We are a nation where obesity is an ever present and growing problem (no pun intended). And why shouldn’t we be? Fast food restaurants are everywhere, and often offer low cost (and low nutrition) meals that “taste great” and cost little money. But fast food isn’t the only problem, and certainly aren’t the worst offenders. Chain restaurants like Applebee’s, TGI Friday’s, Chili’s and more all are serving up disgusting amounts of calories per meal.

An article in Time describes some efforts by the government (federal) to force these restaurants to display calorie information beside items on their menu. The idea being that knowing that you’re eating 75% of your recommended daily caloric intake would make you think twice about it. It also throws out some interesting figures – such as the Tripple Whopper with Cheese from Burger King, which has 1,250 calories. That’s over HALF of your daily recommended intake. But, for those of you who would think to yourself “I’ll just go to a sit-down family restaurant, that’s gotta be healthier!” – try out the Quesadilla Burger from Applebee’s – a whopping 1,440 calories (nearly 75% of your daily recommended caloric intake), or the fried macaroni and cheese from the Cheesecake Factory, which comes in at an astounding 1,570 calories (along with a disgusting 69 grams of saturated fat – which Time helpfully points out is more than you should eat in a 3.5 day period). It honestly makes me seriously consider avoiding eating out as much as possible.

You see, I am not immune to this poison we call the restaurant industry today. Working at a technology company in Downtown Indianapolis I found myself going out to lunch pretty much every day. We’d go to places like Le Peeps, Weber Grill, PF Changs, etc. Nearly every single one of the things I would eat at those places were as bad, possibly worse, than those I list above. It’s no surprise that I gained weight ; a lot of weight. I found that eating out so much, my belt got tighter, my waist got bigger and my wallet got slimmer.

This was distressing to me, as a few years back – as those who read this blog semi-regularly may note – I gave up drinking soda, and through the course of doing that also stopped going to fast food restaurants as well. This worked amazingly well for me as I lost a lot of weight and felt much better about myself. Then I got a new job, and started going out to eat lunch on a regular basis. And so began the slowly expanding waist line.

What I’ve started doing (two weeks in and going strong) – is bring my lunch. A sandwich, some crackers of some sort, and a cup of low-fat (or sometimes even fat free) yogurt, accompanied by a 32 oz bottle of water (not bottled water, mind you, a water bottle I refill and carry around with me everywhere) provide me with a tasty lunch that is much healthier and a whole lot cheaper than going out constantly. But, taking my lunch at first made me miss out on the social aspect of going out to lunch. I also noticed that I was often not getting a break during the day as I worked through lunch. To combat that, I’ve taken to going out to lunch with my coworkers when they go (at least once or twice a week), but not ordering anything. I’m there for the company and the conversation. Then, when we get back from lunch I eat mine at my desk while I work on various things. I get the best of both worlds, and nobody has any objections.

The materials to make lunch for a week (or more) end up costing the same as just one or two lunches out…. and you can’t beat that.

I’ve noticed, over the years, that whenever I go out to eat anywhere and end up ordering a Sandwich, it comes tainted with pickle.  Sometimes it’s as relatively harmless as a pickle wedge on the plate (though some places, for some strange reason, think it’s perfectly acceptable to put that UNDER your fries….so your fries can soak in all that lovely pickle juice… ugh).   Other times pickles make an unexpected (and un-listed) appearance on the sandwich itself. 

Now – I know what a lot of you are thinking. You’re thinking “if you hate pickles so much, just order your food without one!” Which is what I do – when I know there’s a pickle involved.  The problem, and what drives me absolutely batshit crazy (apparently batshit is the epitome of crazy) is that almost NOBODY actually LISTS pickles as one of the ingredients on the sandwich (or as a side item, in the case of wedges).  Some places do – and when they do I respectfully ask for no pickle.   Half the time they respect my wishes, the other half they sneakily place the pickle under my fries.  I suspect this is a deliberate attempt by a passive aggressive waitress to piss me off.   

Anyway, most of the time there is no accounting for a pickle on the menu,  so I oft find myself cursing humanity while pulling pickles off my food.  

So why do I hate pickles so much?  The taste.  And smell.   I cannot stand either.   This makes it especially bad when I have to pull pickles off my food, as they leave their juices all behind which smells, and tastes, just as bad as the pickle (obviously), and thus makes my food smell and taste of pickles.  Ew.  This, consequently, is why hiding the pickle under my fries is almost an unforgivable sin – just ask anybody who has seen my reaction when I find something like that.

Just yesterday, at lunch, I ordered a club.   While there was no mention of pickle on the menu, I had a feeling one would rear it’s ugly head.  What I didn’t expect was that not one, but 4 pickle slices were anchored to the top of my sandwich with toothpicks – making the top piece of bread quite soggy and requiring me to perform surgery on the bread before I could eat the sandwich.   The surgery consisted of cutting the soggy parts out of the bread so I could enjoy my food free from the taint of the pickle juice.  

I wanna meet whomever decided that everyone must love pickles, and so we should put them on everything,  and punch him (or her, i’ll make an exception in this case) square in the nose.   Asshat.