How to Make Your Lunch Less Fattening

Who knew “healthy” stuff like salads and yogurt parfaits could be so darn fattening? It was news to Health’s staffers! See how we learned to lighten up our lunches without sacrificing one bit of flavor.

We put our own lunches under the microscope and discovered just how easy it is to get unwanted calories and fat. Then we turned to our in-house diet expert, Senior Food and Nutrition Editor Frances Largeman-Roth, RD, for simple—and tasty—solutions.



1. Jackie Froeber / Editorial Assistant
Her lunch: Cobb salad with ranch dressing
The damage: 850 calories, 63 g fat, 19 g saturated fat, 1,902 mg sodium

Salads seem like a great option, but this one is a calorie-and-fat bomb. It comes with chicken or turkey, bacon, avocado, cheese, and dressing. Yikes! Not only is it much higher in calories and fat than you’d want in a lunch (nearly two meals’ worth), but it contains almost 80% of your daily sodium limit.


The fix: To cut 350 calories (not to mention 26 grams of fat and 1,260 milligrams of sodium), Jackie should order her Cobb without bacon and cheese. If she leaves off half the dressing (she won’t miss it, we promise), she’ll trim another 65 calories and 7.5 grams of fat.



Jackie should also ask for some extra yummies—another half-cup of tomatoes, cucumber slices, broccoli, or cauliflower, plus an extra half-cup of apple slices or grapes; all are low-cal bites with lots of satisfying bulk. What about all that creamy avocado? She should keep it: the heart-healthy “good” fats are worth the calories.

The new bottom line: 475 calories, 29.5 g fat, 3.5 g saturated fat, 496 mg sodium
Jackie saves: 375 calories and 33.5 g fat!