nutrition as they did to their bank accounts, the world would be a different place. Lots of people would still be obese, no doubt, just like lots of people are drowning in debt. But if we were to actually confront calories the way we confront price tags, it would be a step in the right direction.
Posted by april at January 16, 2006 4:56 PM
Comments
you are lame!
Posted by: steve at February 2, 2007 1:35 PM
does fatfree organic cottage cheese in large containers exist? we cannot find it thanks for your help marcus
Posted by: marcus at August 4, 2007 6:28 AM
You're absolutely right. I just got corralled into eating at Houlihan's & had no chance to check for nutritional info in advance, like I normally do. I ordered a salad (chicken chop chop) based on a friend's recommendation, and when it arrived, my heart sank. The menu description sounded marginally healthy. I did not expect the salad to be 1/4 fried rice noodles, 2/4 fried popcorn-style chicken drenched in sweet sauce, 1/4 pale teensy chopped-up-like-cole-slaw "greens" mixed liberally with peanuts. Oh, there was jicama and bell pepper and snow peas like the menu said, but VERY few of those; they were mostly a garnish. Seriously, there was maybe the equivalent of 1/8 of a bell pepper cut into teensy bits. And this was the healthiest-sounding salad on the menu!
Next time, I'm going to speak up for a restaurant that I'm certain about, and failing that, I'm going to speak up at the restaurant and get a decent salad. There's no reason they can't put together a FULL plate of veggies with a little GRILLED chicken. I really resent restaurants that don't offer any good choices and that hide their nutrition info, too, so you can't even be sure what you've been served.
Posted by: Beth at August 10, 2007 1:17 PM
You can order things differently than what the menu says. For example, ask for grilled chicken instead of breaded, no sauce, etc.
Posted by: Rhonda at May 8, 2008 4:38 PM