Eating out is the hardest part of low carb living, because the menu is built to sell you bread, pasta, and dessert. The fix is a plan you can run on any menu: know what to order and skip in each kind of restaurant, learn the sauces that hide sugar, and have a fallback dish for when nothing else fits. Here is how to do all three.
Ok so I'm hoping by now everyone has found some great recipes from my posts, but now comes the difficult part…eating out. When you are cooking food for yourself it is easy to watch what you eat, but as soon as you step out the door that all changes. Looking at the big beautiful menu just makes you think "oh I could be bad just this one time" Stop don't do it! There are easy ways to wend through that big beautiful menu and here are my step by step tips:
- Look at the menu from left to right.
- Avoid the appetizers. For the most part they are normally fried or dips.
- Look at the soup and salad options first. Order a salad with no croutons and opt out for sweet dressings, such as balsamic vinaigrette. I love caesar salads because they are full of flavor and low in carbs.
- Avoid the pasta and rice section.
- Look at the main courses and try to stick to grilled seafood, chicken, pork, or beef.
- Check out the sides that come with your main course. Don't be scared if it comes with parmesan risotto, I have found that you can almost always ask to substitute any side with a selection of steamed veggies. I chose to have some yummy prime rib and a side of broccoli and asparagus.
- Dessert can be tricky. For the most part I just avoid it at all costs, but you can always try to order just a bowl of berries.
Order by cuisine
Every kind of restaurant has an easy plate and a minefield. This is where to look first and what to leave on the menu.
| Cuisine | Order this | Skip this | Watch for |
|---|
| Steakhouse | Grilled steak, prime rib, seafood, Caesar salad, green vegetable sides | Bread, potato, "loaded" sides | Sweet glazes, breaded onions, crispy toppers |
| Italian | Grilled meat or fish, antipasto meats and cheeses, salad | Pasta, risotto, bread, anything breaded | Sugar in red sauce, balsamic glaze |
| Mexican | Fajita meat, carnitas, a fajita bowl with no rice, beans, or tortilla | Rice, beans, chips, tortillas | Sweet marinades, cornstarch-thickened sauces |
| Asian (Chinese, Thai, Japanese) | Steamed or grilled protein with vegetables, sashimi | Rice, noodles, tempura, dumplings, sushi rice | Teriyaki, sweet chili, cornstarch-thickened sauces |
| Fast food | Burger with no bun or a lettuce wrap, grilled chicken, side salad | Bun, fries, breaded chicken | Ketchup, barbecue, honey mustard, sweet sauces |
The hidden-sugar traps
The carbs that wreck a careful order are usually not on the plate you expect; they are in the sauce. A grilled chicken breast is fine until it arrives glazed in teriyaki. The repeat offenders are teriyaki, barbecue, sweet chili, honey mustard, balsamic glaze, and any sauce called a glaze or reduction, all of which lean on sugar. Asian sauces add a second problem, cornstarch, which thickens sweet-and-sour, orange, and most stir-fry sauces. The same goes for the words "lightly breaded," "crispy," and "crusted," which all mean flour. Order sauces and dressings on the side, ask what is in a cream sauce before you trust it, and when a dish sounds sweet, it is.
Go for seafood
When a menu fights you, seafood is the way out. Most fish and shellfish are naturally low carb as long as they are not breaded or sitting in a sweet sauce, so a grilled or steamed seafood plate is a safe order almost anywhere. My favorite thing to order is cioppino, a dish of seafood simmered in a spicy tomato broth. Unlike a chowder it is hearty in flavor but has no thickener added, so it stays low carb while still feeling like a real bowl of food. If you enjoy seafood, order it the next time a menu has you stuck.
Cook the restaurant dish at home
The best way to stop overspending carbs out is to crave less of it, by making the restaurant version at home. The prime rib I order out is the same prime rib I roast at home; a steakhouse Caesar becomes a cobb salad on a weeknight; and the Mexican plate I want is slow cooker carnitas in lettuce instead of tortillas. For more sit-down dinners that copy the restaurant plate, see my low carb comfort food dinners guide, and for the salad side of the menu, my low carb salads guide.
Sources
USDA FoodData Central, added-sugar references for common restaurant sauces.
Sugarfreechic, low-carb dining-out notes.
