Red Robin Customizer... Awesome!!!!

So I recently started Weight Watchers, making my favorite hobby of going out to eat a lot more complicated. However, keeping little splurges like that in my life is important to me, I just want to be able to plan for it.

So we decided to head to Red Robin for dinner last night, and I looked up the nutritional value before we left. Turns out Red Robin has this AWESOME Customizer website and app where they'll give you the nutritional value of anything on the menu. But the cool part is that you can remove items, and then they'll give you revised nutritional information on your custom creation. So if you love a certain entree, but plan to order it without cheese to save on fat and calories, you can see exactly what you're saving. Or if you switch out the fries for some steamed broccoli (you know, if you're crazy), you can see how that affects the nutritional value as well.

I just about hit the roof, though, when I found out that my go-to entree at Red Robin (the BBQ Chicken Wrap), has 62 grams of fat and 1100 calories! What!?!?! It's the same amount of calories as the cheeseburger with the fried onion strips on it! I don't mind the occasional (or not-so occasional) splurge, but I have been ordering that entree for YEARS because I thought it was on the healthier side. Turns out, according to the Customizer, the cheese alone adds about 20 grams of fat. Ugh! I could have been leaving that off all along - you can't even taste it! But at least now I know.

So it turns out they have a new burger, called the Keep It Simple Burger (under "Other" on the menu, NOT under burgers), that has 570 calories and 24 grams of fat. Still not as good as staying home and eating something actually healthy, but much better than a majority of menu items there at Red Robin (and only 10 WW points compared to like 26 for the wrap!). It was delicious, I felt happy with my out-to-eat splurge, and turns out I saved a ton of fat and calories compared to the "healthier" option I usually order.

Most restaurants have their nutritional information out there somewhere on the internet, so it's always worth a look, but I just particularly loved this app and wanted to share, since it's so hard to estimate substitutions when you're out. Hope someone else can use this and likes it as much as I did!