Eating Healthy when Traveling

On January 24, 2018 By Isobar ExpeditionsIn Food, Recipes, Travel Tips8 Comments

Regardless of the length of the trip or the exotic nature of the location, it is always difficult to eat healthy when traveling. Whether it is having to grab a quick bite at the airport or train station, eating a meal while sightseeing, or eating the local cuisine, healthy options are either not readily available or your eyes naturally shift to the more decadent options. Believe it or not, we always weigh ourselves before we leave on a trip and then compare it when we return so that we know whether we need to work on losing any weight we might have gained.

Salmon Chesapeake in Alexandria, Virginia

Although it isn’t always easy to find healthy options when traveling, that doesn’t mean that it is impossible. We love seafood and can’t always get a good variety at home, so one thing that we do is to look for fish or shellfish on the menu and try to select dishes that aren’t necessarily covered in a sauce. Another trick that we use is to share a meal or eat small plates to avoid over eating. Eating healthy doesn’t mean not eating things with flavor, it is more a matter of paying attention to how the food is prepared and whether the restaurant uses fresh ingredients.

We try to be realistic and understand that we will want to eat a variety of food some of which is going to be fried, smothered in a rich sauce, or covered in cheese and we are okay with that. As with anything, it is really a question of moderation. For example, just because you are in Italy doesn’t mean that every dish has to be pasta or pizza. We are firm believers of eating like a local, but that doesn’t mean that locals don’t have some healthy choices. What do you do to eat healthy when you are on the road?

Do You Prefer Casual or Fine Dining when Traveling?

On November 15, 2017 By Isobar ExpeditionsIn Food, Travel Tips5 Comments

Especially when traveling to larger cities, there tend to be an abundance of restaurants to choose from. Although we might select a nicer restaurant for a single night or a special occasion, we typically find more casual restaurants to grab a meal or quick bite. We go with casual restaurants for a variety of reasons. First of all, it is likely that we have been walking quite a bit and are usually dressed relaxed as we visit the various sights, so we don’t want to feel underdressed. We also find that some finer restaurants can be a little pretentious and we are all about simple food with great flavors that represent the region as opposed to a gourmet presentation. As we walk the streets of a city, we tend to look for a place that is warm and inviting, where the owners are typically visible, and where locals seem to be frequenting.

That isn’t to say that there is anything wrong with going to a fine dining restaurant, they certainly have a lot to offer as well, but we just tend to lean towards the more casual locations. We do, however, tend to go to an actual sit-down restaurant versus just grabbing something from a street vendor. We will get something from a street cart if we are in a rush and it looks like they have a clean cart and fresh looking food, but our preference is to be able to sit at a table, sip on a glass of wine or beer, and people watch. Sitting at a small café in a plaza or square and relaxing over some nibbles while watching all of the other tourists scurry around can be quite the interesting experience.

Blue Island Oyster Bar and Seafood in Denver, Colorado

On October 25, 2017 By Isobar ExpeditionsIn Colorado, Food2 Comments

We were spending the weekend in Denver and had heard about a seafood restaurant that was celebrating “Oystoberfest” for the entire month of October. The Blue Island Oyster Bar in the Cherry Creek area of Denver has an excellent happy hour every day and a wonderful selection of fresh seafood. One of the things that we learned during our time in Frankfurt, Germany, is that cities have an airport that is a major hub, restaurants can get deliveries of fresh seafood on the same day that the fish are caught. Denver is no different as it is centrally located and can receive seafood from both coasts daily. Blue Island has partnered with Blue Island Shellfish Farms in New York to get their seasonal oysters and other seafood delivered as fresh as possible.

We have mentioned previously that we don’t typically eat a large meal, but eat a few small plates to try as many different foods as possible. Obviously we had to get oysters and they were so good that we ended up getting a second dozen before the night was over. The menu stated that their clam chowder was the “City’s Best Clam Chowder”, so we had to give that a try as well as some chilled shrimp. The clam chowder was nice and thick with a lot of clams and the flavor was wonderful. There were a lot of other choices on the menu and based on the food that we did try, we are sure that you couldn’t go wrong with anything that you might choose. Their prices were very reasonable, especially considering the quality of the food, and we would definitely recommend them to anyone visiting Denver and looking for fresh seafood.