Salad Sabotage - 7 Ways to Avoid Lunchtime Diet Drama

Salad was always the safe choice in a restaurant. A little lettuce, some dressing...maybe a little chicken - and you're golden. No longer true. Restaurants have whipped up some delish sounding salads - and while they sound amazing (and diet-friendly) they are the devil in disguise!

Thanks to books like Eat This, Not That - and regularly regurgitated Diet Shockers stories on every talk show & morning show - we can now arm ourselves with the right info in order to avoid salad sabotage. In fact, check out their website for 15 Atrocious Salads. You'll be flabbergasted.

So what can you do to save yourself from a monster salad?

1. Count the Words: The more words that appear before the word "Salad" - the worse off you are.
Asian Sensation Crispy Mandarin Chicken Salad - not good.
Garden Salad - better.

2. Eat Half: Or at least shoot for eating half. Many of these dangerous salads clock in at over 1,000 calories. If you can stop yourself at half, you'll be saving yourself from diet drama later on. If you want to get really crazy, dump a ton of pepper, salt, or a clashing condiment (ketchup?) on when you've reached the half way point.
Drastic? Yes.
Conversation piece? You bet.
Good to do at a business lunch? Not so much.

3. Go Veggie: The meat is half the battle. Some salads contain the equivalent of a whole platter of chicken strips. If you wouldn't order that meal, you shouldn't get duped by the salad. Stick to the vegetarian options, or just request no meat (or 1/2 meat) when ordering.

4. Fry & Die: Fried anything is not your friend when it comes to salad. That includes tortilla strips, crispy noodles, or tostada (sometimes code name for giant tortilla bowl). Fried chicken, shrimp, or chicken fried shrimp also should be avoided.

5. Order off the Menu: Modify whenever possible! Most restaurants will honor your special requests (believe me, they'll find a way to charge you for whatever you want to buy). I'm a fan of requesting grilled (or blackened) shrimp with no oil to replace chicken in salad.

6. Easy on the Cheese: This is advice I should take more often. Much of the time that delish cheese that makes your chicken salad a Taco Chicken Salad is weighing you down. Ask for no cheese, or get cheese on the side so you can control how much goes in.

7. Dressing on the Side: Tried and true! Only you can prevent dressing overload. Avoid pouring on too much by dipping your fork in before spearing at your veggies. It's a classic technique for a reason.