A TASTE FOR LITE AND LIVELY : Healthful Menus Prove That Dining Out Doesn’t Have to Be Either Sinful or Boring

Spring. The time of year when we truly awaken from our winter hibernation, take a good look at ourselves in the mirror and decide we are going to be more diligent than ever about eating right.

It’s probably easier than you think to do this in Orange County restaurants.

Many of our leading restaurants feature reduced-calorie and reduced-fat menus that still reflect the spirit of their kitchens. More than 75 of them, in fact, have taken this one step further, supplementing their regular fare with “healthy dining” menus. The thing is, you usually have to ask for them.

But if you want more specific information, there is another tool available locally: a book entitled “Healthy Dining in Orange County,” available (at $9.95) in area bookstores and most Ralphs supermarkets.

Three women, Anita Jones, Esther Hill and Simone Ferreira, of a San Diego-based company called Accents on Health, have put together a book of specially designed menus now being served at approximately 76 different Orange County restaurants in more than 250 locations. All these menus feature dishes low in calories, fat, cholesterol and sodium.

I recently visited several places featured in the book, the purpose being to sample a few of these healthful dishes and report on how they taste. Generally, the results were positive.

You’ll find the number of calories and grams of fat, as reported in the book, in parentheses following each of the sampled dishes. These figures are meant strictly as guidelines. Not all the restaurants practice strict portion control, nor do they tell you the exact number of calories in any given dish, since government regulations require such estimates to always be accurate to within 3%.

More detailed nutritional information (such as sodium and cholesterol counts, diabetic food exchanges and the like) can be found in the pages of “Healthy Dining in Orange County,” or by calling the restaurants. The toll-free number for Accents On Health Inc. is (800) 266-2049.

Ho Sum Bistro

Chinese cafe fare, finger foods, dim sum and light salads are generally healthful foods to begin with, a natural for the healthful dining genre. They don’t sacrifice much in taste or color when they are further lightened to conform to diet restrictions.

This is a clean, bright place with a vaulted glass front, a high ceiling and two large counter areas. Service is performed by a cheerful team of beach types, and the average diner is bound to wish he was half as healthy as any of the waiters.

I had a revelation about Chinese food while dining here. Take the calories--mostly because of cooking oil--out of Chinese cuisine, and it tastes Japanese. (That’s why I haven’t bothered to include Japanese restaurants in this piece. Except for salt levels, almost any non-fried Japanese dish meets healthful dining standards.)

The healthful dining menu at Ho Sum Bistro is one of the most versatile of all these menus. You’ll dine on quenelles (433 calories, 7 grams fat), light steamed dumplings filled with minced chicken and vegetables; sesame seed chicken salad (460 calories, 15 grams fat), romaine lettuce tossed with sesame seeds, shredded chicken and a too-sweet dressing, and a rather tasteless dish of rice, steamed chicken and vegetables with the kittenish name Califoriental (507 calories, 3 grams fat). Pass on tong mein (589 calories, 5 grams fat); it’s a thoroughly boring noodle soup. But do try the vinegary hot and sour soup (56 calories for 10 ounces, 1 gram fat). It’s not wonderful, but with these few calories, who cares?

Ho Sum Bistro, 3112 Newport Blvd., Newport Beach. (714) 675-0896. Open Sunday through Thursday 11 a.m. to 10 p.m., Friday and Saturday till 11 p.m. American Express, MasterCard and Visa accepted.

Antonello

Many of us, wrongly, associate Italian dining with excessive calories. But for every Italian who looks like Pavarotti, I know three soccer players. It’s all that sauce, and not those much-maligned noodles called pasta, that makes an Italian dinner a blowout.

You won’t have to worry about that at Antonello, arguably our most elegant Italian restaurant. Slimmed-down owner Antonio Cagnolo calls his healthful dishes la cucina leggera, literally “the light kitchen,” and it’s one of the biggest and most accomplished selections available. The only caveat is the price. This is a big-ticket restaurant, and there’s no reduction for the wallet.

Start with one of many pastas or appetizers. The linguine alle vongole (455 calories, 17 grams fat) employs less oil than the traditional white clam sauce, and is delicious. I also like fagioli e gamberetti (372 calories, 15 grams fat), Tuscan white beans and shrimp. Instead of excess olive oil, the natural flavors of the bean themselves enliven the dish.

Italians are great fish eaters, so expect good light seafoods here as well. Halibut alle cinque erbe (437 calories, 20 grams fat) is broiled with a half-ounce of olive oil, and pesce spada al giardino (500 calories, 25 grams fat) turns out to be meaty swordfish with an ethereal vegetable topping. Incidentally, there are excellent and relatively guilt-free sides such as boiled potatoes (134 calories, 7 grams fat) and steamed spinach (83 calories, 7 grams fat) to round out your meal here.

Antonello, South Coast Plaza Village, 3800 S. Plaza Drive, Santa Ana. (714) 751-7153. Lunch Monday through Friday, 11:30 a.m. to 2 p.m,; dinner Monday through Thursday, 5:45 p.m. to 10 p.m., Friday and Saturday till 11 p.m. All major cards accepted.

Mayur

Indian cooking has one big ace up its sleeve when it comes to low-fat dining. I refer to the tandoor, or clay oven, a cylindrical pit that gets heated up to almost 800 degrees Fahrenheit, practically vaporizing the fats on meats and searing the juices into good vegetable preparations.

Mayur, an elegant small Corona del Mar restaurant run by Anju Kapoor, takes the healthful dining idea seriously. Both tandoori chicken (a scaled-down portion at 374 calories, 8 grams fat) and fish tikka kebab (342 calories, 7 grams fat) are great, the former ruddy with tandoori spices, the latter soft, red chunks of fresh swordfish redolent of ginger and garlic.

Side dishes such as fragrant basmati rice (132 calories, no fat) and roti (210 calories, no fat) marry perfectly with the vegetarian and non-vegetarian items Kapoor has designed for her healthful dining menu. But the biggest surprise here has to be her tandoori vegetables (267 calories, 10 grams fat), one of the simplest yet most sumptuous of all dishes I tasted while researching this article. It’s a gleaming metal dish of bell peppers, tomatoes, potato, cauliflower, mushrooms and paneer, low-fat farmer’s cheese, spiced with fennel, cumin and a hint of garlic.

One more to try is bharta (225 calories, 15 grams fat), not from the clay oven. It’s a stew of smoked, roasted eggplant cooked in a tomato and onion reduction, without the ghee, or clarified butter, that makes most Indian vegetable dishes taboo to the weight watcher.

Mayur, 2931 E. Coast Highway, Corona del Mar. (714) 675-6622. Open daily 11:30 a.m. to 10 p.m. All major cards.

McCormick and Schmick

McCormick and Schmick, a Portland-based chain rapidly expanding in Southern California, has the best selection of seafoods of any Orange County restaurant, on a terrific printed menu that changes daily. One day’s list included things such as Oregon ling cod, New Zealand sea bass, Costa Rican mahi mahi and a variety of fresh oysters from Puget Sound.

This is also an extremely handsome place with a ‘20s elegance--lots of rich mahogany, stained glass and other luxuries. Too bad the service is often spotty and user-unfriendly. With a little improvement, it would be one of the county’s best places to dine, bar none.

We all know fish is a good diet food, particularly when we pass up the beurre blanc. But McCormick and Schmick goes us all one better, with a small and perhaps superfluous menu of dining specials. Superfluous because the natural taste of plain broiled fish, with a little lemon squeezed on top, will do just fine, thank you.

One must, though, is tuna-pepper seared (214 calories, 2 grams fat) served with a rice vinegar soy sauce, resolutely Japanese except for a fine crust of black pepper. This is top-notch tuna--red in the center, slightly cooked around the edges. Black linguine with prawns pasta (481 calories, 8 grams fat), on the other hand is unspeakable, in a sticky sweet-sour sauce done in by pineapple. Less can be more, and the good noodles plain with steamed prawns would have been a better idea.

McCormick and Schmick, 2000 Main St., Irvine. (714) 756-0505. Open Monday through Friday 11 a.m. to 11 p.m., Saturday 5 to 11 p.m., Sunday 5 to 10 p.m. All major cards accepted.

The Black Sheep Bistro

Mediterranean cuisine employs lots of olive oil, lemon, garlic and tomato, a natural road to good health. Tustin’s Black Sheep Bistro, a small, homey restaurant with the most eclectic selection of red wines anywhere in Orange County, practically wrote the book on these foods.

Rick and Diana Boufford cook the healthful foods of France, Italy and Spain to begin with, so adapting these dishes to suit the standards set down in the “Healthy Dining” book required little effort. How about a salad maison (216 calories, 7 grams fat) to start with, assorted fresh greens and vegetables in a warm fresh herb vinaigrette? Or, when available, steamed Prince Edward Island mussels with a savory Spanish topping? (The latter dish is an occasional addition to the menu and not featured in the book; calorie and fat counts are not available.)

Main courses are definitely winners. Fresh lamb loin Provencale (358 calories, 16 grams fat) is flame-broiled lamb made in a thick sauce of tomato, onion and olives, and Rick Boufford prepares his chicken breast and herb garlic sauce (289 calories, 7 grams fat) with white wine, garlic, olive oil and more than a dozen herbs and spices. Basically, though, any meat served here is grilled over an open flame and trimmed of virtually all fat. Rick Boufford is apt to have fish like fresh sea bass on hand, too, and good sides of fluffy rice and steamed vegetables.

When ordering wine, remember that, despite the alleged benefits with regard to lowering blood cholesterol, red wine is still more caloric than white. That said, my advice would be to leave yourselves in the Bouffords’ capable hands and let them choose the wine that will best accompany your dish. Don’t miss the fresh raspberries they keep around for dessert, either. You can eat raspberries all day and not gain an ounce.

Black Sheep Bistro, 303 El Camino Real, Tustin. (714) 544-6060. Lunch Tuesday through Friday 11:30 a.m. to 2:30 p.m., dinner Tuesday through Sunday 5 to 10 p.m. American Express, MasterCard and Visa accepted.

Avila’s El Ranchito Mexican Restaurant

The El Ranchito restaurants have been around for ages, but the festive Costa Mesa location recently reopened after a long closure. Part of the regular menu here is labeled “light cuisine,” but there is no special menu card per se. And common sense would dictate that here, the caloric estimates in the book are not exactly in the ballpark--portions simply look too big.

Take pollo asado (182 calories, 4 grams fat), which is a huge chicken breast smothered in a tomatoes and onion; light, yes, but plated with Spanish rice, pinto beans and a big glob of sour cream. I didn’t bother to ask if this was “lite” sour cream.

Most of the “light cuisine” entrees are delicious and substitute chicken for pork or beef, both of which contain substantially more calories per ounce. The book’s enchiladas nortena (469 calories, 12 grams fat) are called light enchiladas on this menu, rolled crepes with more of this chicken, onion and tomato filling. The book tells you to request no sour cream. Better tell them to leave off that cheese as well.

One thing you can safely eat, however, is the house salad (calorie and fat counts unavailable), a pungent toss of greens with a delicious lime cilantro dressing. You’ll also do well to order Avila soup (568 calories, 12 grams fat), a steaming bowlful of chicken, rice and diced avocado. Chips and salsa come with everything, and the calorie meter is clicking with every crunch.

Avila’s El Ranchito Mexican Restaurant, 2101 Placentia St., Costa Mesa. (714) 642-1142. Open Monday through Thursday 11 a.m. to 10 p.m., Friday 11 a.m. to 11 p.m., Saturday 10 a.m. to 11 p.m. and Sunday 10 a.m. to 10 p.m. All major cards accepted. (Other locations in Newport Beach, Laguna Hills and Santa Ana.)

Amelia’s

This Balboa Island institution has been around for more than 30 years, a homey spot specializing in old-style Italian and seafood specialties. I like to come here for Sunday brunch, when the kitchen, though not thrilled to do so, will nonetheless make allowances for healthful dining.

My favorite dish here is swordfish salad, great greens made with a low-calorie vinaigrette mingled with chunks of grilled swordfish, but for the same approximate number of calories (364), you can also have the good salad made with white meat chicken breast (6 grams fat). Normally, the healthful dining menu salads are served with a honey mustard dressing (60 calories, 6 grams fat per tablespoon), but there’s also a low-fat vinaigrette available that I much prefer. Both are garnished generously with slices of fresh fruits such as kiwi, melons and strawberries.

Don’t fear Italian specialties, either. Lasagna primavera (433 calories, 17 grams fat) is a delectable vegetable lasagna made with artichoke, broccoli, zucchini and more, which the kitchen will prepare with Amelia’s low-fat, low-sugar marinara sauce upon request. But don’t expect a dish such as chicken breast with artichoke and mushrooms (467 calories, 17 grams fat) at Sunday brunch; the kitchen generally won’t make it on Sunday mornings. And stay away from those complimentary muffins.

Amelia’s, 311 Marine Ave., Balboa Island, Newport Beach. (714) 673-6580. Lunch Monday through Friday 11:30 a.m. to 2:30 p.m.; dinner Sunday through Friday 5 to 9:30 p.m. and Saturday till 10 p.m., Sunday brunch 10 a.m. to 3:30 p.m. All major cards accepted.