I call them FDC meals. That is, Full Day’s Calories (FDC) meals. I suspect there are many meals that fit the bill, but here are 3 that I’ve eaten. Often after I eat out, I come home and check the nutritional data. Call it a hobby. Strangely I was a bit surprised at some of the numbers here. I have presented them here as a single day’s “three square meals”. Imagine if you at the following in one day:

FDC Breakfast: Perkins Heartland Omelette, served with hash brows, and 3 pancakes. Total calories: 1,830 cal. Total fat: 94 g. Total carbs: 185 g. Total protein: 63 g. Total sodium: 4380 mg.

FDC Lunch: McDonald’s Angus Burger, large fries and large chocolate shake. Total calories: 2,450. Total fat: 91 g. Total carbs: 329 g. Total protein: 78g. Total sodium: 2,930 mg (that’s without adding salt to the fries)

FDC Dinner: The Keg’s Caesar salad and Prime Rib with mashed potatoes. Total calories: 2,017. Total fat: 139 g. Total carbs: 88 g. Total protein: 102g. Total sodium: 3,942 mg.

Now I’m not one who recommends eating clean 100% of the time. It’s just that there are some meals that should probably be avoided if you have a hard time getting to or staying at a healthy weight.

I talked about this in my One True Diet article, where I coined the phrase Junk Food Efficiency. To recap, here are my Four Laws of Junk Food Efficiency:
“First Law: If I am going to eat food that’s bad for me, it better taste really good.
Second Law: Ideally it shouldn’t be so bad for me that it will undo 3 days of good eating.
Third Law: If there’s a choice between two mediocre tasting junk food options, pick the healthiest one.
Fourth Law: Less is better. ”

Back to the FDC meals. If you were to eat those three meals in one day, this is what your day would look like:
Total calories: 6,297. If you are a 335 pound male, that’s probably okay. It’s also okay if you are a 140 lb woman and are splitting this with 2 friends.
Total sodium: 11,252 mg! In fact let’s call it 11 g. That’s almost enough sodium for 5 people!

Admittedly very few people would eat all of those meals in one day. Instead lets a assume that you would eat one of those meals but still eat your regular meals the rest of the day. If you ate like that just once a week, you would stand to gain about 15 pounds per year. Just from eating that one FDC meal each week. Is it really worth it? I’m going to guess no. Remember Junk Food Efficiency next time you decide to treat yourself.

Do you know of any other FDCs? Or suspected FDCs? Please share!

References:
Nutrition data on Perkins website
Nutrition data on McDonald’s website
Nutrition data on The Keg website