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I Thought Chipotle Was Healthy
By spokesman | March 30, 2009
As an avid cyclist, I am health conscious and try to eat healthy. I avoid the big fast food chains because of the high fat and sodium content of the food. I would occasionally eat at Chipotle because I had the perception that it was reasonably healthy. Like all fast food restaurants, they have to publicly disclose the nutritional content of their food, but it is not easily accessible from their website. However a site called Chipotlefan.com has taken their nutritional information and created a clever application. The site allows you to select the items for your particular burrito (or taco or burrito bowl) and it calculates the nutritional information in the format of a nutritional label similar to those found on packed products. The nutrition label above was created by the site. I was shocked at the results. A chicken burrito with rice, beans and tomato salsa has 20 grams of fat and 1910 mgs of sodium. Add corn salsa, cheese and sour cream and you wind up with 40 grams of fat and 2530 grams of sodium. Since the folks at Chipotle tend to really stuff the burritos, the actual fat and sodium can be even higher.
While rice and beans with grilled chicken seems to be much healthier than a burger and fries it is not if it comes from Chipotle. A McDonalds Big Mac and large fries has 54 grams of fat, 13.5 grams of saturated fat and 1390 mg of sodium. So Chipotle is lower in total fat but higher in saturated fat and sodium for the burrito combination described above. That is one killer burrito.
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Topics: Training |
March 31st, 2009 at 10:17 am
WHOA, I need to let my friends know about this. Great stuff. Thanks for letting me know.
April 1st, 2009 at 12:07 am
I checked out the nutritional calculator. The tortilla alone has 9 grams of fat and 28% of your daily sodium. You can get fat free corn tortillas and no sodium beans at Whole Foods. You are much better making your own burrito at home.
July 2nd, 2010 at 3:30 pm
I also thought that this was a healthy alternative, especially since they have such a “green” vibe. I too finally looked at some numbers after eating there and they are off the charts, scary.