Tips for eating while travelling...

[GregP]

I am away with work for the next 3 days (in Poland so plenty of stodgy carbs on offer!) and at the mercy of hotel/canteen/restaurant food.

Any tips for attempting to eat a vaguely sensible diet while travelling?

 

[Copepod]

From my memory of working at an adventure race in Poland a few years ago, bread and dumplings were included in most meals, but it's easy enough to ask not to have them, then eat just the soup / stew / meat / salad / pickled veg / yogurt etc. Diet soft drinks were available. Alcohol was very freely available, and the Poles were extremely generous. In a group of 7 Britons, 3 had birthdays within the week, so at the celebratory meal, we were given unlimited beer (lager type), Russian champagne and Polish vodka. Not the most even vaguely sensible evening of my life!

 

[khskel]

I can just about remember being in Warsaw once. The tripe soup was surprisingly good and they do a mean pork and cabbage dish calles bigos if memory serves me correctly

 

[@Fractis]

I'm like a bull in a china shop when I see a hotel breakfast buffet, so I have taken to bringing (for short trips) or buying (for longer stays) the "just add water" porridge pots. They are far from my favourite thing to eat 🙂eek🙂 but they do get the day of to a good start (i.e. better than a 1,500 calorie attack on the buffet).

 

[Copepod]

Just remembered a couple more things, prompted by other posters' comments.
Yes, bigos, meatballs with red or white cabbage and onions was tasty and low carb. One tip is to ask a local person how to pronounce some useful words. Before travelling to Poland, I met up with a Polish colleague to ask them how to pronounce eg names of towns, as I knew I would need to buy bus and train tickets. However, he suggested that some names were so difficult for a non native speaker, that he suggested writing them down or showing a map. He helped me pronounce a few words eg please, thank you, does that contain sugar? etc.
Hotel buffets throughout Europe often include cold meat, cheese, yogurt etc, which are generally lower calorie than English / Scottish / Welsh / Irish cooked breakfast items on UK / Irish hotel buffets. Even for those committed to low carb eating, treat of a single local bread roll is surely part of the pleasure of travelling?

 

[GregP]

Feeling quite proud of myself having walked to polish supermarket and bought cold meat, salad, fruit, cheese, natural yogurt etc enough for 3 days lunches and under a fiver

 

[GregP]

I'm like a bull in a china shop when I see a hotel breakfast buffet, so I have taken to bringing (for short trips) or buying (for longer stays) the "just add water" porridge pots. They are far from my favourite thing to eat 🙂eek🙂 but they do get the day of to a good start (i.e. better than a 1,500 calorie attack on the buffet).

Love a hotel breakfast! But stuck to fruit and eggs this morning so feeling virtuous!