[00:00:00] Welcome to the UFFDA! podcast, hosted by Emily O'Connor and Jordan Rudolph. The UFFDA! podcast brings you a surprisingly fresh take on everyday topics in health, fitness, and everything in between. We want to open the door to explore new information and new solutions in a way that's easy for you to understand and apply to your own life.
Let's get into today's episode.
Hello everybody. Welcome back to the UFFDA! podcast. I'm Jordan Rudolph. And I'm Emily Morris. We're happy to be with you and this week we are talking, uh, a little bit more about nutrition, not a little bit more, a lot more about nutrition 'cause it's been a minute.
Uh, very, very long minute as we were [00:01:00] coming up with today's topic.
Then I was thinking about it last night prior to knowing we were recording this today, realizing that it's been, you know, since September that we recorded an all nutrition episode. We've obviously woven it in, but not, uh, not in a little while since we dove in fully to just the nutrition side.
Yes. So after we figured out what we were talking about, which is again, dining smart, eating well at restaurants is the name of the title.
Uh, at the time of this recording, it is pre-master weekend, so as your time of listening, it is post-Masters weekend if you are a golf person. Um, obviously this is kind of like that first weekend of the year in terms of the golf season where it kind of launches golf. Mm-hmm. So a lot of people are excited about that and I, I view it as like more so like the, the weekend that officially starts spring in my head.
Um, so that means no more snow after, after this. Like anytime, any, any, not just this year, but any year. Yes. Um, but as we're going into this, we, we also are announcing a couple of different things. [00:02:00] First of all, uh, I'll say thank you for you listeners on here and everybody, uh, else out there who voted Unity Fitness as the number one gym in La Crosse.
And do you have anything you want to add? Number one over there.
I will say thank you for voting for me as the number one personal trainer in La Crosse County. So really cool, really grateful for the support through the voting, um, but also just in general as well.
Yeah, super cool deal. Super big deal. Yeah.
Um, we probably won't be able to. Uh, perhaps make the announcement for this on the podcast, but we are gonna throw one hell of a raging party at some point in the near future, um, probably to celebrate that and then do another one for being in business in 10 years. Yeah. Because we're approaching 10 years, I think, almost, almost to the day of this airing as you're listening to it, uh, wherever you are and whoever you are.
It has been almost 10 years since I got the keys for this building. Mm. [00:03:00] So coming up, uh, it's, it's next week. Yeah, I think it's like the 14th or 15th, 16th, something like that. So very, very close. Um, for April, uh, will be our 10 year mark where we first, uh, signed the lease and got the keys and we started ripping this building apart.
Um, and with that, we're also making the announcement, and we don't want you to get everything up in a bundle. We'll be back, but we're gonna take a little break after season four here of the UFFDA! podcast before we gear up for season five, or whatever the heck we call our next season.
Yep. We just keep. I would say just continue on, but we'll, we'll see what the, what the time brings when we get there.
But we'll have another couple weeks here, uh, together with new episodes each week. And then just taking a little bit of, bit of a breather similar to how we've done in previous seasons where just kind of regroup, revamp, and kind of see, see what is to come, uh, and where the direction of the UFFDA! podcast goes.
Like Jordan said, we are not going anywhere. Uh, we will be back. It's just in what form you might see us.
Mm-hmm. [00:04:00] And great time for you to go back and look at like the other 120.
Uh, it's a hundred and I think this will be 123 or 124.
Okay. Really close to Yeah. And 122 or three other episodes start back from the beginning.
Um, but we, uh, we're moving in today about dining well. How to eat well, uh, when you're out to restaurants, how to eat well, when you're out to eat when you're traveling. This goes in, in the case of those circumstances as well. Um, this ends up being a lot more of, you know, when we, obviously, when we work with people that travel, this comes into play.
But obviously there's, uh, as us being Americans like, and, and particularly in American culture, like going out to eat is a thing that is done through reward and through social connection, um, as it is in other cultures. But Americans in particular, emphasis on that for many meals, not just like one in particular.
Um, and it's also for people that travel a [00:05:00] lot for, for not just like, for leisure or, but also for work. Mm-hmm. And, and this comes up quite often. Um, very, very easy also in our American culture to get caught off guard because you are out to eat a lot. Our portions in the US are extremely large compared to literally everybody else in the world.
Um, there also tends to be a lot more processed and. Um, synthetic foods available that to make the, make the, the going out or making the food at these restaurants cheaper so that when we go out, we don't have to spend as much money. So we're, we're dealing with large portions. Um, we're dealing with cheaper, we're dealing with specials and deals, we're dealing with alcohol and drinks and very high calorie containing beverages.
And we're also dealing with usually either, um, very like. Uh, like time sensitive things. And what I mean by that is that we are either being pushed to get in and out so people can get the seats taken care of and turned around [00:06:00] as fast, or the tables taken care of and turned around as fast as possible so they can get as many orders in in the night as they can.
Or you're gonna go through a multi-course meal where you are being overserved and overindulging for a long period of time. Mm-hmm. So those are our three big factors, uh, outside of just the obvious ones of convenience and scientists. Doing whatever they can to make foods more tempting and, and, and, uh, craving for us than ever before.
Mm-hmm. Well, and there's, like you're saying, there's so many of these variables to contend with. As we go out to eat and going out to eat or sharing a meal is such a large part of our culture in celebratory things, right as it is in many others as well. But a lot of our celebrations tend to revolve them self around some sort of meal, typically some sort of meal that isn't always the most nutrient dense of options, if you will.
[00:07:00] Right? Like. Thinking, birthdays, parties celebrating, right? All the good things and necessary celebrations to happen, but always revolving around food. So as we navigate these situations and as we go out to eat and we share meals with other people, or maybe it's just more of a convenience like ourselves, then we start to, you know, weed our way through and kind of decide.
What is the best option for me? What is the choice I should be making? And having a set of guidelines and a rule, kind of a list or criteria to perhaps to follow or to keep in mind might be one of the better things you can have going into it. Right? Being better prepared for tackling that situation as it arises and knowing some of this information before, if it's the first time you're hearing that, you know, there's a lot of synthetic ingredients in foods that eat out.
For, you know, sake of pricing or convenience, like maybe that's something that you're just learning now for the first time, which is totally possible, probably [00:08:00] not as if you're an avid listener of the UFFDA! podcast, but maybe, um, and knowing that information can be powerful, it can allow you to make decisions and decisions that align with what your end result in your end outcome is
a a hundred percent.
And. The second thing I said was about how we celebrate a lot of things going out or we, we, in America, we tend to just go out to eat more often 'cause of the convenience factors there. Um, but you nailed it right there in in terms of like, we do it for celebrations, we do it for different social events and, and occasions.
Um, so understanding then all that being said, taking that next approach that you just said there and for the people of proactivity mm-hmm. Like, like how can you be better prepared or how can you be more proactive? On to help you stay on track when you go out, uh, because it is so easy to, uh, increase calorie.
Like if the, the, the apps out there are getting better at this MyFitnessPal macro factor, lose it, all of 'em. Mm-hmm. Um, where you can, you can look up the calories of a specific meal at certain [00:09:00] restaurants. Um, some restaurants are actually showing the calories on the menu now too. Mm-hmm. Some of them are not, and some of 'em are not on purpose.
Well, and I think that's, it has to do with a mandate as a result of that. I don't remember the exact specifics, but I remember something learning about it. Yeah. Um, and I wanna say it was by like 2025 or 2026 where chain restaurants are required. Um, and then it's some of the smaller ones, they don't have to.
Yeah. Like there's a scale scale to that too. I know there's
something out there. Mm-hmm. Um. But when we look at that, you can obviously then make a choice from calorie wise, but they're not changing their meals to do that. Right? They're just being semi-transparent. Uh, and remember that calories are averages.
They're not a hundred percent true. They, they're, they're, they're, statistically, they're, they're not a hundred percent accurate. Um, so understand that could be eating more, could be eating less. Mm-hmm. But that's kind of the average and when we think about those things, you going out to eat, you're more likely.
[00:10:00] I, I, I can't give you a statistic. I know I like to in a lot of these things, but you are way more likely to go overboard on calories faster and, and, and probably almost like doubling or tripling the amount of calories that you think you are eating when going out to eat. Mm-hmm. Regardless of the restaurant, just because of the way things are set up.
For sure. Well, it's all the sneaky calories, right? How they're cooking it, what they're adding, spices, sauces, those types of things that maybe not so much spices, but definitely sauces, all the extras, the oils, all of those mm-hmm. Can kind of be hidden throughout that you might not even notice you're consuming because you don't see it.
Right. So let's just think. If you went out, let's just say, for easy, super easy math. Um, you were trying to average 2000 calories a day, and you do that five days a week really well, where we're, where maybe some days you were at 2200, some days you're at 1800, but 2000 average, we go out to eat and you're still maintaining your 2000 average day during the week, but then you have, uh, something out maybe Friday night, maybe Saturday night, and then maybe you go out for breakfast one of the [00:11:00] days or lunch one of the days, and, and then you, and, and you're done with it.
If you're going like maybe 3,500 calories, then on one of those, or on two of those days. You now just took your, your thousand, or sorry, your, um, 2000 calories a day that you were averaging on five days a week. And we add in those other days. Uh, just to give you an example, you just bumped up your average by over 400 calories a day just from those two meals.
Mm-hmm. Just to give you an example, I think I've seen statistics out there. Before this, and I don't remember what they're right now, like what the average calorie consumption is for like each fast food meal and each dining meal. I, I know I've seen like ballparks, but it's, it's probably so hard that they probably don't have an accurate depiction.
Right? But it's so easy to go up in calories and what happens is we underestimate, we drastically underestimate what we think we're eating. And then if you add in the drinks on top of it, this is just food we're talking, right? You add in the drinks on top of it. Now we're, we're, we're, we're going 200, 300, [00:12:00] 400 calories per drink.
You're having multiple drinks, like this stuff adds up really quick. Mm-hmm. And this, this blows your average, repeat this entirely. It annihilates what we're trying to accomplish.
Yeah. And again, it's the things that you don't really realize. I did a quick Google, so I can't verify the accuracy of this information, but, uh, results among adolescents.
Uh, adults, adolescents and school age children, the average calories per meal were 836 calories, 756 calories, and 7 33 calories respectively. So that's among all age ranges is still falling within that.
Yeah.
Which is also astounding from a kids' standpoint. We didn't even even touch on that kids. Yeah. Yeah.
Um, and I'll look into this more and include some links as we, we post this, uh, but it falls right in line. With what you were saying, uh, there in terms of, it's super easy to bump those up when we're thinking. You [00:13:00] know, even three meals a day, average of 2000 calories a day. One of, plus the snacks, right? So that, that's not an even divide by three there.
But if an average meal is 836 calories, even call it 800 for easy math, that's a very large meal there. And a very large chunk of calories that if even your other meals are smaller is going to bump that. Mm-hmm. Without much. Much effort there.
And keep in mind, most restaurants are not building a, a meal for quality satiation purposes.
They're not doing it to make it balanced, really well balanced for you. Some are, but most are not. Most of 'em are doing it to indulge in our American cuisine and, and, and American food culture flavors and stack things together. So as we're, as we're, um, prefacing all of this information of now how to eat well, we understand.
Our point to this is that there's a lot stacked against you. [00:14:00] If you're going out to eat and going out to eat often, or just out to eat in general, it's hard to stay on track. This is why the people that have the best success are usually either A, being proactive, B, they're looking at the menus of these places ahead of time.
C, they're not going out to eat very much, or D, they're following this restaurant ordering system that we're about to share with you.
Absolutely.
So you have no more excuses now. Some of this is understanding that it will come off as you being slightly inconvenient for the potentially waiting staff, especially if you've got an asshole waiter or waitress and maybe a cook or chef.
But highly doubtful if you're, especially if you're gonna somewhere semi nicer. Um, but when you go out to eat, you gotta understand like they're there to serve you and you have to understand that the restaurant's menu is built on recipes or designed to sell. But that doesn't mean that's the only thing that they make or can make.
[00:15:00] So basically our rule number one is, uh, there are some exceptions, but virtually every restaurant menu can be modified in some way, shape, form, or order to fit your healthy lifestyle. Mm-hmm. Usually, yes, you're gonna have to make exceptions. Yes. You might have to, to ask a little bit and dig a little bit, but this is where you can do some research, get educated, like listening to the UFFDA! podcast and then figure this out going forward.
Well, like you're saying, the menu is designed to appeal to sell to the average person. Right. And when we're thinking, talked about it before with the average portion sizes of in the United States, but if we're eating as the average American Eats, and we've talked about the standard American diet previously on this podcast, right.
But if we want to deviate from that, we will have to deviate also from the menu as well. Right? And this is where some of that yes, can be inconvenient, but it's also, and you'll learn a little bit more as we go, and maybe you already know some of [00:16:00] this. It's also not that challenging to do so, right? It might be a little easy swap that can save so many calories or put you in a better position or reduce an oil that you don't necessarily want to consume, and it's not hard to do.
It just requires you to ask the question. Which might feel a little bit uncomfortable upfront if you haven't done it before or if you don't know what to ask, which is hopefully the question we're answering as we build on our rules and system here.
I mean, there's a lot of people that we work with that have better success by ordering.
Like looking at the menu, but not ordering the specific menu option, but ordering the different foods that they see on the menu. Mm-hmm. Right. They, they have great success off of that.
If you have a salad, you can, you know, they have some sort of greens or lettuce, you could order greens or lettuce hundred percent.
So you can, again, not totally mix and match sometimes, but sometimes you can totally mix and match.
And remember we said virtually every restaurant we can do this at. Right. But [00:17:00] very, very likely you can there. Here's, like more and more people are being diagnosed, um, with food sensitivities or allergies. So a lot of these restaurants you'll see now more than ever, are coming out with different options, gluten-free options, vegan options, whatever it is.
So they, they are available to do this. They, and do you have any food sensitivities?
I am sensitive to gluten,
yes. So you have to watch out for gluten. Mm-hmm. Otherwise, you know what's gonna happen. Yep. I am newly, newly found sensitive to eggs. So now I. The, my number one favorite meal ever to go out to eat was for breakfast.
I still can, I still can have eggs, but I'm gonna have a bad day or two afterwards. Um, and it's gonna happen quick. So devastated, crushed all the things, whatever. But now, even when I go out to eat, I have to ask 'cause there egg in that sauce. If I get, if I have a free meal where I'm not worried about so much about calories this time because I've, I've prepared for it.
I've, I've, I've, I've essentially been proactive and I've worked around this. Um, but if I'm getting like a. [00:18:00] A burger and their secret sauce like, Hey, I, what's the secret sauce? I can either ask for it on the side or I can say, you know what, I'll just take ketchup and mustard, right, and go from there. So a lot of these menus are also posting their allergens or their sensitivities on the menus as well.
We're getting better, but again, at the same time, especially with the introduction of GLP ones, which are now in America, and over 6 million people are using as of 2024, and they're expecting it to double or if not triple this year. Scientists are getting better at creating foods that actually counteract the effects of GLP one.
Even if it said what you, you heard this? I just read this article. Yes. Even if it says the GLP ones are meant to have you reduce cravings, well guess who's already making sure that food becomes more crable?
Food manufacturers probably
the same ones that are spending the money to also market GLP ones, by the way.
Also that,
but fuck us.
Well, three episodes left. Sure. You
gonna do cancel me?
Make sure we'll tap with you. Yeah. Explicit one on this one, um,
[00:19:00] explicit. And you can also beep that out if you want.
Anyway, uh, as we go into this, then we're, again, that was
for you, Tim,
from the beginning and an uphill battle against so many of these different things.
So coming in prepared, knowing what questions to ask is one of the best things we can do when a lot of things are starting to be. Stacked in our favor or against our favor, excuse me. We need to come in equally prepared. Mm-hmm. So as we're navigating, again, some of the more palatable foods, whatever, making choices that align with our goals and keeping our overall goals in mind as well.
Like what is the end result that you want to have, Jordan just reference, like, if it is a free meal, cool. Enjoy the heck. Like, order whatever you want on the menu. Enjoy the heck out of it. Right. But if it is something where you're like, gosh, I have. Multiple dinners out. I'm, you know, traveling for a week. I need to kind of be mindful in some areas.
Awesome. Like, this is where some of these might come into more of a play. [00:20:00] Um, and kinda leads us into rule number two of like, you don't necessarily have to eat when you're out and that comes in to play with a lot of these work things or a lot of. Some of the trips or extended time away, you can always wait till you get home or back to a hotel.
Right. You don't have to eat at every opportunity for which there is food available to you. No is a complete sentence. You can say, no thank you, I'm good. Right?
So you don't have to, you don't have to eat everything or you have to eat when you're out, nor do you have to eat everything. Mm-hmm. You can also portion things out.
You can ask for it to go box right away. Put that half, whatever it is, portion size out into the decco box, close the lid. You would be amazed at how well that, that, that works in helping you manage portions. Mm-hmm. That's a huge thing. You can also ask the waiter, waitress, can you grill, bake or steam that?
Okay. So when you're ordering food at [00:21:00] restaurants, especially with like different proteins or vegetables, you can always ask that. You can skip fats altogether if you'd like to. You can ask for things on the side so they're not overloading your salad with a gallon of ranch dressing. Uh, you can also pick out certain amounts of foods that you want right away too, uh, and then you can ask for vegetables and carbs and things like that.
Also, what are they being cooked in? You can ask to see if there's a different oil specifically, like a better type, like of olive oil or avocado oil to cook in as well, not canola or. The processed butter stuff that they used, that is diabolical as well. Um, and then again, if you're really stuck in a pinch, you can use your hand as a portion guide.
Mm-hmm. So this has been, we've talked about this a few times.
Yeah. I think we've, we probably have a full episode. We'll see if I can find it.
We might. So your palm is a protein, so the size of your palm is a protein, a deck of cards. Uh, your [00:22:00] thumb is a fat, but remember, you can always skip the fats when you're out to eat, especially because you're probably having a lot of foods cooked in it anyway.
Uh, your fist is carbohydrate and essentially your fist is also vegetables. So for females, usually we say one palm of protein, one fist of carb, one thumb of fat. And vegetables, depending on how they're cooked, you can do two or more. Mm-hmm. Like, but you usually, vegetables are pretty easy to kick, uh, eat and consume, especially if they're steamed.
'cause there's not a lot of calories to 'em For sure. Um, for males, we essentially double all of those. So it's twos of everything. Um, and you can make that pretty easy. But a lot of this stuff, what we're, what we're essentially recommending here is you have options. I, we don't want you, the last thing we want you to do.
A, we're being proactive. We're looking at the menu ahead of time. Again, we're preparing for what was happening. We understand that we can say, no, we don't have to eat. We can portion things out right away. We can get things to go even though we ordered it. But the last thing we want you to do when you feel like you're going out to eat is feeling like you shouldn't [00:23:00] be having a good time or feeling stuck.
Mm-hmm. So what we're trying to do is give you better ways and ordering system to get you unstuck, to help you with all of this. Mm-hmm.
Well, and, and we've said it time and time again, but coming in with that unstuck mentality of not feeling. Pigeonholed into ordering what's on the menu, recognizing that there are other options available to you, and how you navigate that and find those options can un maybe reveal is a better word, reveal what the better choice is, what the best choice is for you in your specific situation.
And there might be times you lean on this. And there are other, might be times that you don't, but allowing yourself to see both sides of the situation instead of feeling like you don't have a choice. Instead of feeling like you are only able to do one thing and one thing only. And that is order off the menu.
Go out to eat. Be subject to your environment. Be the victim of [00:24:00] your environment instead of taking control over the situation. And you dictating how that situation plays out for you and what the outcome of that is for you and for no one else in that situation.
And that's what ultimately comes back to, right?
Like what you were kind of saying there. And what we're saying is no one, no one's at like with so many different options surrounding us and peer pressure, which we didn't even talk about in this episode, and understanding that part of it. Like no one's saying, Hey, let's go out to eat so we can smash these, uh.
I shouldn't say that. Sometimes we're saying, go out to eat and let's have a couple of these buttered old fashions beforehand. Um, but very rarely are they, are they saying, let's, let's, like, we're here for the butter old fashions. We're here because we have you here. We're here together. We're here for the connection.
We're here for the social element. Um, I think the last thing that I was gonna add on here is eat slowly. If you are gonna eat, it's, it's crazy if you guys go outta the country, especially if you go to like Europe. Um. [00:25:00] Or, or maybe even somewhere like Mexico and, and, and, and, uh, Caribbean. But certainly in Europe, everything's slower over there.
Americans hate how slow it is, but people do this and they take hours to go eat. They're not trying to get out in 45 minutes and get to your next thing. Uh, and you're also not spending loads and loads and loads of money. Like sometimes you have to beg for the bill just to leave. Mm-hmm. But they expect you to be there.
They expect you to hang out. Take your time, eat slowly. They'll let you know if you have to go. Mm-hmm. As long as you're paying though you are a patron, you have the right to have the seat, you have the right to be there for that, that part of it. Um, so eat slowly is my last little piece on there
for sure.
I think I only know one place in LA Cross that has a like time limit, but it's two and a half hours, right? Even they're not gonna make you leave. Like two and a half hours is plenty of time to eat slowly and enjoy your meal. Enjoy the company. Instead of, you know, the 45 minutes or the as fast as possible and onto the next thing of a lot that we, we [00:26:00] have here in America.
A hundred percent. So
as always, thank you guys so much for tuning into this week's episode of the UFFDA! Podcast. Share this with someone who you think will find it valuable. Leave us a rating or review, subscribe. Download all the things that help us grow organically, and we'll catch you in the next episode.
Bye everybody.
Thanks everyone.
