Calories can be hidden in the most unsuspecting foods - teach kids to ask for dressing on the side!

I liked to share with you a little story:

My mother-in-law, I call her Ma, is always watching her calories and trying to eat healthy.  Her and my father-in-law, I call him Dad, went out to dinner one evening.  Dad looks over the menu and orders his usual favorite, a hamburger with fries.  Now Ma is not too happy about Dad ordering this high calorie meal, but she bites her tongue and carefully looks over the menu.  After a couple of minutes she decides that she has found a nice healthy meal, a chicken salad.

After they placed their order, she put down her menu and began to talk to Dad about how he should really order something a little healthier.  Afterall, he has to take care of his heart and high fat foods aren't good for you.   Dad, gives her the brush off "Ahhhh, I eat what I like!"

To further her point, she grabs the menu to show him what a better choice he could have ordered, when she notices the back of the menu has the calories listed for each meal.  Wow, this is new.  She quickly looks up his burger and announces that it is almost 750 calories.  But what she did not expect was to find out that her salad was over 1000 calories!!!

I tell you this because we typically underestimate the calories in a meal and often times are misguided, thinking that a restaurant is putting in similar ingredients that we would use when cooking at home.  It is not that salads are unhealthy, but by the time they drown it in very high calorie dressing, bacon bits and other ingredients the calories can really start to add up.

So when eating out, teach your kids to ask for dressing on the side.  That way you can put in just the amount you need.

And as a side note, Ma says she would not have ordered the salad had she known the number of calories.  So despite all the political debate over whether to require restaurants to post their calories, I think it will make a difference.

Resources:  Family Restaurant Tips- Food Choices for Kids Healthy Nutrition

What do you think!