Healthy Fast Food

Tips for Making Healthier Fast Food Choices

When you’re hungry and on the run, fast food can really hit the spot. It’s quick, tasty, and, best of all, convenient. But it’s also loaded with calories, sugar, sodium, and fat—often enough in one meal for an entire day or more. And if you’re feeding your whole family, it can be expensive, too—often more so than cooking at home.

Fast food menus are tricky when you’re watching your weight or your health. Finding a healthy, well-balanced meal in most fast food restaurants is a challenge. But there are always healthier options hidden among the diet disasters. You just need to know where to look and how to order.

Can fast food really be healthy?

The truth is that it’s extremely difficult to follow a healthy diet when you’re eating regularly at fast food restaurants. Fast food restaurants typically use the cheapest ingredients possible in order to keep costs down. That means that foods that otherwise could be considered healthy may not be when ordered from a fast food chain. For example, cheese can be a good source of protein and calcium, but the cheese topping your burger or covering your pizza is most likely heavily processed, made from non-dairy ingredients. The same goes for meat, chicken, and eggs. Fast food is also typically high in trans fat, unhealthy saturated fat, hidden sugar, sodium, and calories. At the same time, it tends to be low in nutrients and almost totally lacking in fruits, vegetables, and fiber.

That doesn’t mean you have to avoid fast food entirely. It’s OK to indulge a craving every once in a while, but to stay healthy you can’t make it a regular habit; consuming fast food regularly will almost certainly have a negative affect your health. The key is moderation—both in how often you frequent fast food chains and what you order once you’re there. There are always choices you can make that are healthier than others. The following tips and menu recommendations can help you stay on track. Just remember that even the healthiest fast food options often have nutritional drawbacks so try to keep fast food to the occasional treat.

Aim to keep your entire meal to 500 calories or less. The average adult eats 836 calories per fast food meal—and underestimates what they ate by 175 calories. So don’t guess! Most chains post nutritional info both on their websites and at the franchise location. Take advantage of this information.

Opt for foods that are lower in fat and higher in protein and fiber. Look for items with more good stuff, like fiber, whole grains, and high-quality protein. Also aim for options that are relatively low in saturated fats—while not all saturated fats are bad for you, most of those found in fast food restaurants are.

Steer clear of trans fats. Small amounts of naturally-occurring trans fats can be found in meat and dairy products but it’s the artificial trans fats used to keep food fresh that are dangerous to your health. Avoid anything containing “partially hydrogenated” oil—even if it claims to be trans fat-free—or any foods that have been deep fried. While no amount of artificial trans fat is considered safe, the USDA recommends at least limiting trans fat to no more than 2 grams per day.

Keep an eye on sodium intake. The American Heart Association recommends that adults stay under 1500 mg of sodium per day, and never take in more than 2,300 mg a day. That can be tough to do when eating fasting food—a burger and fries can easily exceed your daily limit.

Bring your own add-on items if you really want a health boost. Even when you order wisely, it can be pretty tough to get enough fiber and other important vitamins and nutrients from a fast food menu. If you plan ahead, you can bring healthy sides and toppings like dried fruit, nuts and seeds, carrot sticks, apple or pear slices, and cottage cheese or yogurt.

Beware of added sugar

One of the biggest problems with fast food is the amount of added sugar—and it’s not just in sodas or desserts. Even the average burger contains 5 to 10 grams or more of added sugar, about the same as a couple of cookies. Salad dressings, ketchup, dips, and BBQ sauces are also packed with added sugar. Your body gets all it needs from sugar naturally occurring in food so all this added sugar just means a lot of empty calories that can add inches to your waistline and contribute to diabetes, depression, and even an increase in suicidal behaviors.

According to the American Heart Association, men shouldn’t eat more than 37.5 grams or 9 teaspoons of added sugar per day and women 25 grams or 6 teaspoons. While that may sound like a lot, the grams can quickly add up when you’re dining at a fast food restaurant:

• A 12-ounce soda contains up to 40g of added sugar; a 64-ounce soda about 200g of sugar, or more than 5 days’ worth.
• A medium shake contains about 45g of added sugar.
• McDonald's Hotcakes and Sausage contains 46g of sugar.
• A large side of coleslaw at Popeye’s contains 45g of sugar.
• Wendy’s Apple Pecan Chicken salad contains 40g of sugar.

When you opt to eat at a fast food chain, try to plan ahead if possible and eat low sugar in the meals leading up to and following your fast food meal. You can minimize some of the damage by requesting salad dressing on the side, limiting ketchup, eating subs, burgers or sandwiches open-faced, and skipping dips or sides that are packed with sugar.