How to Find Healthier Fast Food

Fast food is in trouble. New York started the fast food ban and now the Los Angeles city council has voted to put a one-year moratorium on new fast food restaurants in South Los Angeles. The move is controversial with some applauding the attempt to improve the health of the city's poorest residents and others concerned that fast food is all the city's poor can afford.

This new (long overdue?) trend is positive. I don't feel sorry for fast food restaurants. I'm not a fan of fast food. Most of the offerings on a fast food menu are loaded with fat and high in sodium. And while having zero tolerance for fast food and the damage it does to your body is a worthy goal, we are only human, right? What if you get stuck and your only option is fast food?

Is it possible to find something remotely healthy to eat at a fast food restaurant?

To find out, I scoured the nutritional information of meals offered at various fast food restaurants (available on the restaurants' web sites) and offer the list below.

What makes my list unique? While most lists consider calories and fat, my list considers another very important health factor - sodium.

Why does sodium matter? Because excess sodium intake is linked with high blood pressure and heart disease among other ills and according to some experts the average Western diet provides more than 5 times the recommended daily allowance of sodium.

To make the list, an item had to have less than 400 calories AND less than 500 mg sodium AND less than 50% fat (1 gram of fat = 9 calories). I prefer less than 30% fat, but I was forced to make a few allowances since this is fast food. Although technically, any number of ice cream treats met my criteria, I did not include them since, sadly, they are dessert.

Here is what you can eat if you get stuck.

Taco Bell

Fresco Crunchy Taco - 150 calories, 8 grams of fat (2.5 sat fat), 370 mg sodium
Fresco Grilled Steak Soft Taco - 160 calories, 4.5 grams fat (2.5 sat fat), 550 mg sodium.

McDonald's

Fruit 'n Yogurt Parfait - 160 calories, 2 grams fat (1 sat fat), 85 mg sodium. Note: 21 grams sugar
Premium Asian Salad (without chicken) - 150 calories, 7 grams fat (0.5- sat fat), 35 mg sodium. Get it with Newman's Own® Creamy Southwest Dressing (only 6 grams of fat and 100 calories). Yes, you could save 40-60 calories going with a low-fat dressing, but you'll double (or more) the sodium while lowering the fat just 3 grams - not a good trade. Adding chicken to this salad doubles the fat and pushes the sodium over 800 mg!

Wendy's

Sour Cream & Chives Baked Potato 320 calories, 4 grams fat (2 sat fat) 50 mgs of sodium. Note: this does have 63 grams carbs. Adding 1 container of Wendy's Buttery Best spread adds 50 calories, 5 grams of fat and 90 mgs of sodium.
4 Piece Kids' Meal Chicken Nuggets 190 calories, 12 grams fat (2 sat fat) 420 mgs of sodium. Need sauce? The Sweet & Sour Nugget Sauce is the healthiest - it adds 50 calories and 120 mgs of sodium.
Jr. Hamburger 230 calories, 8 grams fat (3 sat fat), 490 mgs of sodium. Cheese adds 40 calories, 3.5 grams of fat (2 sat fat) and 200 mgs of sodium.

Sonic

Even their wraps are sky high in sodium (most wraps are by the way) and not low on calories. If you are truly stuck get an order of French Fries - regular size - 220 calories, 9 grams fat (1.5 sat fat) and 100 mgs sodium.

Arby's

Keep on driving. Seriously. Even their kid's meals are loaded with sodium.

KFC

House Side Salad without Dressing 15 calories, zero fat, 10 mgs sodium. The Hidden Valley® The Original Ranch® Fat Free Dressing is the best they offer and while it's only 35 calories, it has a whopping 410 mgs sodium.

If you must have chicken get a Original Recipe Chicken- Drumstick - it has 130 calories, 10 grams fat (2 sat fat) and a moderate (for fried chicken) 350 mgs of sodium. You'll save some on calories and 8 grams of fat with the Chicken-Breast without skin or breading, but you'll almost double the sodium. For sides, pick corn on the cob and coleslaw. Both have negligible fat, low sodium, and add only 211 calories combined.

Jack in the Box

Side Salad - 50 calories, 3 grams fat (1.5 sat fat) 60 mg sodium. The low-fat balsamic dressing adds only 35 calories, but the spikes the sodium 480 mgs.
Fruit Cup 90 calories 5 grams of fat (0 sat fat) and 20 mg sodium. If you are really hungry, you can eat two!

Tempted to get the Ultimate Cheeseburger? It packs 1,010 calories (just over half of the recommended 2,000 calories per day diet), 71 grams of fat (the equivalent of 15 teaspoons of fat!) and 1,580 mgs sodium (healthy adults should have between 1,500 mgs and 2,400 mgs of sodium per day). No wonder it tastes so good! By the way, do you add salt to your meals? One teaspoon of table salt has 2,325 mg of sodium. With all the hidden salt in most foods, adding more salt will likely kick you over the recommended daily sodium intake.

Baja Fresh

Any of the four Original Baja Tacos are fine:
Chicken 210 calories, 5 grams fat (1 sat fat) 230 mgs sodium
Steak 230 calories, 8 grams fat, (2 sat fat), 260 mgs sodium
Carnitas 220 calories, 7 grams fat (2 sat fat), 280 mgs sodium
Shrimp 200 calories, 5 grams fat (1 sat fat), 280 mgs sodium

Grilled Mahi Mahi - 230 calories, 9 grams of fat (1.5 sat fat), 300 mgs sodium
Veggie Mix - 110 calories, 0 grams fat, 330 mgs sodium

Pizza - from anywhere

Pizza, starting with plain cheese and getting worse with each added ingredient, is loaded with fat and sodium.

Subway

Subway has a 6 grams of fat or less menu offering great 6" low fat sandwiches. While some boosted the sodium levels to unhealthy, these three are healthy alternatives.

Oven Roasted Chicken - 140 calories, 2.5 grams fat (0.5 sat fat), 400 mg sodium.
Roast Beef - 120 calories, 3.0 grams fat (1.5 sat fat), 480 mg sodium
Veggie Delite - 60 calories, 1 gram fat (0 sat fat), 75 mg sodium.

As always, watch the condiments and extras or your healthy sandwich can turn into a fat and salt nightmare very quickly.

Panda Express and Long John Silver's have enough healthy options that you could almost create a relatively healthy dinner from their menus.

Panda Express

Sweet and Sour Chicken Breast - 350 calories, 14 grams of fat (2.5 sat fat), 330 mg sodium
Chicken Egg Roll - 170 calories, 8 grams of fat (1.5 sat fat), 410 mg sodium
Cream Cheese Rangoon - 190 calories, 8 grams of fat (5 sat fat), 180 mg sodium
Steamed Rice - 380 calories, 2.5 grams of fat (0.5 sat fat), 30 mg sodium
Mixed Vegetables - 90 calories, 7 grams of fat (1 sat fat), 110 mg sodium

Get the sweet & sour sauce - all the others are sodium traps.

Long John Silvers

Baked Cod - 120 calories, 4.5 grams of fat (1 5 sat fat), 240 mgs sodium
Chicken Plank® - 140 calories, 8 grams of fat (2 sat fat), 480 mgs sodium
Lobster Stuffed Crab Cake - 170 calories, 9 grams fat (2 sat fat), 390 mgs sodium
Corn Cobbette - 90 calories, 3 grams fat (0.5 sat fat), 0 mgs sodium

Need breakfast?

Although it did not make my list because the sodium level is too high, the least offensive fast food breakfast is the Egg McMuffin®. It packs a way too high 820 mg sodium, but at 300 calories and 12 grams of fat (5 sat fat) it has the lowest calorie count and unbelievably the lowest sodium level (except for pancakes) of all the offerings at McDonald's.

Think I left one off? Probably not. Burger King, Taco Cabana, Dairy Queen, and Hardee's to name a few, all failed to have any items meeting my criteria. And Quizno's does not provide nutritional info at all!