This Is What Can Happen When You Eat Too Much Chick-Fil-A
We live in a world focused on absolute convenience. Whether you need your legs waxed, a giant inflatable duck, or something horrid sent to a person you hate, someone at the end of a social media message will sort it for you in mere minutes.
With this in mind, it's strange that instant salads haven't taken off. It could be the case that any time you fancy a burst of goodness you suddenly get a piece of fruit or veggies slid into your mailbox, but no one has had the capability to take that plan mainstream — and with eateries like Chick-fil-A dominating the convenience food market, it's little wonder.
It should come as no surprise that few items on the Chick-fil-A menu would feature in a dietitian's paradise. Even its salads can be extremely unhealthy. Its Spicy Southwest salad, for example, contains 10 grams of saturated fat and 690 calories, while the Cobb salad is packed with 13 grams of saturated fat and 850 calories (via Chick-fil-A). The American Heart Association advises eating a maximum of 12 grams of saturated fat a day.
Excessive consumption of Chick-fil-A can have some shocking effects on your body
As well as being fatty, sugar can also be a problem with some of Chick-fil-A's dishes. The CDC urges restricting consumption of sugar to 10% of your daily calories, and Harvard School of Public Health notes that you should keep added sugars under 24 grams or less for women and 36 grams or less for men. But Chick-fil-A items, such as the Grilled Chicken Club Sandwich and Chocolate Milkshake weigh in with 11 grams and 87 grams of sugar respectively (via Chick-fil-A).
Perhaps one of the most alarming possible issues with eating too much Chick-fil-A is chronic body inflammation, a condition that is associated with heart disease, diabetes, and cancer, which can cause the body's immune system to go into overdrive, attacking healthy cells (via Harvard Medical School). According to the Arthritis Foundation, foods filled with saturated fat, sugar, and refined carbohydrates can promote chronic inflammation.
The final argument for keeping your Chick-fil-A cravings in check is the quantity of salt in a selection of its meals, especially those topped off with sauces (which can contain as much as a day's worth of salt in only a few spoonfuls, Eat This, Not That! reports). Sure, fast food meals are good — but a long life is definitely a lot more valuable. The key is moderation.