This is Sara. And Holy Crap.

I took a long lunch today to pick up a welding setup my boyfriend bought for me for X-mas. We'll just call him Pete. SO, on the way there Pete and I decide to hit a quick bite, I was so hungry I was cranky and it was top priority. So we head to On The Border. I generally don't like major restaurant chains, and I generally don't like mexican food. They both make me feel heavy and greasy afterward, but we were in the West End and local culture has an inverse relationship to westward travel here in Boise. So be it.

I scanned the menu, everything looked good to me and my stomache. Then I got hung up on something. They advertize what they call their "Smart" menu and claim: All these meals are less than 800 calories. Golly, only 800 per meal huh? Then I'll take 3! Right. This number seemed rediculously high to me. 800 calories?! Are you serious? This is something to brag about? I showed this to Pete then scanned the restaurant. America was quite present.

So I decided to mosey on toward the fish selections. Ah! Fish tacos! That looks great. And how in the hell could they be more than 800 calories? It was fish, lettuce, chipoltle, and taco shells.

Well, when they got to me I realized the fish was battered and deep fried. The chipoltle was a mayo mix and the taco shells were actually flour tortillas. Okay I said, I'll just munch on the fish and there is now way I could eat all three of those monsters!

One thing blatant about at least my town is the size of the portions every where. A "small" soda is at least 20 ounces, even though it should be 12 or 8 which are the technical adult servings of any beverage. And that is the way it is for all food everywhere now. So normally 1/3 of a "standard portion" is enough to hold me for a good 4 or 5 hours. Often the kids portion is perfect.

I eat a little over a third of the meal before I am stuffed. Here is why I am so glad I only ate a third:

Later on I checked out the web site my friend and I are using to tell how many calories our food is when we are curious. (www.calorieking.com) This meal came up under "fish tacos" at "On The Border" as a whopping 1590 calories!!! --keep in mind the adult recommended caloric intake is 2000 a day. And really that should be less if you are sedentary. So add a dessert and in one sitting you are done for the day!

It is gross. Very very gross. And to think that the majority of Americans eat this way ALL THE TIME. NPR today called it "processed food like substances " as opposed to "real food."