Cook This, Not That
6 ABC took low-cal versions of restaurant favorites to Rittenhouse Square for a local taste test.
Cook This, Not That, a cookbook brought to you by the Eat This, Not That gurus, shows you how to slash calories in popular chain restaurant dishes by cooking lighter versions at home. Sounds good, but how do the DIY dishes really compare? Yesterday, 6 ABC went into the kitchen with local nutritionist Emma Fogt to find out for themselves.
They whipped up the Cheesecake Factory’s mac and cheese, Chili’s hot spinach and artichoke dip and T.G.I. Friday’s potato skins. Then, they took the lower-cal dishes and their high-fat counterparts to Rittenhouse Square to see if local taste buds would be able to tell the difference. Surprisingly, Philadelphians actually liked the calorie-conscious mac and cheese—which was still made with real butter, cheese, panko breadcrumbs, and prosciutto, but used milk instead of cream—better than the Cheesecake Factory’s popular plate. On average, the cookbook versions trimmed 700 to 1,000 calories from each dish. Just goes to show you that you don’t have to compromise taste to cut down on calories.
