We ended up at this great outdoor mall and enjoying this wonderful fall like night we had. Started out at Sephora my favorite makeup place EVER. We meandered around and got to a cute little gift shop boutique with two of my favorite things, Vera Bradley and Brighton Jewelry, LOVE! With being a college student it doesn't leave much room for those kinds of things in the budget but I did splurge on one charm for my Brighton bracelet :oD. After we got done shopping we were both starving and it was deff. time to eat some dinner. Here at this point comes the reason for this post.....what to do in situations like these when you wanna live a fun life and do the "normal things" but yet be healthy while doing it.
We contemplated where in the world we were going to eat. Thankfully Kelli is health conscious too so it wasn't like we had to battle eachother or not agree. I think that is something that is SO important when you are trying to change your habits and way of living, is to deff. tell your friends be open and ask them to help you as much as they can. It doesn't me they have to change what they do, but just that maybe they can be more considerate to you and also help keep you on track in even the smallest ways. It was surprising to me how open and understanding a lot of friends and family members were when I told them about my change to living and eating healthier, a lot of people even get really excited about it.
We finally chose this neat place called Houlihan's. I was a little nervous because smaller chains don't normally have the calorie count posted and it's almost impossible to find the information online but that is where my point comes in of adapting to that and making it work so that you don't always have to miss out! I knew Kelli really wanted to try it and it did look good, and I was pretty much starved so I agreed. I looked at the menu and began scanning for what I could have. Of course your safe bets at places are always salads, but with caution of course. I am sure many of you have seen where the nutrition broken down on salads and you realize you could have gotten a burger or chicken sandwich or something you would have thought would have been much worse, but by the time they get done loading the salad you would have been about the same haha. Of course the big red flags are "breaded chicken" "creamy ranch or any kind for that matter" even Cesar you have to be careful because it's loaded in carbs,fat and calories! Another couple things is obviously bacon, and tons of croutons especially the homemade buttery good fat filled ones lol. Then there are tortilla strips and many other things, and even steak at some places.
With all that being said you have to learn to also let up a little bit and enjoy(which for me is SO much easier said than done lol). Sometimes I get SO anal about my calories I forget to just sit back and enjoy but I did last night and it was good. I knew a side salad is always safe, and a pretty obvious tip would be to get the salad dressing on the side and always like I said stay away from ranch and Cesar and go with the vinaigrette's always a lower fat safe choice ;o). I got a nice side salad with the cheese and croutons and then the balsamic vinaigrette on the side and put only half as much on as they gave me of it all. It's nice to get it and then just kind of decide what you want and don't want on it. It ended up being great and they even had shredded Romain which I LOVE shredded salads over not, not sure why it makes a difference haha but I love it.
The next safe zone bet while eating out at a place you don't know the calories is SOUP! While it may be higher in sodium it's always pretty good in calories. Lower fat kind are always great too but sometimes that's just not an option. Anyways I went for the Homemade Chicken Tortilla soup, with salsa,onions,fresh shredded grilled chicken and a little bit of cheese and tortilla strips on top. It came out with a nice lime in a little cup and was great. They gave it to me when Kelli got her entree' another tip that is great so that way you don't feel left out when they are eating a bigger portion that comes out later. I did take some of the tortilla strips off because I could barely see the soup below haha but it was great! I drank at least 3 glasses of water too to help combat the oncoming sodium haha. Again that is the only cruddy part about soup but you can always balance it out. It was hard to say no to desserts but another tip I do, it tell myself mentally what I have at home that I DO know the calories in and that I WON'T feel guilty about eating. I knew I had yogurt blend light ice cream and a double chocolate vita top at home and that would be so good when we got home in about an hour, I just had to be patient.
All in all it ended up being a successful, fun night and I am deff. learning still throughout this life changing process. Is it hard sometimes, yes at times I wanted to give in but when I got home and knew I still had fun on a girl's night out but also didn't forget my limits and DIDN'T just ruin my hour workout with my trainer, I was a much happy camper and slept well and woke up knowing this was going to be a successful weekend with hopefully a successful weigh-in and results Monday! I guess my moral for this is learn to be able to adapt wherever and remind yourself it is worth it! :o). Hope every is having a great wkend already!
~Kassandra
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