On average, Australians eat takeaway or restaurant food four times a week! With many fast food outlets advertising healthy alternatives on their menu, how do we know what is healthy or unhealthy?
When following a healthy eating diet plan and focusing on the best ways to lose weight it is important to know what are healthy food recipes to make at home and what are unhealthy options to try and avoid when eating out.
Here are a list of takeaway foods to avoid:
Indian
Indian dishes appear to be a good choice because they contain healthy ingredients like whole grains from lentils, pulses and legumes. However, depending on how the dish is cooked, and the regional cooking style, many Indian dished are very high in calories, and are cooked in ghee (clarified butter).
The rice (unless boiled) such as Pulauo or Biryani have very high calories because it is fried and contains other fat laden ingredients. If you are trying to control your weight you should avoid Indian takeaway.
Subway
Something that most people don’t realise is that most six inch Subway rolls contain more calories and fat than a Big Mac, yet it is something that is advertised as being healthy. While meals at McDonald’s averaged 1,038 calories, the Subway meals weren’t far behind at 955 calories each. As for the fat content for the 6 inch Sub, the average number was 28 grams per roll and sodium sat around 1470 milligrams, offering little nutritional value as well.
Pizza
Everyone loves pizza right? But I’m not sure everyone wants to know how bad it is for your weight loss. The main reasons why you shouldn’t choose takeaway pizza if you are on a weight loss program is, they are high in saturated fats which are the bad fats.
Take away pizza is high in sugar which if you’re trying to lose weight, should not be in your diet.
Last but not least take away pizza is high in salt, salt not only creates fluid retention, it is like a leech that sucks and damages all the other nutrients that it encounters.
Chinese
Takeaway Chinese could be a healthy option if you were to order steamed vegetables. But I’m here to tell you to stay away from “Sweet and Sour Pork”. Not only is the pork very high in saturated fat, the salt and sugar content for this dish is extremely high, none of which are a good recipe for weight loss or nutritional health.
KFC
Kentucky fried chicken is just that, DEEP FRIED. This means that the chicken is high in cholesterol, saturated fats and trans fats. The KFC menu, no matter what you choose, is also very high in sodium. Too much sodium not only retains fluid, it will make you bloated.
A bucket of KFC chicken may offer you a small amount of protein, but the way it is cooked and the seasoning that is added, cancels out any good nutritional value it might have.
– Sarah Michelle Weir
Advance Dip in Nutritional Medicine
Nutritionist
