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Worst Foods of 2007

by John McGran

 

Selecting the 10 worst foods of 2007 is kind of like shooting fried fish in a barrel. But after much deliberation Mr. Bad Food has come up with the best of the worst foods he’s reviewed over the past year at BadFoodGoodFood.com.

Always keep in mind that no food is a truly bad food… as long as you enjoy it in moderation.

 

Now, here are my 10 worst… in no particular order.

Western Bacon Six Dollar Burger, Carl’s Jr.

Mr. Bad Food is an East Coast kind of guy, but I realize there are no boundaries when it comes to bad foods. So, for this review, I took the advice of 19th Century newspaper editor Horace Greeley who urged, “Go west, young man, go west.”

The Western Bacon Six Dollar Burger will gun you down with 1,130 calories (600 from fat), 66g total fat (100% of your Daily Reference Value), 28g sat fat (140% DRV), 150mg cholesterol, 2,540mg sodium (110%DRV), 83g carbs and 47g protein.

I’m beginning to understand why it’s called the wild, wild west. Sorry boys, but I’ll take the 3:10 to Yuma… and then the next plane to good old Philly, land of cheesesteaks and soft pretzels!

Double Deep Pizza, Pizza Hut

The Double Deep Pizzas are hand-crafted by loading the entire pizza with twice the toppings of a medium pizza, plus 50% more cheese and then wrapping the crust over the top to hold all the toppings in.

I opted for two slices of the Meaty variety. According to the www.PizzaHut.com Web site, I also opted for 1,160 calories, 72g of fat (110% of your recommended Daily Value), 28g saturated fat (140% DV), 3g trans fat, 200mg cholesterol, 3,980mg sodium (166% DV),  62g carbs and 62g protein.

In all fairness, the suggest serving is one slice (1/8 the medium pie) but who eats a single slice? Not me.

 

XX Large Chimichanga, El Monterey

 

While shopping at Wal-Mart here in Northeastern Pennsylvania, I noticed Spicy Red Hot Beef & Bean XX Large Chimichangas in a cooler near the deli. They looked suspiciously like my 3-for-a-buck burritos of yesteryear – only bigger and a tad more costly.

 A burrito is a filled flour tortilla wrapped around a filling of meat, beans and/or cheese. A chimichanga is a meat-filled tortilla… a dish that consists of a deep-fried burrito with a spicy meat filling.

 The key words “deep-fried” may explain why my mushy 10-ounce XX Large Chimichanga did a Mexican fat dance on my diet to the tune of 920 calories, 57g of fat (15g saturated;1g trans fat), 40mg cholesterol, 1,140mg sodium, 83g carbs, and 22g protein.

 Ay, caramba! It’s a good thing I only had one.

 

Meat Lover’s Scramble, Denny’s


Mr. Bad Food has seen plenty of bad nutrition numbers in his day. But I never saw such heart-stopping info as I did when I surfed the Denny’s Web site (www.dennys.com).


It was my stomach that turned upside down when I checked out the nutrition numbers for Denny’s Meat Lover’s Scramble. Denny’s could be charged with “salt with a deadly weapon” for serving a breakfast entree that packs an unbelievable 4,170mg of sodium! The Recommended Daily Allowance for sodium is 2,400mg.


The Meat Lover’s Scramble will also shake you down with 1,280 calories, 71g of fat (21 saturated; 0 trans), 565mg cholesterol (the RDA is 300mg), 103g carbs and 54g protein (RDA is 50). By the way, the RDA for fat is 65 grams, so you are taking in more than a day’s fat, cholesterol and sodium in a single meal!


So, my advice is if you find yourself at a Denny’s and someone recommends a scramble, you take their advice… and scramble for the door!

 

Country Breakfast Burrito, Hardee’s

The word burrito sounds like a term for a little burro. If you don’t want to make a big ass of yourself by scarfing down 60 grams of fat with your first meal of the day, then steer clear of the Country Breakfast Burrito at Hardee’s.

The king-sized breakfast burrito is cobbled together from two omelets, five hashrounds (their cutesy version of hashbrowns), cheddar cheese, and sausage gravy. The omelets that fill out the tortilla each contain two eggs, crumbled sausage, diced ham and bacon bits.

Now, if you’re hungry for 920 calories, 23 grams of saturated fat, and nearly 2,000 milligrams of sodium, dig in!

 

Chicken & Biscuit Bowl, KFC

The clever cooks at KFC devised a way to toss together an entire chicken dinner in a single bowl. According to the KFC.com Web site, the new bowls are “a blend of mouth-watering KFC flavors and textures all layered together.”

A blend… a jumble… a clutter… Call it what you will. But after checking out the nutritional facts, we call the Chicken & Biscuit bowl a great way to flock up your diet!

The nutrition guide at www.kfc.com says the Chicken & Biscuit dish bowls you over 870 calories, 44g of fat (11 saturated, 4.5 trans), 60mg cholesterol, 2,420mg sodium (101% of your recommended daily amount), 88g carbs (7 fiber, 5 sugars), and 29g protein.


Double Chocolate Chip Frappuccino Blended Crème, Starbucks

When is a coffee drink not a coffee drink? When it comes across with nutritional numbers and frothy extras you’d expect to get with a milk shake! Oh, and when it doesn’t even include coffee!

Case in point: The 24-ounce (it’s Venti-sized in Starbucks lingo) Double Chocolate Chip Frappuccino Blended Crème served up at your local Starbucks. This coffee drink is made from rich chocolate, chocolate chips and milk, blended with ice, topped with whipped cream (optional), and chocolate drizzle.

With 670 calories, 22g of total fat, (12g saturated fat; 0.5g of trans fat), and 107g of carbs, it only sounds like a coffee drink. The 12 grams of saturated fat is equal to the saturated fat you get in a McDonald’s Quarter-Pounder with Cheese… but the sandwich packs 160 fewer calories than the Frappuccino!

 

P’Zone, Pizza Hut       

It takes two hands to handle a Pizza Hut P’Zone. The problem is – according to the nutrition info at www.pizzahut.com – it should also take two people. Yes, despite the fact the TV ads show a bunch of hungry guys chowing down on whole P’Zones, each of these super-sized dough pockets of meats, cheeses and sauce is considered TWO SERVINGS.

The nutrition numbers… doubled for those of us who consider the P’Zones one-meal wonders:

P'Zone Classic: 1,220 calories, 46g fat, 22g saturated fat, 2g trans fat, 130mg cholesterol, 2,700mg sodium, 144g carbs, 8g fiber, 60g protein.

P'Zone Pepperoni: 1,260 calories, 48g fat, 22g saturated fat, 2g trans fat, 140mg cholesterol, 2,980mg sodium, 140g carbs, 6g fiber, 64g protein.

P'Zone Meaty: 1,380 calories, 58g fat, 26g saturated fat, 2g trans fat, 160mg cholesterol, 3,460mg sodium, 144g carbs, 8g fiber, 70g protein.


The Baconator, Wendy’s

The term Baconator sparks images of a poorly acted action flick featuring a leading man with a terribly thick Austrian accent. Think Arnold Schwarzenegger. And if you’re planning on ordering Wendy’s newest offering, think again. Yeah, I can picture it now. A seatbelt-straining drive-thru customer grabs his grease-stained bag of beef, bacon and fried potatoes, and before driving off to feast upon his Baconator, he shouts to the drive-up window jockey, “I’ll be bawk… for my defibrillator paddles!” Then, just before he zooms out of earshot, the server leans out of her window and yells back at him: “Hasta la vista… flabby!”

OK, so it’s poor scriptwriting. But it’s also poor dining to indulge in this Wendy’s double cheeseburger on steroids. The Baconator boasts two beef patties, two slices of cheese and SIX slices of bacon! It’s more like hasta la vista diet!  Do yourself a favor and terminate your urge to order this beast of a burger.

The nutritional numbers for the 10-ounce Baconator: 830 calories,  51g of fat (22g saturated; 2.5g trans fat), 170mg of cholesterol, 1,920mg of sodium, 35g of carbs and 57g of protein.

 

The Extreme Grand Slam, Denny’s

Ads for Denny’s Grand Slam breakfasts used to feature the tagline, “$2.99… are you out of your mind?!” Now that the restaurant chain has launched ads for its new Extreme Grand Slam – a breakfast platter piled high with three strips of bacon, three sausage links (hmmm, it must be the year of the pig), two eggs, hash browns and three pancakes – the updated ad copy should now read: “You’re ordering a Denny’s Extreme Grand Slam… are you out of your freakin’ mind?!”

The Denny’s Web site, www.dennys.com, urges customers to “fall in love with breakfast all over again.” It then offers up its latest line of “Breakfast Cravers” platters – dishes packed with the artery-clogging goodness of not-so-lean meats. Cases in point: The Meat Craver’s Breakfast and the Steak and Cheese Omelette.

The nutritional numbers for the 21-ounce Extreme Grand Slam: 1,160 calories… 64g of fat (17g of saturated fat), 560mg of cholesterol, 3,750mg of sodium, 102g of carbs, 4g of fiber, and 45g of protein.


BONUS BADDIE:
The Subway Feast
According to the www.subway.com Web site, a Subway Feast is meat lover’s dream of “heaping piles of roast beef, salami, pepperoni, turkey and black forest ham, all wrapped up in American cheese on freshly baked bread.”

A steady diet of this fare will have Jared straining to squeeze back in to his “fat jeans” in no time. Especially if he listens to the site recommendation that says The Feast “goes great with Coca-Cola and DORITOS Nacho Cheese!”

Normally, I’d trot out the nutrition numbers to prove just how bad a featured food can be. But such info seems to be missing from the Subway Web site. And that in itself sends up a giant red flag.



The worst of the rest:

Jalapeno Cheddar Double Melt, Wendy’s

According to the www.wendys.com Web site, the 10-ounce Jalapeno Cheddar Double Melt – yes, the final weight of your melt is about 10 ounces despite the half-pound pre-cooking weight claim – will rock you with 730 calories, 42g total fat (18g saturated; 2.5g trans), 150mg cholesterol, 1,760mg sodium, 35g carbs, and 53g protein. And that doesn’t include the soft drink and fries that beefs up the negative nutritional values.

Bacon Double Homestyle Melt, Burger King

The Bacon Double Homestyle Melt has four half-slices of bacon, three slices of melted Swiss cheese and two hamburger patties with a garlic cheese sauce on ‘buttery flavored’ sourdough bread. It crowns you with 810 calories (520 calories from fat), 58g fat (20g saturated fat; 2g trans fat), 135mg cholesterol, 1,370mg sodium, 34g carbs, and 39 grams protein.

Banana Cream Pie Blizzard, Dairy Queen

I ordered a Banana Cream Pie Blizzard and mentally patted myself on the back for getting a medium rather than a large. My 14-ounce sweet escape weighed me down with 790 calories, 30g fat (16g saturated; 2.5g trans), 60mg cholesterol, 460mg sodium, and 118g carbs.

Chunky Fully Loaded Stroganoff-Style Beef soup, Campbell’s

The marketing slogan promises "extreme amounts of meat"… Chunky is taking soup "to the next level"… the Fully Loaded varieties will “fill you up right.” While my Stroganoff-style beef variety did indeed fill me up it also bloated me out with 500 calories, 28 grams of fat and 1,620mg of sodium. You could do less damage to your diet if you tried halving your 18.8-ounce can, but since you don’t add water and it basically filled one soup bowl I considered this two-serving soup a single serving.

Classic Italian Toasted Sub, Arby’s

Arby’s, the king of roast beast sandwiches, rolled out a four-sub line of toasted offerings that include Philly Beef, French Dip & Swiss, Turkey Bacon Club, and my favorite, the Sophia Lorne of subs… the Classic Italian! According to the nutrition facts at the www.arbys.com, Web site, this 13.5-ounce toasted sub hits your soft underbelly with 827 calories, 45g of fat (13g saturated; 0.5g trans), 89mg cholesterol, 2,495mg sodium and 66g of carbs.

Maxed Out Lunchables Pizza Stix

As our waistlines have grown, so too have the nutrition stats for the line of Lunchables.  The new and “improved” offerings are boldly labeled Maxed Out. The nutrition label on the Maxed Out Pizza Stix Lunchable lists 680 calories, 10g of fat, 4.5g of saturated fat, 15mg cholesterol, 1,440mg sodium (60% of your Recommended Daily Allowance), and 130g carbs (with 72g of sugar)!

 

 

John McGran (nargcm@aol.com) has been a writer/editor for about as long as he’s been battling his weight. During his 25 year-career, John has written for several newspapers, tabloids and Web sites. One of his newest gigs is as co-writer of BadFoodGoodFood.com.

 



Note: This information was accurate when it was published. Please be sure to confirm all rates and details directly with the businesses in question before making your plans.

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