Pasta!

So, everyone knows - or should know! - that a REAL serving of pasta is around 1 cup. Well, if I'm going out to dinner, and I order pasta, and I eat 1 cup of it, um.. yeah, I'm going to be hungry still or atleast like 30 minutes later. Should I eat 1 cup pasta and then get a small dinner salad with it? Or do I just have to suck it up and just have my 1 cup and be hungry?

In addition to the salad, try ordering chicken with the pasta?  It'll sit a little heavier in your stomach than the pasta will.  Well, it does for me, anyway.  ;)

Oops, yeah I forgot to mention when I order pasta, I normally always get one that has chicken and veggies in it. But still, 1 cup versus the 3 or 4 I'm used to, probably won't make me full for very long.

Actually, half a cup of pasta is usually the same as a serving.  I know, it's ridiculous.  Make sure you never eat anything but whole wheat pasta.  If you hate whole wheat, suck it up for about a month at the most.  You'll eventually like the taste and forget about enriched wheat flour all together.

Before the pasta, drink a full, restaurant-sized portion of water.  Also order tea (green is usually the best) to drink with the meal. 

You should always aim for half of whatever meal you eat to be veggies.  Sometimes this means filling half your plate with veggies and 1/4 with meat and 1/4 with pasta.  It could also mean adding a whole lot of veggies to your sauce. 

Eating out is always tricky.  You never know exactly how much oil they are cooking with or what brands they use or if they mixed up low-calorie with extra creamy.

Pasta doesn't fill you up well without being high in calories unless it's whole wheat.  Even then, I find that it doesn't really do the trick.  I would just eat it once a week and try eating two cups of it instead of one. 

You can also put speghetti sauce on your salad.  It's delicious - but not socially acceptable.  Speghetti sauces are usually stupid-high in calories, so if you take out the noodles and replace it with ice burg lettus, the speghetti sauce makes a yummy meal without the noodles.

You can also warm up salsa and put that on your speghetti.  It's a lot lower in calories than speghetti sauce.

I find whole wheat pasta is delicious, and is full of protein and fiber (two things white pasta basically lack). Some people dislike the texture of whole wheat pasta, but to me only the more expensive brands have that gummy texture. Barilla PLUS is just like white spaghetti, except is it super-filling and has a nutty, satisfying taste. It's the only pasta I will buy.

My self imposed Italian restaurant rules: 

1.  Order a large salad with low fat dressing on the side and eat it first. 
2.  Drink water
3.  Don't eat the bread!
4.  If you order pasta, get it with marinara sauce and no cheese.  If there are grilled meats or fish on the menu, order them with a side of pasta.
5.  Ask for a take out box at the begining of the meal and put half your meal in the box.
6.  If there are vegetables on the menu as side dishes, order them.  Roasted red peppers are low calorie and delicious.
7.  Don't have dessert

Yeah, my rule is when I have pasta, no bread or dessert allowed with it. I will for sure have a healthy, light-dressing salad before the pasta and lots of water!