This is tasty way for a magazine to get you to click 51 times: The online version of Health magazine has come out with a list of the “50 Fattiest Foods in the States,” a collection of gut-busters that areeither unique to a certain state or created there.
This is like fast-food p*rn, and it’s most entertaining if you use the “view all” button and can see everything stacked up together. It’s a palette rich with gastrointestinal history. For instance, I learned that in my home state of Wyoming, a group of Shoshone Indiansacquired their nickname, the “Sheep Eaters,” because of their fondness for lamb, one of the fattier kinds of meat. And the BLT served at Tony’s I-75 in Birch Run, Mich., must be seen to be believed.
What’s California’s contribution to this culinary compendium? In-N-Out’s Double-Double with onion. Here’s what Health.com has to say about it:
Golden State residents are known for their fit bodies, gym-sculpted abs, and love for In-N-Out Burger. This West Coast drive-thru chain uses fresh ingredients, but its Double Double should also be known for its fat content, nearly double the fat in a McDonald’s Double Cheeseburger.
What’s that you say? Nearly twice the fat of the McD’s double cheese? A comparison of both chains’ nutritional PDFs shows that to be true: the Double-Double has 41 grams of fat, as well as 670 calories and a whopping 1,440 milligrams of sodium. The sodium alone represents 96 percent of the limit most Americans should abide each day, according to new dietary guidelines.
McDonald’s offering, by comparison, has 23 grams of fat, 440 calories and 1,150 mg of sodium. Better, right?
But wait! One might debate how many times more flavorful the In-N-Out burger is than McDonald’s (10 times? 20 times?), but there’s no doubting it’s exactly twice as big. The Double-Double weighs 11.6 ounces, compared to the McD’s double-cheese’s 5.8 ounces.
So let’s break it down per ounce:
In-N-Out: 57.8 calories, 3.5 grams fat, 124.1 mg sodium.
McDonald’s: 75.6 calories, 4.4 grams fat, 197.6 mg sodium.
So In-N-Out is actually healthier than McDonald’s! Take that, Health.com!
The list is more for fun than a contribution to nutritional science. “We got many submissions from local Health.com and Health mag readers through Twitter and Facebook. So this is not a scientific poll — it’s more local foods that locals consider the fattiest, then we vetted with our staff dietitians,” Health.com Editor in Chief Amy O’Connor said by way of an e-mail offered by a Time Inc. PR person.
Here’s something else I just learned: If you want a healthier version of the Double-Double, order it “Protein Style,” in which the bun is replaced by leaves of lettuce. That brings the nutritional numbers down to 39 grams of fat, 520 calories and 1,160 mg of sodium.
