When I visit my favorite Italian restaurant, I鈥檓 hard-pressed to find an appetizer to fit into my health-conscious eating plan. Steering clear of the fried calamari and pesto bread, I鈥檒l often talk my dinner partners into sharing an antipasto plate. I mean, what鈥檚 not to love about a fresh, eye-pleasing assortment of cheese, marinated vegetables, olives, hard-boiled eggs and other healthy goodies?So, feel like hazarding a guess on how many calories are in a standard antipasto plate? Is it:
(a) 390
(b) 436
(c) 630
(d) 783
Answer: (c) 630 calories (and 47g fat, 15 of them saturated!)
Apparently there鈥檚 a lot not to love about this popular Italian appetizer. If you were to polish off the entire plate, you鈥檇 end up with 75% of the fat and saturated fat and all, or more, of the sodium you should eat in an entire day. You would have been better off with another classic Italian dish anyone hardly thinks of as healthy: Veal Parmigiana, which contains 650 calories and 36 grams of fat, 12 of them saturated.
But this doesn鈥檛 mean you still can鈥檛 enjoy this mangia-licious meat-cheese-veggie spread. Just be smart about it. Ask for the oil and vinegar or other dressings on the side and use just a little bit. You can also ask the kitchen to bulk up on the veggies 鈥
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