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It's difficult, but you CAN diet while traveling! Updated August 9, 2007. Related info--- HOME :: Latest News :: Travel tips and checklists :: Clothing Checklists :: Baby travel checklists :: Travel Medicine Bag :: Road Trip Planning Checklist :: Checklist for Diabetic Travelers :: Diet tips while traveling How to Maintain Your Diet While TravelingDieting isn't easy on vacation....but it CAN be done!
Do you need to stay on a special diet while you're traveling? Many of us do. Diabetics, especially, need to watch their food intake while traveling to avoid getting dire symptoms while out on the road.Many other people, however, are watching what they eat voluntarily...by following weight reduction diets. Travel---whether for business or vacation---introduces a whole world of temptation before the dieting traveler which he or she would NOT have faced at home. On this page, we'll talk about maintaining a low-fat weight reduction diet during meals eaten at fast food restaurants. Fast food restaurants are where many travelers choose to eat while on a road trip. The reason is simple: time spent waiting for meals in a table-service restaurant means time LOST for racking up miles on the highway. Though it's easier, in many cases, to find fresh fruits and vegetables at a table-service restaurant, modern fast food restaurant menus have kept pace with the demand for healthier...and lower-fat...meal choices. On this page, we'll talk about lower-fat, lower-calorie lunch and dinner choices you'll have at some of Southern California's most popular restaurant chains. Plus, you'll find direct links to the "nutrition facts" pages of several of these restaurants...so that you may know in advance of your trip which foods that each one offers which will "fit in" with the particular diet you may be following. Diet while traveling -- McDonald's Restaurants
Do you like to eat at McDonald's? If so, GOOD. Making friends with McDonald's restaurants is one of the handiest things a road-trip lover can do. The first reason is simple: McDonald's Restaurants are nearly everywhere...and not just in Southern California. All 50 states have McDonald's locations seemingly "on every corner," and most countries of the world have McDonald's restaurants, as well. Statistically speaking, one out of every 5 meals eaten away from home is eaten at a McDonald's restaurant. Wherever YOU are, THEY probably are, as well.The second reason that McDonald's is the good friend of dieting travelers is that, as the world's largest fast food establishment, they've been the target of lawsuits complaining about the "unhealthful qualities" of the food they serve. As a result of these lawsuits (and the accompanying publicity), McDonald's has "bent over backwards" to provide low-fat choices to its customers. The McDonald's Classic Sandwich is very simple; it consists of a specialty bun, a chicken patty without breading, and a tomato slice on top. There's no cheese; cheese is the enemy of low-fat dieters (rats!) What really "saves the day" is how very delicious the chicken patty is. This is not a slab of chicken cut from the bird and plunked onto your sandwich. It's had some kind of tasty marinade injected into it. It's juicy, and it's tender to eat. Note: Do NOT get the Premium Grilled Chicken CLUB Sandwich; you want the "Classic." The Grilled Chicken Club sandwich...which I did order by accident recently...comes with tasty (but fat-laden!) bacon. The total fat for this sandwich rises to 21 grams---what a difference! At only 10 grams of fat for the sandwich, dieters can finish off my meal with a McDonald's low-fat vanillaice cream cone...another very filling product that McDonald's offers. (If you're not very hungry, the cone by itself can fill you up & keep you going for another hour or two.) The vanilla cone contains only 3.5 grams of total fat. So far, then, this meal totals 13.5 grams of fat...an amazingly low amount of fat for a meal in the USA...and it's very filling. If you are watching your total calories in addition to the grams of fat you eat, then you can either buy bottled water at McDonald's, or get a small cup of tap water for free. Diet soda is another option. Neither diet soda nor McDonald's bottled water have any calories at all! Here are some other lower-fat choices--- Diet while traveling -- Jack in the Box
Jack in the Box restaurants are another "friend" you should make if you'll be vacationing in California. Jack in the Box is a Western USA chain of fast food restaurants. The big reason that you should get to know them is that they serve both breakfast AND lunch/dinner items 24 hours a day. Therefore, you can get anything on their menu at any time day or night.This is a particularly handy feature during breakfast hours...when all the other fast food restaurants are serving ONLY what's listed on their breakfast menus. Surprisingly, it's hard to get a breakfast meal for 10 to 12 grams of fat or under. 2 eggs alone have 12 grams of fat, and that doesn't even begin to consider all the fat that's added when sausages, buttery biscuits, bacon and cheese are added into the mixture. That's why I like to order lunch foods at breakfast. At Jack in the Box, I generally order the Sourdough Grilled Chicken Club Sandwich. Though it's listed on the Jack website as having 28 grams of fat, most of the fat is in the ingredients other than the chicken and the bread. So, I have them leave off the mayo, the cheeses and the bacon. I end up with grilled sourdough bread, tomatoes and lettuce. It's filling all by itself...just the thing to eat before a busy day at Disneyland! Another Jack in the Box sandwich featuring an unbreaded, grilled chicken patty is the Bruschetta Chicken Ciabatta Sandwich. Listed at 24 total grams of fat, this sandwich is no dieter's friend when made to the restaurant's specifications. However, this sandwich may also be ordered without the cheese and the mayo. It's a tasty change of pace from other plain grilled chicken sandwiches. Other lowfat menu items at Jack in the Box are--- Diet while traveling -- Burger King
Burger King is another fast food outlet you'll find in many locations throughout Southern California. Like McDonald's and Jack in the Box, their menu now features low-fat items for calorie and fat conscious dieters.Burger King's website features 3 separate pages of dieting recommendations...depending on which diet you prefer to follow. Your choices are ( 1.) Carbohydrate-restricted diet (lo carb); ( 2.) a fat restricted diet; or ( 3.) a calorie restricted diet. Naturally, to get these low-fat, low-calorie items onto their menu, Burger King has added main-dish salads and grilled chicken sandwiches to their menu, just as you read about in the above McDonald's and Jack in the Box sections. Burger King's delicious 10 grams/fat "Tendergrill Chicken Sandwich" is another one of the sandwiches I recommend for fellow travelers looking for a filling, low-fat entree. You can look over the fun Burger King nutritional pages by using the following link to the
Burger King official website's nutrition section.
Diet while traveling -- Mexican-style Fast Food
If you're from a section of the USA (or the world!) which doesn't have Mexican fast food restaurants "on every corner," then you'll be surprised to find how many of them there are in Southern California. If you're used to eating real Mexican food...from Mexico, that is...you won't find the foods at these American-style Mexican restaurants to be identical. The recipes have been adapted to fit North American taste buds. Yet, they're similar. The Mexican and "Gringo" eating habits have merged to a large degree in this part of the country.Taco Bell and Del Taco are the two leading Mexican-style fast food chains in Southern California. Taco Bell is the larger of the two companies nationwide, but around Southern California, both have many locations...so you'll run into them both just about equally. Taco Bell is a member of the Yum!Brands, Inc, whose group includes KFC (Kentucky Fried Chicken), Pizza Hut, Long John Silver's Seafood, and A & W Root Beer Restaurants. Therefore, you may see restaurant locations which feature a Taco Bell/Pizza Hut combo menu, or a Taco Bell/KFC menu. Taco Bell has been at the forefront of developing different low-fat menu items; a number of items have rotated on and off of the restaurant menu in the past 10 years. Currently, Taco Bell offers a tasty "Fresco" (fresh) menu. The Fresco menu doesn't offer different selections; it offers the same selections MADE differently. If you choose an item to be made "fresco style" then a zesty tomato/onion/cilantro sauce will be used to replace the normal sauce, cheese, and/or sour cream that would normally have been added to that menu item. The result is that you'll be able to find 15 different menu items at Taco Bell that are under 10 grams of fat each...and some, much less. (That's good...because it will take more than one menu item to fill you up at Taco Bell. In my opinion, their food is tasty, but not tremendously filling.) Good-tasting examples of their ultra-low-fat items are the Ranchero Chicken Soft Taco (made Fresco style), which has only 4 grams of total fat; and the Grilled Steak Soft Taco (with only 5 gm/fat.) Not bad at all, eh? If you're interested in low fat dining, you really need to check out the other options that Taco Bell has to offer...and remember them for when you're traveling. You may use the following link to view the
Taco Bell website,
where you'll find information about this restaurant's Fresco choices under the "nutrition" tab. You'll find that Del Taco's "Chicken Taco del Carbon" (pronounced car-BONE) has only 5 grams of total fat; and both their "Soft Taco" and "Carne Asada" (CAR-nay ah-SAH-dah) tacos have 8 grams/fat. The Del Taco small strawberry shake has only 8 gm/fat in it, and is the best low-fat strawberry shake that can be found in fast food restaurants, in my opinion. When dining at Del Taco, even if your diet isn't stringently low fat, you'll want to stay away from items marked "Macho" or "Double"...because these items are truly OVERloaded with fat and calories! To view other menu items that may have an acceptable amount of calories and fat for your diet, please use the following link to look at the
nutrition facts page of the Del Taco website.
Diet While Traveling -- SubwayWell, Subway Sandwich Restaurants aren't one of my first choices for low-fat dining while I'm traveling. They're a great SUPPLEMENT to the other fast-food restaurants...very nice for a change-of-pace. But, they'll never be my first choice for dining while on the road, for several reasons. First of all, their advertised low-fat sandwiches are low-fat because their meat is sliced thin and their bread is quite thick. Since bread is the low-fat element of the sandwich (and meat is the high-fat component), it's only natural that if you skimp on the meat and heap on the bread, you'll end up with a low-fat product! So, what could be wrong with that? Well, I don't know about you...but I find myself hungry again too soon after eating one of the low-fat sandwiches at Subway. The bread digests quickly...and there wasn't much meat to begin with...so I get hungry! (Yes, you CAN order hearty sandwiches at Subway...but these no longer fall into the "low fat" category!) On the other hand, a dieter can find it really nice to enjoy a low-fat roast beef sandwich at Subway. Beef, as you know, is not generally a low-fat meat. So, dieters generally have to steer clear of beef...and reach for the chicken, turkey or fish. But, with Subway's thin slicing of lean cuts of beef, you can enjoy a beef sandwich...without an appreciable amount of fat or calories. On the "plus" side, Subway restaurants do offer a kid's meal. This includes a small, round "deli-style" sandwich, a choice of juice or milk, and a choice of raisins or some other fruit for dessert (no more fruit roll-ups, though, like they offered in the past!) A toy of some kind is included. If your kids are like my grandkids...and are much happier travelers if whatever they've eaten is in the form of a KIDS meal!...then Subway can satisfy the kiddies in that respect. Please use the following link if you'd like to view the
nutritional information page of the Subway restaurant official website.
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What can you buy at McDonald's that's low fat? The McDonald's menu item that I have found to be BOTH low fat AND filling is the "Premium Grilled Chicken Classic Sandwich" (which has a "total fat" content of 10 grams.)
What other low fat offerings can you eat at McDonald's? If you're a dieter, then you probably already know that McDonald's has a selection of main-dish salads. (Just stay away from the salads featuring "crispy chicken," which are higher in fat & calories...and not really a diet food.) To keep your meal low in fat and low in calories, however, you must use the McDonald's low-fat salad dressing on top. If you choose the "regular" salad dressing, you'll be consuming 9 to 18 grams of fat in the dressing alone. You might as well have eaten the small bag of fries (13 grams of fat) instead!
Taco Bell's major Southern California competitor, Del Taco, can also offer you some tasty low-fat dining. Del Taco is a handy chain to know about because (unlike Taco Bell) it sells hamburgers and french fries...a definite "plus" if you're traveling with kids who refuse to eat tacos. Like a burger restaurant, Del Taco offers kids meals which include a toy. Older Del Taco locations don't have playgrounds...but some of the newer Del Taco locations DO.
