Thoughts on olive gardens soup and salad

When going out to eat, I like to go to olive garden for a bowl of their zupa soup and salad. I've never thought about whether or not it's actually healthy. Any ideas on if this is a good meal for losing weight? 

I Googled it for ya...

Zuppa Toscana (one serving) Calories 220 Fat 15g Sodium 990mg Carbs 15g Sugar 2g Protein 7

Famous House Salad (one serving with dressing) Calories 140 Fat 1.5g Sodium 740mg Carbs 12g Sugar 3g Protein 3g

So...if you could eat all of both items (I would not be able to eat that much volume of food personally) you would be spending 360 calories and 27 Carbs to get 10g of Protein. WLS and RNY specificly really focuses on "Protein Forward" meals so this ratio is not ideal. Consider that you can get 13g of Protein from an 80 Calorie cup of Greek yogurt. For 360 calories I would be looking for at least 36g of protein. 

On the Carb side, many RNY folks aim for between 50 (or less) and 100 (high side) carbs per day. If you had this meal it would be one-half to one-third of all your carbs for the day with very little nutritional return.

Generally speaking for WLS folks, this would not be an ideal meal. 

~E

Thank you sooooo much. Yes, absolutely no more olive garden. Just the sodium alone is crazy. I wouldn't think soup and salad would be that unhealthy. Glad I asked 

You can have this meal...sometimes... up to you.  We all can do more than we ought to do.  Perhaps this is the best choice for you out of all the things at that particular place.  Sometimes you just bite the bullet. 

Personally feeling like "I can't" ior "Absolutely no more ever" makes me feel trapped.  I work hard to think of it in terms of "I could but it would make me sick" or "I could but it isn't a good choice." 

At Olive Garden specifically I looked and found this would probably be my choice...

Garlic Rosemary Chicken Calories 400, Fat 19, Sodium 1400, Carbs 29, Protein 38

It is pretty salty but the protein is good. Hope this helps!

~E

^^^^What she said.

I have burned into my brain the bariatric guidelines given to me in a handbook; they would be better followed than burned. Here's one of them that may or may not help:

      When making food choices, ask yourself three questions:  1) Is it a dense protein?  2) Is it a vegetable?  3) Is it an occasional fruit?  If the answer is "no," rethink your choice.

Last time i went to olive garden I order 4 chicken meatballs. They were extremely filling. But I avoid Olive Garden because those bread sticks are the devil's work!!

....baked in the fires of Hades for sure.

~E

You might like this one I make... you can replace the beef for sausage or do a combo which would be delicious I think. LOL gonna try that myself next time.

http://theworldaccordingtoeggface.blogspot.com/2007/12/soups -on-again.html