Eating out on the keto diet can be tricky. It’s hard to ever know exactly what ingredients are going into your food, and getting the right nutrition facts is usually challenging.

While chain restaurants aren’t generally known for being the healthiest options, some of them do at least provide a lot of information that you can arm yourself with when trying to stick to keto and still eat out.

In this article, I’ll exam the pros and cons of Red Lobster, and give you the best tips available to help stay low carb while eating there.

Tips for Ordering Keto at Red Lobster

• Portion control

One of the reasons Red Lobster is so vastly popular in America is because of it’s large portions, and enticing all you can eat options. However when you’re following a keto diet, portion control is one of the best defenses you can bring with you to help enjoy your meal without risking your state of ketosis.

It’s easy to get sucked in to chain restaurants’ deals, but price shouldn’t be a deciding factor when it comes to over-eating. Red Lobster has lots of endless shrimp and endless biscuit deals but it’s important to know that a lot of chain restaurant food can still be high in carbs even though homemade versions might be perfectly keto-friendly. When it doubt, look up the macros online first, and stick to a decent portion within your macronutrient and calorie goals.

• Take advantage of the interactive menu for nutrition facts

One cool thing about eating at Red Lobster is each table usually gets a fancy electronic interactive menu. You can use this to your advantage and quickly look up nutrition facts when deciding on what to order.

It’s extremely helpful for deciding between fish, meat, and vegetable dishes that may have a surprisingly high amount of carbs that you wouldn’t have known about before.

The interactive menu is also a solid bet for those with food allergies or diabetes, because all of the important nutrition facts are presented right there at your fingertips.

• Steak is your best bet

While fish is probably what Red Lobster is most known for, certain cuts of steak are one of the best ways to meet all of your macros, and are the least likely menu option to have hidden amounts of net carbs.

While a lot of keto dieters will attest that fish is a good source of fatty acids – which is true – steak still provides more bang for your buck in my opinion.

As an example, a serving of Live Main Lobster has about 35 grams of fat and 34 grams of protein, whereas the New York Strip steak has a whopping 45 grams of fat and 68 grams of protein. While it might be more expensive depending on the location you go to, you can’t argue with those macros.

• Ask about the catch of the day

Another pretty cool aspect of Red Lobster is that most locations offer a catch of the day, which almost always guarantees that you’ll be able to get the freshest type of fish available.

When deciding on fish, you can also ask if it’s farm raised or wild caught, which can help give you insights into things like mercury as well as vital nutrients like magnesium, phosphorus, and potassium. Typically, wild caught fish is the healthier option of the two when it comes to those nutrient breakdowns.

• Opt for melted butter wherever possible

While most diets will tell you to shy away from butter, all good keto dieters know that grass fed organic butter is one of the best ways to add healthy fat macros to a meal, and Red Lobster has got a ton of it.

Generally the butter is reserved to baste most lobster, crab, and fish entrees, but you can easily ask for them to lather your steak, chicken, or vegetables in it too to help beef up your fat count for the day.

You can also ask for sour cream, which is another good way to add a huge amount of fat, good flavor, and still not go overboard on carbs or calories.

Keto-Friendly Red Lobster Menu Items

• Appetizers

  • Tuna poke tasting plate (order without the tortilla strips or soy-sesame sauce, ask for butter or sour cream instead)
  • Roasted garlic mussels (without bread, sub sauce for butter)
  • Signature shrimp cocktail (sub cocktail sauce for dipping butter)
  • Buffalo Chicken Wings (hold the sauce if possible, ask for celery on the side – still only 5 grams of total carbs)

• Lunch

  • Maple-glazed chicken (hold the glaze, sub rice for double broccoli or ask for no rice at all)
  • Yucatán tilapia and shrimp (hold the pineapple, sub rice for double broccoli)
  • Farm-raised catfish (ask for blackened instead of fried, hold the tartar sauce or sub it for dipping butter – ask for a side of broccoli or asparagus)
  • Classic Caesar salad with chicken (hold the croutons, stick to the regular caesar dressing, but you can sub chicken for grilled shrimp or salmon if you prefer)
  • Wild-caught flounder (ask for oven-broiled instead of fried, hold the tartar sauce and sub with butter, ask for vegetables instead of fries)
  • Grilled or steamed sole
  • Summer power bowl (hold the grapes, substitute rice for broccoli and asparagus)
  • Hand-crafted garlic shrimp scampi (side of vegetables)
  • Dragon power bowl (hold the soy ginger sauce in place of butter, sub rice for double veggies)
  • Wild-caught snow crab legs
  • Shrimp and wood-grilled chicken (ask for wood-grilled shrimp as well, sub rice for double veggies)
  • Wood-grilled shrimp skewers (side of vegetables and a side salad with oil and light vinegar)

• Seafood Dinners

  • Live Maine lobster (steamed with broccoli and asparagus on the side, sub tartar sauce for butter)
  • Rock lobster tail (substitute rice for extra vegetables)
  • Canadian walleye (ask for it to be made blackened or broiled with vegetables as the side, and butter instead of dipping sauce)
  • Salmon New Orleans (substitute vegetables for rice or potatoes as side)
  • Harbor Bay Lobster Bake (ask for no broth and no sauce, substitute the linguini for broccoli or vegetable of your choice)
  • Wood-grilled shrimp, lobster, or salmon (Substitute rice for veggies with any of these.
  • Seafarer’s feast (ask for grilled shrimp as opposed to fried shrimp, substitute sauce for butter, and choose vegetables as your side)
  • Ultimate feast (Ask to have the Walt’s favorite shrimp grilled instead of fried, hold all dipping sauces in place of butter, and choose vegetables and side salad instead of rice and potatoes)

• Steak Dinners

  

  • Seven ounce sirloin steak
  • Six ounce filet mignon
  • Wood-grilled shrimp and sirloin
  • New York Strip and lobster rock tail (grilled)
  • 12 ounce New York Strip steak

• Drinks

Drinks are generally pretty slim when it comes to Red Lobster. You can of course enjoy water, coffee, and unsweetened tea, but you’ll have to be very safe when it comes to alcohol. You can check out my guide to drinking alcohol on keto here.

Off Limits Red Lobster Food for Keto

This list is obviously going to be a lot longer than the list of what you can eat on keto, so I’ll keep it brief and general. While it’s important to know what not to eat to avoid at Red Lobster risking ketosis, I’ve also included some useful tips for eating at any restaurant while on keto that you can check out at the end of this post.

• Appetizers

  • Fried Oysters
  • Seaside sampler
  • Lobster and Langostino pizza
  • Langostino lobster-artichoke-and-seafood dip
  • Seafood stuffed mushrooms (with the signature sauce)
  • Shrimp potstickers
  • Chilled lobster and shrimp roll
  • Dragon broccoli (because of the sauce)
  • Loaded seaside fries (or any french fries or potatoes)
  • Peppercorn-panko calamari (or any kind of calamari)
  • Parrot Isle jumbo coconut shrimp
  • Batter fried crawfish (and generally any other batter fried options)

• Lunch

  • Seaside shrimp trio
  • Snow crab legs
  • Dragon shrimp
  • Lobster Mac and Cheese
  • Fried sole
  • Admiral’s feast
  • Southwest Style tacos
  • Linguini alfredo
  • All types of soup
  • Crunchy popcorn shrimp
  • Hand-breaded shrimp
  • Chilled lobster and shrimp rolls and fries

• Dinner

  • Four-course feast
  • Tuna Poke Tasting Plate
  • Seafood Gumbo
  • Manhattan Clam Chowder
  • All desserts (Brownie Overboard, Warm Apple Crostada, Vanilla Bean Cheesecake, Chocolate Wave, Key Lime Pie, Baileys and Coffee, Coffee Nudge, Irish Coffee)
• Drinks
  • All signature cocktails, martinis, frozen favorites, and margaritas

Keto Restaurant Rules to Follow

• Plan your order in advance

This rule is vital for sticking to keto when eating out at any type of restaurant, fast food or otherwise.

One of the best ways that you can set yourself up for success is to simply plan your meal out ahead of time, and stick to it once you’re ready to order. Some of the best ways to do this include research (like what you’re doing on this article right now!) and pre-recording your meals with a macro-counting app. This way you’ll know how much you have left in your calorie and carb budget for the rest of the day, especially if you feel like getting a non-menu special or item that you didn’t see previously on the menu.

• Watch out for deep fried foods

Deep fried foods can be tough, and depending on who you ask in the keto community, you might get some mixed opinions.

Specific types of oils used in deep frying can sometimes promote inflammation in the body, which can negatively affect your state of ketosis, even if they’re not inherently high in carbs. This is because inflammation works against the ketogenic process, and can work against your body when it comes to burning ketones and fat. Some of the big oils to look out for include vegetable oil and soybean oil – unfortunately two very common frying oils in a lot of fast food chains and restaurants.

• Aim for high fat over high protein

When it comes to the keto diet, a lot of people spend too much time focusing on where they’re going to get their protein, and not enough time on their fat macro targets.

On a keto diet, it’s commonly advised that you should aim to eat more fat than protein, because that’s what your body has adapted to for burning fuel and creating energy once it has entered a state of ketosis.

Focusing on fat over protein is important for a couple of reasons. Many people don’t know this, but eating too much protein can actually contribute to you getting kicked out of ketosis.

This effect happens via a process known as gluconeogensis, and while it can be hard to induce, if you’re not paying attention to your protein count it’s definitely possible to have it happen. During gluconeogenesis, your body will start to create glucose out of protein, which will take you out of ketosis fast.

• Balance out the rest of your day

If there’s at least one suggestion to remember to follow when it comes to eating out on keto, it’s this one.

It’s perfectly fine to go ahead and bend the rules of your diet by having fast food every once in a while, and you should definitely opt for fast food over no food if there are simply no other options around.

However if you do eat fast food, your body will greatly thank you if you always balance those unhealthy meals with nutrient-dense healthy meals before and after, so that your body can perform optimally and process that fast food much more efficiently, and not give you those uncomfortable digestive effects afterward.

• Don’t get discouraged

This one’s important for sticking with keto in the long run. Accidents happen, cravings take over, and sometimes there just isn’t another available option. If you have some fast food that you don’t know how to track, and think it might knock you out of ketosis, it’s going to be okay.

One of the main reasons people quit this diet is from being discouraged or accidentally eating the wrong thing and just giving up. But honestly, ketosis can be achieved fairly quickly, its the results you want out of keto that are a marathon and not a sprint. You’re much better off sticking with ketosis, even with a dietary hiccup, than you are giving up altogether.

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