Absurdly unhealthy Asian food in America

I know quite a few people that will go and eat at Asian restaurants because they think about how small the average Asian person is and think to themselves that because most Asian people are skinny that their food must be good for you right? Well, sure some of it is, but especially food that has been altered to accommodate western palates are the opposite of that and if you are going to these restaurants thinking that you are automatically eating better because it is an Asian restaurant you are probably wildly uniformed. Just because a food comes from an Asian notion doesn't mean that it is good for you and in many cases it can actually be much worse than if you just had a burger and fries.

Here are some of the top things that you really shouldn't ever eat at Asian restaurants and for a lot of people this should all be fairly obvious.

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Crab Rangoon

This one is particularly absurd because if the people eating it would just stop for a second and use their brains it is obviously terrible for you. It's cream cheese and a tiny bit of imitation crab meat that isn't even crab (it's colored fish) stuffed into a pastry and deep friend in probably one of the worst oils possible and then covered in sugar sauce. Of course it is delicious! It's basically a dessert for an appetizer. 3 tiny pieces of this pack a whopping 300 calories and when you consider that this is just an appetizer, it is a terrible choice to eat ever.

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Fried Rice

This is another one of those things that should be obvious but some people will chow down on this stuff as if it was a protein shake. Regular rice has about 280 calories per cup and most of the portions that you will get at a restaurant or take-away place has at least 2 cups in there. Then you have to contend with the normally fatty meats that they put in there and again, probably really cheap oil that they use to make it. Traditionally, fried rice was "yesterday's rice" made palatable by mixing it with other things that people had around the house and it was done with a rice that had some level of nutrition. The rice you are likely to find in grocery stores in USA and in restaurants is the really cheap rice that has had nearly all nutritional elements of the plant removed from it. One of these dishes is going to set you back around 700 calories and the silly thing is, most people eat this in ADDITION to a main course.

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General Tso's Chicken

Chicken is a lean meat and there are vegetables in there so it has to be good for you right? Wrong! The chicken in this as well as many other Chinese dishes is breaded and deep friend again, probably in really horrible and cheap oil like palm oil, then it is covered in a really think syrup that is basically 100% fructose corn syrup. An average serving of one of these is going to have around 1300 calories in it and this is before we even factor in the rice that you are meant to eat along with it. You could have 3 Big Mac's and consume less calories than if you went this route.

People need to throw out this notion that just because a cuisine in name comes from a country where most people are thin that eating this stuff is somehow going to make you that way as well. The problem with a lot of Asian food in America is that they have to use cheap ingredients and cater to an American palate. What this ends up involving is things that are absolutely loaded with calories. People who think they are eating better just because they eat Asian are in for a big wake up call because nearly all the popular Chinese dishes in America are actually worse for you than something that you would normally consider bad like burgers and pizza.

I have never been to China, but I have heard that these dishes for the most part (not fried rice, obviously) don't even exist there outside of tourist areas. The reason why Asian people are so thin is for a variety of reasons including genetics and also because what the average household will cook is not a bunch of mass-produced and deep-fried things. Much like the home style food in USA of meat and potatoes, Asian home cooked food consists of better quality ingredients and is heavy on the vegetables. Unfortunately you are unlikely to be offered healthy options at the average Asian restaurant in America because they are in it for a profit. If you want healthy food, you are going to have to do a bit of research because most places are simply trying to conceal the fact that their dishes are intentionally unhealthy because it is much cheaper to prepare that way.

For the most part not eating out is one of the only ways to guarantee healthier meal options and this includes a vast majority of Asian food. Basically, if it has a sauce on it that makes your tastebuds pop and it isn't spicy, it probably is terrible for you.

_{I have no professional qualifications for what I write here. What I do have is 20+ years of making decisions, many of them the wrong ones. I hope others can learn from my mistakes and perhaps never make them in the first place}