Is Home Cooking Truly Healthier Than Restaurant Meals?

[Moonbear]

One restaurant meal will last me three days. I agree with Monique, the stuff is always swimming in butter. But I like butter.

I only think that's true with the "cheap" restaurants (not to say the prices are exactly inexpensive in them, but Outback and similar type restaurants are not a "fine dining" experience...they serve a steak for one that's larger than what we cooked to feed a family of 4 when I was still living home). As I mentioned before, if you go to a very nice restaurant, one known for quality of food, not quantity, you'll have a very different experience. Each course is rather small...sometimes it even looks funny to have just a few tiny slices of meat in the center of a huge plate. But, that's all you need if you're eating 5 or 7 courses, just a few bites from each course so that by the time you get to dessert and coffee, you can still savor it and walk away satisfied but not stuffed.

Usually after eating the salad I'm full and can't even get to my entree, so I always end up eating it cold the next day.

It USED to be a trick that they'd serve you a big salad so they could get away with a small main course (salad is cheap, beef expensive), since you were already full. I'm not sure when it switched that the chain restaurants started serving giant main courses and didn't stop serving the giant salad before it. If I'm going to a chain restaurant, I usually just skip the salad course unless it's included in the price of the meal, then I just nibble at it, but don't finish it...it's always iceberg lettuce anyway - might as well just have another glass of water for all the nutrition that provides.

 

[Astronuc]

Apparently on average, Americans eat nearly twice as much as they should, and they eat too much refined grains, sugar and fat.

http://www.ers.usda.gov/publications/FoodReview/DEC2002/frvol25i3a.pdf

Excercise can not make up for a horrible diet. You can not burn several thousands of kcal through exercise each day. Maby 600-700 if you are active.

It really depends on the excercise. Playing soccer or bicycle riding or swimming for prolonged periods can burn several thousand calories. However, most people do not engage in such activities.

Anyway, exercise does not make up for a bad diet.

 

[Monique]

Mmmm, butter... I love American restaurants. I defiantly prefer them over European ones

I always go for authentic asian restaurants, cannot go wrong there. I had the best classic chinese stew today in a restaurant, it came in a small bowl and I ordered a small bowl of soup with it. No big salads. Best thing I tasted in a while.

 

[chroot]

You can not burn several thousands of kcal through exercise each day. Maby 600-700 if you are active.

Of course you can. Each day that I ride my bike to work (around a 32 mile round trip), I burn approximately 1400 kcal. When I'm pedaling as hard as I reasonably can, keeping a heart rate above 160 beats per minute, I can easily burn a thousand calories an hour. It's not that hard to burn off a thousand calories. I burn 50-70 calories per mile at 20+ mph.

I've done several 100+ mile bike rides and burned more 5,000 kcal for each one.

And yes, I'm using a heart rate monitor on the bike; I'm not just guessing.

- Warren

 

[Azael]

Of course you can. Each day that I ride my bike to work (around a 32 mile round trip), I burn approximately 1400 kcal. When I'm pedaling as hard as I reasonably can, keeping a heart rate above 160 beats per minute, I can easily burn a thousand calories an hour. It's not that hard to burn off a thousand calories. I burn 50-70 calories per mile at 20+ mph.

I've done several 100+ mile bike rides and burned more 5,000 kcal for each one.

And yes, I'm using a heart rate monitor on the bike; I'm not just guessing.

- Warren

well keeping a pace where you burn 1000 kcal/hour for extended timeperiods is far out of reach for most. I could not do it and I am fit above avarage(strenght athlete though, not at all a endurance athlete) I assume you have a lot of experience with endurance training?
When I am at it at the stairmaster I burn roughly 300kcal in 12 minutes. But I would be half dead doing that for a hour.

I was talking about avarage people, I should have specified that. I meant something a avarage person can do daily. I doubt most avarage people burn more than 700kcal tops when they train and very few have time or most importantly motivation to do that 7 times a week.

I would not even recommend anyone to try to burn more than at most 1000 kcal/day through endurance training since I personaly feel it is a much better way to cut down bodyfat by trying to improve muscle mass. To much cardio doesn't go hand in hand very well with increasing muscle mass. Slow twitch fibers doesn't have much growth potential.

I feel my point still stands firmly. Cardio can not balance out a poor diet. Unless we talk about extrem amounts and those that do those ammounts of cardio are usualy smart enough not to stuff themself with bigmac's everyday.
Everything revolves around what you put into your mouth.

 

[chroot]

Azael,

I agree that you can't eat slop and then try to exercise yourself to death to counteract it. I agree that poor diets are hard on the liver, kidneys, and other organs.

I disagree that an average person can work their way up to 1000 kcal/hr exercise. From the time that I began biking, it probably took me about two months to get to the point where I can maintain 160+ bpm heart rate indefinitely, which burns about 1000 kcal/hr. I'm no elite cyclist by any means. I'm probably in the 60th-70th percentile among (recreational) competitive cyclists.

It sounds to me like you're hitting the stair master a bit too hard. The highest heart-rate that I can maintain indefinitely is about 175 bpm. Anything over 185 bpm (which would correspond to about 1400 kcal/hr) is not sustainable for me. That's above my lactate threshold, and I end up taking about five minutes to recover from even a brief sprint above 190 bpm. I strongly suggest that people use a heart rate monitor for any kind of cardiovascular exercise -- they make a remarkable difference. And, you're right, the vast majority of people are not physically capable of sustaining more than 1000 kcal/hr without enormous amounts of lactate-threshold training, which is pretty much hell on earth.

- Warren

 

[Moonbear]

Of course, the people who are exercising enough to burn 1000 kcal/hr are generally not the ones engorging themselves on fat-laden, oversized portions in restaurants.

 

[chroot]

Of course, the people who are exercising enough to burn 1000 kcal/hr are generally not the ones engorging themselves on fat-laden, oversized portions in restaurants.

You'd be surprised how much I can eat after two hours on the bike.

- Warren

 

[Mk]

I can easily burn a thousand calories an hour. It's not that hard to burn off a thousand calories.

Wow. That sounds unhealthy. To me, that sounds just as a bad as eating several big macs. If you are on a standard 2,000 kcal diet, and bike like that for two hours... how much energy do you have left? A few days with only one hour of biking and 2,000 kcal/day, you're a dead man.

I know you don't eat that little during biking like that, but that seems too close to death to me.

 

[Moonbear]

Wow. That sounds unhealthy. To me, that sounds just as a bad as eating several big macs. If you are on a standard 2,000 kcal diet, and bike like that for two hours... how much energy do you have left? A few days with only one hour of biking and 2,000 kcal/day, you're a dead man.

I know you don't eat that little during biking like that, but that seems too close to death to me.

Why do you assume he isn't increasing his caloric intake sufficiently to make up for the energy burned with biking, especially given the post directly above yours where he references the amount of food he eats after biking?

 

[Azael]

Azael,

I agree that you can't eat slop and then try to exercise yourself to death to counteract it. I agree that poor diets are hard on the liver, kidneys, and other organs.

I disagree that an average person can work their way up to 1000 kcal/hr exercise. From the time that I began biking, it probably took me about two months to get to the point where I can maintain 160+ bpm heart rate indefinitely, which burns about 1000 kcal/hr. I'm no elite cyclist by any means. I'm probably in the 60th-70th percentile among (recreational) competitive cyclists.

It sounds to me like you're hitting the stair master a bit too hard. The highest heart-rate that I can maintain indefinitely is about 175 bpm. Anything over 185 bpm (which would correspond to about 1400 kcal/hr) is not sustainable for me. That's above my lactate threshold, and I end up taking about five minutes to recover from even a brief sprint above 190 bpm. I strongly suggest that people use a heart rate monitor for any kind of cardiovascular exercise -- they make a remarkable difference. And, you're right, the vast majority of people are not physically capable of sustaining more than 1000 kcal/hr without enormous amounts of lactate-threshold training, which is pretty much hell on earth.

- Warren

Om doing a variation of HIIT(High intensity intervall training)on the stairmaster. What I have read about HIIT suggests that it is the most efficient way to increase endurance. Not sure if that is true but its fun and time efficient(I do it right after my weightlifting) :)

Most of my fatburning I do by regular walking. I walk 1,5 hours each day. Nothing like a long walk to calm the mind down

The rule of thumb in bodybuilding circles to burn fat is to stay betwen 75%-85% of max heart rate so that would be around 160 for me aswell. To bad that I have never dished out the cash for a heart rate monitor

If I sometime seem a bit defensive/offensive in my posts in this thread its just a bad habit, I am a moderator at a fitness forum so I have been discussing these things for years and years.

 

[Astronuc]

Each day that I ride my bike to work (around a 32 mile round trip), I burn approximately 1400 kcal. When I'm pedaling as hard as I reasonably can, keeping a heart rate above 160 beats per minute, I can easily burn a thousand calories an hour. It's not that hard to burn off a thousand calories. I burn 50-70 calories per mile at 20+ mph.

I've done several 100+ mile bike rides and burned more 5,000 kcal for each one.

When I was in university - I'd run about 3 miles a day, play soccer, ride my bike just about everywhere. During summers and holidays, I'd work construction (structural steel). I could easily burn 4000-5000 cal. I would have to eat about 1 kg of food a day to maintain weight.

Since I am older, and somewhat less active, I don't need to eat as much, but when I do gardening or start playing sports, I have to increase my food intake.

One has to be conditioned to be able to sustain a pace in which one would burn 1000 cal/hr.

I stay with a friend when I visit San Diego. We used to go to a gym for weightlifting and running on treadmill or stationary cycle. I used to max out the treadmill at 10 mph for several minutes, and my pulse rate would max out at 130 bpm.

I would not even recommend anyone to try to burn more than at most 1000 kcal/day through endurance training since I personaly feel it is a much better way to cut down bodyfat by trying to improve muscle mass. To much cardio doesn't go hand in hand very well with increasing muscle mass. Slow twitch fibers doesn't have much growth potential.

I don't necessarily agree with this assertion. With a proper combination of weight training, stretching and cardio one can add muscle mass and endurance (improve cardio efficiency). This is the approach I used 30 years ago, when I did weight training and construction (mentioned above).

I increased my body weight by about 10 kgs to 80 kgs, and I was lifting (military) more than 110 kgs with reps of 100 kgs, and on bench press I was doing about 140-150 kgs). At the same time, I was running long distance 3-5 miles daily, with the last quarter mile at full sprint, and riding a bicycle.

Stretching is really important!

 

[Azael]

I don't necessarily agree with this assertion. With a proper combination of weight training, stretching and cardio one can add muscle mass and endurance (improve cardio efficiency). This is the approach I used 30 years ago, when I did weight training and construction (mentioned above).

I increased my body weight by about 10 kgs to 80 kgs, and I was lifting (military) more than 110 kgs with reps of 100 kgs, and on bench press I was doing about 140-150 kgs). At the same time, I was running long distance 3-5 miles daily, with the last quarter mile at full sprint, and riding a bicycle.

Stretching is really important!

Again I was to unspecific
I should have mentioned not burning over 1000kcal/day through cardio while on a fat loss diet. I am so used to talking about conditions during a kcal restricted diet that I by habit leave it as unsaid but understood on the board I browse. If you gained 10kg I assume you where eating atleast 500kcal above maintanance(including the kcal burned during cardio into the maintanance).
Offcourse the kcal and macronutrient ammounts can be tweaked to allow it. That I agree with 100%.

Doing a excess of cardio and a lot of weightlifting during kcal restricted diet can screw up the body royaly. I did the misstake once myself and it took me 5 months to get back on track again.

Imo its better and easier to maintain strenght and muscle on a restricted kcal diet if using the absolut minimum of cardio nessecary to boost fatloss.
Using some high intensity cardio aids a lot in explosive strenght gains. But to much long distance cardio will hinder strenght gain.
Especialy since the body want to convert muscle fibers into slow twich fibers because of endurance training and into fast twitch fibers from strenght training. Fast twitch fibers are what is used in explosive/strenght movements. If someone wants to maximise strenght and muscle tissue gains long distance endurance training should be avoided.

That is a very respectable benchpress for that bodyweight :) and the militarypress is awsome.
What kind of style of training did you use? Was it a more bodybuilding style routine or was it more of a powerlifting routine?? I would love to know your entire layout both cardio and weightlifting if you remember it and have patience to write it up

Best I have done is 140kg in the bench at 84kg bodyweight. I am more of a deadlifter/puller though. I am a very poor in all pressing exercises mostly because of my very poor shoulder strenght(triceps are by far my dominant pressing muscle).

How many kilometers is 3-5 miles? Around 4-7 kilometers right?? When I speak of long distance I usualy mean running more than 8-10 kilometers.
Doing 3-4 kilometer runs and periodicaly switching pace from slow pace run to sprints would be a very good way of doing a HIIT sessions. I would do it myself if my knees would allow it

I have split feelings about stretching. I stretch some for safety reasons but not to much. Many powerlifters avoid stretching(atleast as a wamup) because(they claim) a stretched muscle is not as strong as a unstretched(but warm offcourse) muscle. I have noticed that myself but might be just mental.

 

[Astronuc]

How many kilometers is 3-5 miles? Around 4-7 kilometers right?? When I speak of long distance I usualy mean running more than 8-10 kilometers.

3 - 5 miles is ~5-9 km. I also did sprints on a bicycle, which in combination with squats can build very strong leg muscles (thigh and quadraceps).

Doing 3-4 kilometer runs and periodicaly switching pace from slow pace run to sprints would be a very good way of doing a HIIT sessions. I would do it myself if my knees would allow it

Consider wearing knee braces for those times when the knees are stressed.

I have split feelings about stretching. I stretch some for safety reasons but not to much. Many powerlifters avoid stretching(atleast as a wamup) because(they claim) a stretched muscle is not as strong as a unstretched(but warm offcourse) muscle. I have noticed that myself but might be just mental.

In my experience, stetching alone tends to increase muscle strength (by 10-20%). I never had bulging muscles. I prefer to retain full and maximum range for arms and legs. I also did Tae Kwon Do, briefly Karate, and recently some Kung Fu/ Kempo which are also good exercises for strength and cardio fitness, as well as relaxing.

I prefer strength to size, so I trained for maximum strength-to-mass ratio.