Difficulty assessing calorie content when eating out?

Does anyone else have trouble figuring out just how many calories they've consumed when they go out to eat? It makes doing my food log so difficult...

Like today, I went to this organic cafe for brunch and had an egg white omelette with mushrooms, spinach and goat cheese, with a side of home fries (fried red potatoes with herbs) and i had NO idea how many cals I'd consumed...I'd estime somewhere between 600-800, but it could be way more...what do you guys do in this situation?

I know I have to meticulously watch my cals in order to be successful at losing weight. HELP!

I know the best I can do in those situations is just to remember everything I ate, and try to find a similar listing in the data base and log it. If I'm at home and I dont know the portion sizes, I weigh something similar to try and get an idea. Dont forget to add butter or oil that they will have used to cook it in. I always round up the calories, or choose the higher calorie content food, just to be safe. Then I try to get in some extra excercise, as well.

But if you dont do this very often I wouldnt worry too much if you are out 100-200 cals - it wont be the end of the world. If it is often however, maybe you could ask the waitress before the meal how it is cooked (in oil or butter etc) to get a better idea of what you're eating.

One thing I have had to start doing is figuring out what I will eat at home, before I go out.  So, I tell myself:  I will order one poached egg and one slice of toast, and then I order it. 

I know its not as fun, but it gets rid of the calorie count aftermath that ensues when I eatmore complicated foods at restaurants.

I do the same as gg80 - I try to remember each of the ingredients and calculate how much was in the dish.  Then, I just go into calorie count and add each ingredient.  Add in another 100 calories for error, and another 100 calories for anything that may have been in it that I wasn't aware of (like oil or butter that they cooked with).  Then, I round up on anything else that I eat that day.  I figure by the end of the day, if anything I'm showing more calories consumed than I actually did.