Friday, March 19, 2010

Healthy Eating via Fast Food

Fridays seem to be the bane of my existence when it comes to healthy eating. It's the only day I keep the car and that means I have to drive my husband to and from work. We leave so early in the morning (he has a commute and there is always heinous traffic) that 3ft (my five-year-old) is starving by the time we drop Daddy off so we have to pick up something to eat.

3ft has an addiction. We're not proud of it and someday he'll have to go to rehab. He loves Loves LOVES the Cinnamon Melt from Mc Donalds.

So...

Every Friday morning we go to Mc Donalds so he can have one for breakfast. That's isn't so much the problem as I don't have time to eat before taking my husband to work either and I'm hungry. Mc Donalds has a LOT of healthier choices for lunch/dinner -- ie salads and grilled chicken sandwiches -- but for breakfast it's pretty much eggs, meat, cheese, and grease. The Egg McMuffin (the one with ham) has the least amount of calories sitting at 300. Three Hundred! For ONE little sandwich. Ridiculous I tell you, but that's what I get and that's ALL that I get. Then I slowly eat my lowly sandwich and watch 3ft dig into his Cinnamon Melt. To date I haven't eaten any of his. So that's something at least.

We're home for lunch so that's not a problem.

Then dinner. We have to pick up Daddy which falls during dinner time so we end up not eating and we're all hungry once we pick up my husband. 3ft is too hungry to be patient and well behaved at a "sit down" place, aka restaurant, so where do we end up?

Yep you guessed it. Fast food again.

So, I get the pleasure of scouring menus and nutritional charts looking for something halfway healthy to eat. Which isn't always the easiest thing to do when your boys (who are completely blessed with fast metabolisms and in no way need to watch what they eat ever) want Weinershnitzle or pizza or some other equally fast food that doesn't really offer healthy alternatives. I make do, though. I usually get something small and when I get home hit some of my healthier snacks if I'm still hungry.

But truth be told, I usually whine when they want that and tell them I can't eat anything at their choice so we end up at Mickey D's again because 3ft loves their cheeseburgers ( I think they lace their food with kid crack) and their salads are pretty good and not that bad for you either.

1 comment:

Melanie Hooyenga said...

I have such a hard time choosing the healthy options at fast food places. I RARELY go to them, so when I do I feel like I can get a burger and fries since I never eat there, but I don't take into consideration what I've been eating lately. You're so good!