I know so many fo us eat out..a nd some of us seemed ot be addicted ot ceratin foods and of course theer are some who are on a budget.
I am all three..........

these ae the foods that I found are easy, cheap and nutritious:

Taco Bell: Chalupa: 30 grams of carbohyadrte, but if you get the steak or chicken the protein brings it down even more. If you order it fresco style it also has less carb and fat.. i wonder if it tastes as good............

Mcdonalds: I make my won cesar salad. Get a McChicken from teh dolalr menu and a dolalr menu side salad, get the ceasar dressing and you have a 2dolalr cesar saald with grille d chciken.. instea dof the 4 or 5 for the bigger one thats not really that much bigger.

Chinese Buffets: I chose to pig out on soup. I take the eggdrop and mix it with wonton broth. I also choose plain meats and loads of veggies. Whiel rice does nto impact me, i take the fried rice as it has eggs!

Long John silvers new Baked cod......... wonderful.. but not enough COD.

do you have nay ideas///////////

I wish I *did* have ideas for this one! Unfortunately, it's not the soups that I crave at Chinese buffet. It's the stuffed mushrooms, mayo mussels, walnut chicken, and sushi. (It's a Chinese/Japanese buffet). The walnut chicken is especially bad because the white sauce on it, I'm sure is mostly mayo. I guess one idea might be to just pick up half of what your normal serving would be at one of these places.

Myhusband like sthe walnut chciken at Buffet City. Its in a cler sauce. The walnuts are turned into a flour and then extra walnustm, turbinado sugra, lemon juice are turnbed into a sauce.

I never heard of Mayo??? how interesting a combination. Now Dutch foods I know use alot of mayo.........

Ilike shahsimi,, especially salmon in saoysauce or salt water and then crusted in salt andpepper.........
I like sushi rolls, but only veggie rolls...........

Sprinmg rolls i learned to make..............
Oh and sesami chciken is awsome...........

sesami chciken is Banquet chciken chunks.. teh sauce is as follows,, 1/4 cup lemon juice, 1/2 cup turbinado or raw sugar..mixed with alittle water, some soy sauce, salt black pepper and abit of ginger, a bit of garlic. cookd for a bit. Sprinkle sesame seeds into sauce and dump chciken bites in it..

of course youc an cheat and but the powder micx,, which is a heckuva lot easier.

I've been trying to gather up recipes for my favorite buffet things, too. Some of them are difficult to find so that it tastes the same, but it doesn't stop me from trying. It's much better to be in control in my own kitchen.

My father was never one to quibble when it came to asking for restaurant recipes..
When I was inmy early teens we went to Howard Johnsons in POughkeepsie, he lov dthe cloesalw. No wheer else could they macth that recipe. So my dad asked about the recipe especially teh dressing. the manager gave my dad a can of HoJos secret coleslaw dressing. Dad went back and bought a case of it.

he then discovered dirty rice at Bojangles.... They told him that Zataraines Dirty rice or Uncle Bens drty rice is what they buy in BUlk under their own name.

We disocvered from aplace on teh web that specializes in copycat recipes form restaurants,, some resteaurants recipes and secrets. Like KFC is Good Seasons.

Some are just restaurant tricks... like those Krab coctails,, teh secret is a spice called Old Bay in teh batter and the boiling water.

So I woudl jjst ask your favorite restaurant what their ecipe is, can they sell you whatever ingredients that they use for you to read ingerdient list!

I know its avcheat but it helps.
IN chcinese restaurants,, often the manager will give you explicit recipes. so will italaian restaurants.........

like LInguini with Garlic sauce. it has tobe fresh or Muellers linguini.. then iin a hot skillet take 1/4 cup olive oil, Crushed chpped garlic.. but it has to be sweet italian garlic, rock salt, a splash of chianti, a grind of black or white epper and toss that in the hot drained lingiini. Serve that with real scampi.. which according to them is boiled shrimp placed in a dish that has 1/4 stick real salted butter, a squich of lemon juice, black or white pper. Soak teh shrimp in it with tails up. Srinkle ontop of sizzling butter lots of parmesean . Palce under a broiler until parmesean melts.. that is Angelos Linguini and Scampi...
Courtsey Angelos Restaurant corner of 54th and 8th NYC

I may just have to do this! Reading all this just made me very hungry.

When I ate out I started with the protein on my plate as well as the vegies. Then I had half of the potato and I was full. I liked to start with a salad with oil and vinegar. That helped too.