Day 38 - Taco Bell

Taco Bell is my one and only favorite fast food chain, but like Burger King and all other fast food restaurants, their products (though tasty) are not all that good for us. But before I get into that any further, I want to look briefly at the history of Taco Bell.

Taco Bell was originally created by Glen Bell. However, before he opened his first Taco Bell restaurant , Glen first started a Bell's Drive-In and Taco Tia in San Bernardino in 1954.

Glen Bell

In 1962, Glen opened his first Taco Bell in Downey, California.

First Taco Bell

Like other chains, Glen began to franchise his stores to other people in the mid 1960s. In 1964, Glen sold his first franchise to Kermit Becky, a retired L.A. policeman who opened his store in Torrance, California. From there, Taco Bell restaurants began expanding all over the country. In 1967, just three years after selling its first franchise, Taco Bell opened its 100th store in Anaheim. Three years later, Taco Bell became a public business.

In 1978, Glen Bell sold 868 restaurants to PepsiCo and became a PepsiCo shareholder, linking Taco Bell with Pepsi and creating a very profitable partnership. In 1989, Taco Bell pioneered the concept of linking fast food marketing promotions with major movie blockbusters like "batman". This proved to be a huge success and was further used by other fast food companies.

In 1990, Taco Bell began making improvements to the menu items and speedy concept by adding 59 cent, 79 cent, and 99cent menu items and by adding drive through windows to their stores. This helped to both increase sales as well as provide customers on the go with an opportunity to buy their food quickly.

Taco Bell partnered up with the Boys and Girls Clubs of America in 1992, allowing them to help raise funds to support the children in the program. Taco Bell is still in support of this organization.

The famous slogan "Think Outside the Bun" finally came into existence in 2001. The slogan is now synonymous with Taco Bell. They also added new products to their menu like the Gordita in 1998, Baja Blast in 2004, and the Crunchwrap Supreme in 2005 (which was such a big hit that it was added permanently to the menu in 2006).

Finally, in 2010, Taco Bell has begun to offer some of their cheapest deals yet: $2, $4, and $5 combo meals!

But before you run over to your local Taco Bell, you may want to take a look at some of their nutritional facts. Some items that you may think are healthy may actually surprise you in the amount of calories, fat, or sodium they contain. Below I will discuss some of their more well known products to give you some insight to their nutritional values.

Taco Bell's exclusive Baja Blast is one of my absolute favorite soda drinks, but I am definitely going to think twice before getting it again. Since almost everyone gets the large size, I looked up the facts for a large sized Baja Blast soda. One large sized soda packs about 410 calories alone! This is about 1/4 to 1/5 of the calories we are supposed to consume in a single day!! On top of the mere calories associated with this soda, it also contains 109 grams of sugar! Better watch those teeth after slurping one of these drinks down.

My other Taco Bell favorite is their plain Bean Burritos, but these too surprised me with how many calories they contain (370) and the extremely high sodium content. One burrito contains up to 1150 mg of sodium. This is incredible considering that we are only supposed to consume 300 mg a day. No wonder the beans taste so good. While the sodium content is horrible, it is good to note that these burritos are high in one good area: dietary fiber, which they contain 11 grams of.

Taco Bell has recently come out with a new burrito product, the Quad Steak Burrito. This burrito contains about 690 calories for just the burrito, and 26 grams of fat! On top of that, it has one of the absolute highest amounts of sodium in it: 2210 mg of sodium!

Surprisingly, even the small packets of sauce tend to be high in sodium as well. The newest Salsa Verde has only about 10 calories, but one packet has about 170 mg of sodium.

Taco Bells Specialty Mexican Pizza contains 540 calories and 30 grams of fat. Consuming this delicious pizza will not only  give you enough calories for one full meal, but it will also give you more than three times the amount of sodium you require: 1030 mg of sodium to be exact.

One of Taco Bells more famous products, the Steak Quesadilla, is also high in both calories and sodium. It contains 520 calories, 28 grams of fat, and 1250 mg of sodium. Of the three different choices of quesadilla (beef, chicken, or steak), it is good to know that steak is definitely your healthiest option.

For those of you who like to keep their Taco Bell meals simple with plain soft and crunchy tacos, it interesting to find that crunchy tacos are actually better health-wise. While soft tacos have 210 calories, 9 grams of fat, and 560 mg sodium; the crunchy taco has only 170 calories, 10 grams of fat (just one more than the soft taco), and 330 mg of sodium. The crunchy taco has one of the lowest amounts of sodium in it.

Finally, one of the more popular dollar menu items is the Taco Bell Beefy 5-Layer Burrito. This burrito contains 560 calories though and 22 from fat. On top of that, the small burrito is also extremely high in sodium, containing 1470 mg of it.

So next time you visit your local Taco Bell, make sure to check out the nutrition facts on the menu items and stick to items that contain fewer calories, fewer grams of fat, and as low of sodium content as possible. I am definitely very saddened to find out that my favorite bean burrito is not as good for me as I had hoped. Perhaps this will just encourage me to make my own homemade and healthier version instead of driving through that window for an impulse buy.

Exercise: While I would have liked to get a good twenty minute run in before my yoga class today, I had to stay and work later than usual. So today is just a Vinyasa II yoga workout. Vinyasa refers to the kind of yoga that uses breathing and flowing movements. So you will inhale to do one movement, and exhale when you move into the next. Try to get a good hour in: starting with warm up stretching for twenty minutes, then working in more cardio with more movements and more difficulty for twenty minutes, then finish with twenty minutes of cool down stretching and at least five minutes of Shavasana (which is just relaxing in a pose lying down and meditating on a peaceful place).

Here is one of the flows we did in my class today (you can look up pictures of the different moves on the web if you don't know them): Reverse Swan Dive - Standing Forward Bend - Extend right leg behind you - Warrior II - Reverse Warrior - Warrior II - Lower hands back to the floor next to left foot - Left foot back to Plank - Lower slowly to the ground - Cobra - Downward Dog - Lift Right Leg into the Air - Knee to Nose - Extend Leg - Knee to right tricep - Extend Leg - Knee to left tricep - extend leg - Lower leg - Walk feet up to hands - Look half way up - Touch toes and stretch in Standing Forward Bend - Reverse Swan Dive - Hands front and center. REPEAT for other leg.

Eat: Breakfast is one of the most important meals you can eat in a day. It is especially important for getting our metabolisms going right off the bat. Therefore, make sure you always eat your breakfast within an hour of waking! And coffee alone does not count! Have a good bowl of cereal, some oatmeal or Cream of Wheat, or some delicious fluffy pancakes :)

Relax: Today I want to encourage all of you to do one of my absolute favorite yoga poses: The Cobra. For this move, you simply have to lie down on your stomach on the floor. Then place your hands right under your shoulders and push up. To do this correctly, you will want your thighs to still be touching the ground and you will feel a lovely stretch in your lower back. If you are ever feeling tension in your lower back, this is a great way to relieve some of that stress!