8 Worst Restaurant "Freebies"

Imagine you’re out shopping for a new car. You arrive at the dealership and find dozens of choices, at a variety of prices. But this particular car dealer has a special bargain for you: He’s got a two-door sitting in his back lot, and just for setting foot in his dealership, he’s willing to give it to you, for free. Free! No charge! Is that a bargain, or what?

There’s only one hitch: It’s a ’74 Gremlin, and it hasn’t run in 25 years. In fact, its engine is so rusted out, it can never run. But if you’re willing to haul it home, it can sit in your front yard forever, collecting pigeon poo, and it won’t cost you a dime. Great deal, right?

No? Hauling home someone else’s useless junk doesn’t appeal to you? Well, this is the kind of deal most of us accept almost every time we eat at a restaurant. Your favorite chains know that people love the word “free,” so they’re willing to give you plenty of free stuff—except that stuff is, for the most part, worthless. It’s the nutritional equivalent of a rusted out Gremlin, but instead of cluttering up your front yard, it’ll be cluttering up your front porch, just above your belt buckle.

And because it's free, we come back for more. That leads to bigger profits for the restaurants and bigger bellies for us. Doesn't sound like such a great deal now, does it? To help you recognize the nutritional garbage, here are most frightening freebies at America's favorite restaurants, compliments of new Eat This, Not That! 2012. Leave these junkers on the trash heap where they belong.

#8: WORST "FREE" BREADSTICK
Fazoli’s Garlic Breadsticks (1 breadstick)
150 calories
7 g fat (1.5 g saturated)
290 mg sodium
20 g carbohydrates

These free, unlimited breadsticks are the foundation of any visit to Fazoli’s. They're also the foundation of a blood sugar spike and carbohydrate coma. If you casually nibble these throughout the course of a meal, you could easily put three of them away. In that case, you've just taken in 450 calories—an entire meal on top of your 800-calorie Chicken Carbonara. Eat any more than that and you'll end up doughier than Fazoli's oven. Breadsticks are like appetizers in that we rarely recognize their full fat-making impact.  

#7: WORST "FREE" BISCUIT
Red Lobster Cheddar Bay Biscuits (1 biscuit)
150 calories
8 g fat (2.5 g saturated fat)
350 mg sodium
16 g carbohydrates

Red Lobster's iconic biscuits are complimentary with any entrée, and as long as you keep eating, your server will keep bringing. Red Lobster’s website boasts that 395 million are doled out every year—that's more than one biscuit for every man, woman, and child in America. And if you eat just two alongside your Parrot Isle Jumbo Coconut Shrimp, your meal balloons to the caloric equivalent of more than a half-dozen Krispie Kreme glazed doughuts. What's especially sad about this is that Red Lobster is among the healthiest restaurant chains in the country, so these biscuits are a stain on an otherwise decent menu. 

#6: WORST “FREE” DIPPING SAUCE
Papa John’s Special Garlic sauce (1 container, 28 g)
150 calories
17 g fat (3 g saturated)
310 mg sodium

Between the fatty toppings and oversized crusts, pizza faces many nutritional obstacles. What it doesn't need is a ramakin of oil to go alongside every order, yet Papa John's will happily hand over this "garlic" sauce with every pizza it serves. Every calorie in this sauce comes from fat, and we're not talking olive oil here. The first two ingredients are fully and partially hydrogenated oils. Add to that 14 other difficult-to-pronounce ingredients and you have one nefarious dipping sauce.

#5: WORST “FREE” “HEALTHY” BREAD 
Cosi Etruscan Whole Grain Flatbread (1 piece)
235 calories
2 g fat (0 g saturated)
72 mg sodium

Let's be fair: This isn't terrible bread. It has 3 grams of fiber and 9 grams of protein. What is terrible is that it comes alongside every salad, and Cosi's salads don't need the extra 235 calories. Say you order a standard Cobb salad. That's 713 calories, a big meal, but you can offset it with a smaller dinner. Now add to that a side of Flatbread and suddenly you're at 948 calories. A lunch that size makes it difficult to stay within your caloric means for the day. The point is, you don't need the extra calories to make a full meal. There's no harm in politely declining. 

#4: WORST "FREE" BREAKFAST
Denny's Unlimited Pancake Stack, Buttermilk Pancakes with Maple-Flavored Syrup (2 pancakes)
473 calories
4 g fat (0.5 g saturated)
1,196 mg sodium
103 g carbohydrates

While I fully endorse eating breakfast—after all, a study in the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition found that the average waistline of breakfast eaters is nearly 2 inches smaller than those who skip—this breakfast is far more likely to increase your waist. Just two buttermilk pancakes will cost you more calories than four full servings of Breyers Smooth & Dreamy Dark Chocolate Velvet ice cream. And if you go for double or triple that, you’ve ruined your diet for the day without paying one extra dime. Denny's PR material boasts about the “value” of this meal, but if you're among those who value your body, steer clear of this endless stack of pancakes.

#3: WORST "FREE" SALAD
Olive Garden Bottomless Salad
Garden-Fresh Salad (1 serving with dressing)
350 calories
26 g fat (4.5 g saturated)
1,930 mg sodium
22 g carbohydrates

Olive Garden's salad may be the most concerning of all free foods. Loading up on greens seems like a smart way to blunt your appetite before the pasta hits the table, but as it turns out, eating a couple bowls of this salad will saddle you with a full 700 calories—more than you should be eating over the entire course of your meal. What's more, Olive Garden hands out free breadsticks, and at 150 calories apiece, they make it very easy to rack up nearly 1,000 calories before your meal arrives. But perhaps the most shocking thing about this salad is the sodium. Each bowl has more than most people should consume in an entire day. The good news? You can cut out about 75 percent of that sodium by eschewing the dressing in favor of oil and vinegar.

#2: WORST “FREE” KIDS DESSERT
Friendly’s Kids Peanut Butter Cup Friend-Z
860 calories
45 g fat (18 g saturated)
71 g sugars

Friendly’s has a philosophy that every meal should end with ice cream, so when your child orders a lunch or dinner, the dessert comes free. And these are no small desserts—8 of the 10 exceed 400 calories. The worst among them is the Peanut Butter Cup Friend-Z, a small bucket of hot fudge sauce and Reese’s Peanut Butter Cups churned into soft serve ice cream. The Friend-Z has four times more calories than an actual package of Reese’s. So say your child orders a crispy chicken Wrap It Up Wrap with Waffle Fries, and for a beverage (which is also free) she orders strawberry milk. Meal total so far: 1,770 calories. You’re hesitant to order dessert, but what the heck. It’s free, right? So you tack on a Friend-Z. The grand total for your child’s meal is 2,630 calories. That’s about 1,000 more than an active 8-year-old needs in an entire day, and it’s a foundation for habits that could lead to a lifetime struggle with food and body weight.

THE #1 WORST “FREE” RESTAURANT FOOD
Olive Garden Fettuccine Alfredo Never Ending Pasta Bowl
1,110 calories
64.5 g fat (38.5 g saturated)
845 mg sodium

Here’s the deal: You pay for the first bowl, and every subsequent bowl is on Olive Garden. Eat as many as you like. Think of it as trough-style eating—the same thing farmers rely on to fatten up livestock. But not even livestock take in such heavy loads of fat. Thanks to the unrestrained use of oil, butter, cheese, and cream, each bowl of this pasta harbors nearly two full day’s worth of saturated fat. Let’s do the math. Say you wolf down two-and-a-half bowls before you wave the white napkin of defeat. You’ve just taken in enough saturated fat to meet the daily limit for a full table of five.  

Now get this: For an extra $2.95, you can top each of these bowls with Italian sausage. Now your two-and-a-half bowl binge weighs in at 3,475 calories (nearly twice what most people need in a day), 4,313 milligrams sodium (three times the amount most people need in a day), and 116.5 grams saturated fat (nearly six times your daily limit). Hope you packed some bigger pants, because you’re going to need them.