Disease Proof : Disease Proof : Health & Nutrition News & Commentary : Dr. Joel Fuhrman

Hey, it’s not Friday. Why the heck am I doing Eating to Live on the Outside today? Let me explain. Out of all the restaurants I’ve written about, I think I’ve only eaten at a handful of them, and they weren’t exactly any of the healthy ones like Baja Fresh or Chipotle. Until now.

Because last week I hit the strip, the Las Vegas Strip that is. When I wasn't beating my bank account into submission, I sat down for a bite to eat at a couple Eating to Live on the Outside’s favorite restaurants, P.F. Chang’s and The California Pizza Kitchen.

And I have to be honest I had no idea either one of these restaurants had Vegas locations, so I was very pleasantly surprised to see them. So rather than tell you what I would order if I found myself planted at P.F. Chang’s or The California Pizza Kitchen, here’s what I actually ate.

In the P.F. Chang’s edition of Eating to Live on the Outside I said I would order the Wild Alaskan Sockeye Salmon Steamed with Ginger, well guess what folks? That’s exactly what I ordered, and it was good. The salmon was a great piece of fish and the veggies were out of this world! To refresh your memory the dish comes with ginger root, green onions, dried shiitake mushrooms, bok choy, roma tomatoes, and asparagus spears. The shiitake mushrooms really make the dish. And, holding true to my word, since I had the salmon on Wednesday night I’ll be waiting a few weeks before I having fish again. Dr. Fuhrman would be proud.

Now the food at P.F. Chang’s was good, but the salad I had at The California Pizza Kitchen was amazing. The first thing I thought of when I first walked pas the restaurant was “Grilled Vegetable Salad,” I remember writing the California Pizza Kitchen edition of Eating to Live on the Outside and thinking how about how good it sounded. So I was primed to make my fantasy a reality. In case you don’t remember the is prepared with grilled asparagus, Japanese eggplant, zucchini, scallions, roasted corn, Romaine lettuce, fresh avocado, and sun-dried tomatoes. Instead of getting the Dijon balsamic vinaigrette the salad comes with I asked the waiter for regular balsamic vinaigrette on the side and I used it sparingly. The flavor combinations were overwhelmingly good, and of course the avocado really kicked it up a notch. This was dish was a welcomed whack of phytonutrients.

So next time you’re reading Eating to Live on the Outside and wondering if this Gerald Pugliese isn’t just some whacko rattling off menu suggestions from a halfcocked mind, you’ll know that when I say Eating to Live on the Outside, I mean it.

Oh, how could I forget? The P.F. Chang’s is in the Aladdin (soon to be the Plant Hollywood Casino) and The California Pizza Kitchen is in The Mirage. Be sure to check them out and let me know what you ordered. Send me an email at diseaseproof@gmail.com.

• Email This
• Print
• Comments
• Share Link

If you’ve been keeping up with this series you’ve probably realized many mainstream restaurants have abysmal menus; mostly loaded with melted cheese, bacon, deep fried this, and chicken-fried that. These restaurants are so greasy, even the pages of the online menu are stuck together!

Where are the healthy restaurants? It seems like for every Baja Fresh and P.F. Chang’s there is a blockade of Sizzlers, IHOPs, Fridays, and Friendly's. No wonder Americans are so fat, we’re a nation that loves to dine out, we crave crappy food, and all our restaurants are happy to serve it to us. (And apparently we have an unrelenting desire for bacon, its everywhere!)

You’ll find Houlihan’s to be no different; sporting ten bacon-including dishes of its own (if you count adding it to a burger as one). Well for better and in this case for worse Houlihan’s is this week’s contestant for Eating to Live on the Outside. So just pretend you’ve been kidnapped from your nutrient dense lifestyle and left for dead at your friendly neighborhood chain restaurant.

After much consternation here’s what I’d order if I found myself staring down the barrel of a gun. Oops! I mean thumbing through the menu at Houlihan’s. No surprise here, a nice safe option might be to order a basic salad or a “Tossed Simple Greens” as the menu proclaims. I’m not sure what simple greens are maybe greens that scored poorly on their SATs, but in the world of Eat to Live, any green is good. I’d probably top these “greens” with a few drops of the balsamic vinaigrette salad dressing. Your other options are cheese and cream based. Egad!

Houlihan’s also has some original salad creations: Ahi Tuna Salad, BBQ Salmon Salad, Chicken Asian Chop Chop, and Mandarin Grilled Chicken. There’s a lot of vegetation variety between them: napa cabbage, cilantro, bananas, cashews, chilled greens, mandarin oranges, spiced pecans, jicama, snow peas, bell peppers, red onions, peanuts, black sesame seeds, and white sesame seeds. But these salads aren’t without their problems. If you’re a non-meat eating Eat to Liver you’ll probably want to drop the chicken and fish, personally I’m okay with eating meat once a week, it’s a concession I’m willing to make. You also have to contend with tortilla strips, I’d ditch these—these damn things are everywhere! And as always, it’s probably a good idea to limit or omit the salad dressing.

If it were me I wouldn’t venture beyond the salad section of the menu. The rest of the entrees require major concessions of the aforementioned ooey-gooey deep-fried variety. But if I were forced to choose, I’d say there are two non-salad options worth taking a look at: Pan-Seared Tilapia and the Grilled Vegetable Panini. Are they perfect? Hell no!

The Pan-Seared Tilapia caught my eye mainly because Dr. Fuhrman regards tilapia as one of the safer sea fares, so it gets points for that, but the dish still has its worries. The first and foremost being BACON, which I am promptly ditching; you watch, next it’ll be in bacon energy drinks! Although this meal does have some redeeming qualities like leeks, tomatoes, white beans, and garlic. So if I don’t allow my mind to wonder about the contents of the mysterious “fragrant broth” I wouldn’t feel to bad about ordering this.

And lastly I’d consider giving the Grilled Vegetable Panini a whirl. To be honest I was hoping it had more vegetables (hence its namesake), but it's not too plant matter deprived. It comes with white beans, grilled zucchini, roasted red peppers, tomatoes, and caramelized onions. It also comes with provolone cheese, now despite my Italian blood I think its more health conscious to skip it (my mother would kill me). There’s also a walnut basil-pesto creation that accompanies the panini, I’d probably go easy on it since pesto as this version is almost certainly loaded with unhealthy fats.

To be honest, Houlihan’s is probably the last place I’d want to eat at, I think only Paco’s House of Atomic Deep Fried Bacon Tacos would rank lower. Too much greasy, cheesy food for my liking, but I think if I were to stick to these dishes I’d have a decent chance of feeling OK in the morning.

And you know the drill, we want your feedback! Tell us what you might have done differently or what you agree with. Check out Houlihan’s menu and let us know how you Eat to Live on the Outside? Leave a comment or email us at diseaseproof@gmail.com.

• Email This
• Print
• Comments (1)
• Share Link

Last week I took a look a New York City’s own Just Salads, and what a refreshing break from the typical oh so greasy American restaurant fare. Unlike standard artery busting foods of places like the Ground Round, Outback Steakhouse, and Friendly’s, Just Salads is a hearty plot of green in them middle of the big apple. So would you be surprised if I told you I found the same thing in notorious Sin City?

Las Vegas, the land of high hopes and high-rollers, and also home to this week’s restaurant of choice the Go Raw Café. Now I thought Just Salads was a phytonutrient heavy hitter—this place is the David Ortiz of healthy eating! With choices like Kale Salad, Cream of Carrot & Avocado Soup, and Caro-bana smoothies, well quite frankly, you can close your eyes and throw a stone in this place, and you’re still bound to hit something that’d make Dr. Fuhrman smile. Although I’m not sure the staff would appreciate that level of enthusiasm.

At the Go Raw Café “making concessions” is a thing of the past. I don’t see any item on the menu that’d make me think twice about ordering it. Good food is everywhere! So here are a few dishes that jumped out at me.

For starters I like the aforementioned Kale Salad, I like it more because there are avocados in it. In addition to the bestest fruit on the planet this salad also includes red bell peppers, onions, cucumbers, and is served with buckwheat bread. Buckwheat bread? Sounds interesting. You do have the option of house dressing with this salad, which I’m not totally against, I’d would just go easy on how much I used, but if you’re totally against oily dressing the Go Raw Café gives you the option of cilantro instead. Pretty cool hunh?

The Gimme the Beet – “Cheese” Burger w/Fries is looking mighty tasty too, although I do have some questions. I’d ask the wait staff to clarify the fry situation because if they are actual deep-fried potato fries I’m not interested. But given the attitude of this place there’s a good chance “Fries” is just a play on words for something healthier. The burger itself is very interesting; it’s made with beets, carrots, sunflower seeds, and parsley—can’t go wrong there! You can dress your burger with hand prepared ketchup, mustard, mayo (I’ll pass), onion, tomato, lettuce, sprouts, avocado (score!), and almond cheese (yet another creation I’d ask about). After you’re done compiling this anti-burger they sandwich it between “living bread.” I have no idea! Ask before you bite into it, it could bite back. Either way this burger still beets (spelling mistake intended) the pants of the traditional burger, and especially this abominable creation: Baseball’s Worst Burger.

Finally I really like a bunch of the smoothies and juices the Go Raw Café offers—and yes I know eating the actual fruit is considerably better than just drinking the juice. Let me indulge damn it! As far as the juices go, I like the All Good (carrots, apples, and beets), Sweet Greens (kale, parsley, celery, cucumbers, spinach, and collard greens), and Popeye’s Favorite (carrot, spinach, and apple). Now that’s some nutrient dense juice! As for the smoothies, I’m digging the Berry Good (apple, banana, strawberry, blueberry, raspberry, and date), Pina Cool-ada (pineapple, banana, macadamia, date, coconut water, and coconut meat), and the Young Blood (wheatgrass, beet juice, and coconut water). These all sound great, but if I’m loosing my shirt at the poker table, well, I’m going to need something a little stronger.

Once again, and much like last week, the only negative I see about the Go Raw Café is its location, Vegas is the only place you’ll find one. So next time your doubling-down at the blackjack table or getting fleeced by the slot machines don’t forget to save some money for a very raw experience.

And as always we want your feedback! Tell us what you might have done differently or what you agree with. Check out the Go Raw Café’s menu and let us know how you Eat to Live on the Outside? Leave a comment or email us at diseaseproof@gmail.com.

• Email This
• Print
• Comments (4)
• Share Link

This week Eating to Live on the Outside is taking the next E train through midtown New York City, or more indigenously New Yawk City. Right across from the historic Waldorf Astoria Hotel is this week’s dinning destination Just Salads, a bountiful harvest in the middle of the concrete jungle.

With a name like “Just Salads” you’re correct to assume the menu is veggie-based (uh, duh!), salad is the absolute cornerstone of this restaurant, a meat-lovers nightmare! Healthy options abound, you’ve got lots to choose from and only a few items that might give you pause. Let’s take a look.

The left side of the menu lists the “Chef Designed Salads & Salad Wraps,” to be honest all these dishes have likable characteristics. The recurring challenge is whether or not to use salad dressing. Personally I wouldn’t get too hung up on this, I’d just order it on the side and dispense it in small increments.

So let’s see, which salads might I order, well for starters I like the Just Salad Signature. It comes with baby spinach, apples, bacon, red onions, walnuts, and shredded cheddar cheese. Clearly I’m not keeping the bacon or the cheese; I know what you’re thinking, “Why bother ordering this one?” I’m lured by the combination of red onion, walnut, and apple.

The Immunity Bowl looks cool too. It’s made with Mesclun, wild salmon, diced roasted butternut squash, and pomegranate seeds. Actually this one sounds really tasty. I’m digging the pomegranate seeds (we all know how healthy pomegranates are) and the butternut squash, not to mention the salmon. If I were to stick with the salmon I’d make sure I didn’t eat fish again for a while. Even though salmon isn’t overly contaminated, I’d rather be safe than sorry.

Fans of Eating to Live on the Outside know about my fetishistic relationship with avocado. So naturally I’m down with The California. This left coast creation comes with iceberg lettuce, grilled chicken, avocado, egg whites, cherry tomatoes, and sliced almonds. The flavor combo of avocado, tomato, and almond sounds very mouthwatering, but I’m not really keen on both grilled chicken and egg whites. I’ll make a concession for one meat, but not two, so I’m dropping the grilled chicken and keeping the egg whites. Still sounds pretty tasty if you ask me.

The Far East is also tempting my taste buds, this is some salad, you’ve got iceberg lettuce, Chinese cabbage, shrimp, carrots, edamame, Chinese noodles, and mandarin oranges. This is the first time I’ve ever seen edamame beans on a menu. This alone makes it worthy of ordering, although I’m giving the shrimp the heave-ho, shrimp has contamination issues. Oh, and I’m sure the Chinese noodles are made with refined flour, but it’s a concession I’m willing to make.

I could go on for hours about all these wonderful salads, but there’s another fantastic element to the menu I’d like to address. YOU CAN MAKE YOUR OWN CUSTOM SALAD! If you’re feeling stubborn and don’t want to deviate from Eat to Live at all, well, this might be your best option. With all the choices on this menu you can have a field day creating your very own meal. For the base lettuce you can choose mesclun, an arugula-mesclun mix, baby spinach, iceberg, or Romaine lettuce. And on top of that you can pile up things like asparagus, beets, chickpeas, golden raisins, my favorite avocado, shallots, lentils, broccoli, corn, string beans, and even tofu! Not to shabby, right? The bottom line, this is a fantastic place for health conscious dining, hands down.

In my opinion the only real negative is that Just Salads is only in Manhattan. Sadly they’re not a national restaurant chain, they’ve only one location. But for out of state Eat to Livers, next time you’re visiting the big apple you might want to pencil in a stop.

And as always we want your feedback! Tell us what you might have done differently or what you agree with. Check out Just Salad's menu and let us know how you Eat to Live on the Outside? Leave a comment or email us at diseaseproof@gmail.com.

• Email This
• Print
• Comments (2)
• Share Link

By now it’s a familiar story, you’re out having a good time with friends and someone suggests grabbing a bite to eat. Now you’re an Eat to Liver, but your buddies aren’t, so chances are healthy food isn’t on the agenda. Yup, you suddenly find yourself on a one-way train to deep-fried-double-battered-triple-cheese-extra-bacon hell. What do you do?

Instead of fisticuffs try rolling with the punches, at least that’s what I do. I’m down with Eat to Live, but I also live in the real world and occasionally that requires some deviations from Eat to Live, or concessions as I all call them. Hey I’m not proud of them, I do my best cushion the blow, but unfortunately the mainstream restaurant world isn’t exactly Eat to Live friendly. So usually I just try to make the best out of an otherwise crumby situation.

And that’s my goal. Find healthy menu selections from popular restaurants, such as Sizzler, Chipotle, California Pizza Kitchen, and Bennigan’s. Sometimes its easy, sometimes it’s hard, but if you really look, there’s bound to be something healthy on almost any menu. Hopefully this holds true for this week’s contestant the Ground Round.

It doesn’t take long to realize that the Ground Round is a meat-centric dining establishment. In fact even many of the “salads” are piled high with animal products, but let’s take a look anyway. My first choice would be the House Salad, but I’m not really sure what’s in it (the ingredients aren’t listed on the menu, only a little photo), if I had to guess it looks pretty standard: lettuce, tomato, onions, etc. Although I do see some croutons, I’d ditch those and limit the oily dressing. The Shrimp & Artichoke Salad also looks pretty tasty, but according to OceansAlive.org shrimp has some contamination issues, so I’d probably omit it from the salad. Oh, the basic Caesar Salad looks okay too.

The Ground Round also has a couple of sandwich wraps that I’d feel comfortable ordering. I really like the Roasted Vegetable Wrap (given the amount of meat on this menu the word vegetable is a godsend in itself), its ingredients include roasted red peppers, zucchini, summer squash, mushrooms, spinach, tomatoes, caramelized onions, and sun-dried tomato pesto mayonnaise. Sounds pretty interesting right? Other than the flour tortilla the only thing that really gives me pause is the mayonnaise, but I really like sun-dried tomatoes and pesto, so I would be willing to make this concession and keep it. What do you think? Another option to consider (if you’re in the mood for animal) is the Turkey Club Wrap. It’s not a very complicated dish, it’s made with turkey, bacon, lettuce, tomato, and cholesterol-free mayonnaise. Now, I have no problem with the turkey so I’m staying with it, but the bacon is history, and “cholesterol-free mayonnaise” is not enticing enough for me to consider, so adios to it too! Since both these wraps come with French fries I’d ask the wait staff if they have a healthier side available or just skip the side altogether.

The last thing to intrigue my taste buds is the Orange Grilled Salmon. Worried about the fish? Remember according to Dr. Fuhrman salmon is one of the better sea fares you can eat. So breathe a sigh of relief! This dish includes fresh stir-fried Asian vegetables, rice pilaf, and garlic bread sticks. I’m okay with everything, but the garlic bread sticks, don’t get me wrong I love garlic, but the bread is probably made with white flour and since I’ll be eating the rice pilaf I feel compelled to ditch something. All the seafood on the menu comes served with a variety of sides including broccoli or a vegetable of the day. Hey maybe you can ask the wait staff if you can make a main dish out of these healthy sides. That would be a great solution to this meaty Ground Round debacle.

Oh, and don’t forget, we want your feedback! Tell us what you might have done differently or what you agree with. Check out the Ground Round’s menu and let us know how you Eat to Live on the Outside? Leave a comment or email us at diseaseproof@gmail.com.

• Email This
• Print
• Comments (2)
• Share Link