Dinner out has consequences....

The kids favorite restaurant and they do have good burgers but one should not dine here more than once a month....

My husband and I enjoy food. We like to cook at home as much as we also enjoy going out to restaurants. And right now we are in the country where dining out is less expensive than stocking the fridge and cook at home. Of course it is fun to go out when it makes it easy on the household work and finer dining is also very inexpensive compared to home. But it will have consequences.

Montgomery might not have as many of the gourmet restaurants we would like to see, unfortunately. And it is truly lacking of the healthier version of food. It is easier to find burger restaurants where you can choose from twelve different versions of burgers. It has taken us a while and we have probably gone through all the fast food restaurants in the beginning, but we have found restaurants we truly enjoy and it is fun to be able to taste some of the true Southern cooking - even if it is less healthy for you. However, all the dining out have consequences - large portions, lots of fat and sugar, makes us at least, gain lots of weight if we do not watch it.

So, all this dining out has been limited to weekends now and when the kids get their choice we know we are having burgers. I always order kids size on the menu, and they are compared to home the regular size salad/burgers. We have banned fries and there will be no soda, except for special occasion. One day I ordered sushi and was served a Southern version of it - Fried! I don´t even want to know how many calories that contained. Many might say, well you are just away for a year. And that is true, one have to enjoy oneself and taste much of the American food culture. But SORRY! There is too much junk and if I where to eat and try it all, I would probably be about 10 kg heavier before I know it. At least that was what happened when I lived in the States as an exchange student back in 1988. My mom thought I was pregnant when I sent a picture home at Christmas, at the age of 17.

When my mother and sister where visiting us a few weeks back, I was guiding them every where around the neighborhoods, we often dined out for lunch and once for breakfast - just because they would like the experience. The portion we got for breakfast was best suited for a hard physical steel worker or something. I am not kidding if that breakfast contained close to 1000 calories.

I have however, started to work out every day now and I also have a wonderful PT (Shea). No less than an hour of hard work, every day, is what I have to do at the gym, to be able to treat myself a little bit of all the big American portion of junk...

This is a local version of Sushi with salmon and Philadelphia cheese and topped with a spicy sauce. The outside of the rice

was

fried. Fried food is a Southern thing. There is a saying: "if it isn´t fried it is not from Alabama."

Breakfast served at a local restaurant. French Toast with scramble eggs and bacon. Topped with syrup and butter.

I however don´t think we are very much better in Sweden. We do have most junk food restaurants, burgers, pizza and lattes. But I know for a fact that the portions are smaller and home cooking a lot more common. And we do not use the car as often as I do in the US. Here, it is no other way to get around which also means less walking and less physical work.

Fried Green tomatos is a Southern dish. And they taste really good if it made correctly. This, served at one of our favorite restaurants, LaJolla.

A nice lunch is served at LaJolla. What we paid for the lunch (2 dishes with water to drink to) is very inexpensive (10 dollars), and what I like about it is that they do serve smaller portions - but if it is healthier - don´t know.