Dining Out for Your Health : New publication gives specific nutritional information for dishes at 76 county restaurants.

Anita Jones and a friend used to meet regularly at a favorite restaurant in San Diego, where they would split a meal that sounded pretty healthy by the menu description: pasta and vegetables in a red sauce.

But when Jones sent the recipe into a lab for analysis, she was shocked by the verdict. The dish had more than 1,800 calories, about half of those coming from a whopping 98 grams of fat.

The incident illustrates the pitfalls health-conscious diners face in eating out. In supermarkets, shoppers get detailed nutritional information, but in most restaurants consumers are at the mercy of vague menu descriptions and chefs more concerned with taste than with health.

Jones, director of a company called Accents on Health, came to the rescue of diners last year with the publication of “Healthy Dining in San Diego,” which armed restaurant-goers with specific nutritional information on dishes at 88 eateries.

Now, local restaurants have received the same treatment. “Healthy Dining in Orange County” will be available starting this week at Ralphs grocery stores and assorted other outlets for $9.95. Five to 10 “healthy” dishes are profiled at each of 76 restaurants, from fast food (Carl’s Jr., El Pollo Loco) to tony (John Dominis, Antonello).

Each dish lists specific figures for calories, fat content, sodium and cholesterol, along with a rating system for the relative levels of each: two check marks for very low, one check for low. Information is also provided on diabetic exchanges (for diners with diabetes) and on the amount of carbohydrates, sugar, fiber and protein in each dish.

Restaurants submitted written recipes for the dishes for laboratory analysis, and signed forms guaranteeing that the recipes would remain unchanged for one year. To be included in the guide, restaurants had to pay a fee covering lab costs.

If anything, the process has proven that diners cannot rely on vague notions of what is healthy when ordering at restaurants, Jones said. Also, because much of the fat used in cooking is hidden, especially in oils, the same dish at two different restaurants can vary widely in fat content and calories.

For instance, two Chinese restaurants in San Diego offered a shrimp stir-fry: one came in at 348 calories and 14 grams of fat, the other at 866 calories and 64 grams of fat.

The lab work also pointed out a problem in labeling. Some restaurants mark a “healthy” item on their menu with a heart, which is commonly assumed to denote an entree approved by the American Heart Assn. However, the association does not monitor or endorse restaurant items, and the symbols are often misleading.

For example, Jones and her team tested one grilled halibut dish denoted with a heart on a menu. It tested out at more than 60 grams of fat and close to 800 calories. At another restaurant, the “healthy sandwich” (with avocado, cheese and mayonnaise) had 746 calories and 50 grams of fat.

Diners also carry somewhat quaint ideas of what constitutes a healthy meal, Jones said. Cobb salads are a popular choice among fitness-conscious customers who believe that “salad” automatically means healthy, Jones said. But, because a Cobb is topped with avocado, bacon, egg and blue cheese, plus a dressing, it typically comes in at more than 1,200 calories and more than 100 grams of fat.

In addition to highlighting low-fat, low-calorie meals at specific restaurants, “Healthy Dining in Orange County” includes several introductory chapters on nutrition. As the book points out, it is not merely the number of calories, but the type of calories that count.

Fat, for instance, should account for less than 30% of total caloric intake. The average American gets 37% of his calories from fat; many of the restaurant meals tested for the book got more than 50% of their calories from fat.

While caloric intake can vary, Jones and her co-authors used 2,000 calories as a base for calculating daily intake. A restaurant entree rated “low” if it contained less than 600 calories, “very low” if it contained less than 350. For fat, 20 grams or less was rated as “low,” 10 grams or less was rated as “very low.” A different set of standards was used for side dishes, sauces and appetizers.

Some of the restaurants agreed to provide, on request, “healthy” versions of dishes that did not score low enough for inclusion in the book. Antonello, for instance, uses half the usual oil in preparing the healthy version of its fusilli con spinaci , bringing it into the low range for both calories and fat.

The initial printing of “Healthy Dining in Orange County” is 10,000 copies, identical to the first run of the San Diego version of the book. Accents on Health is already working on an expanded second edition of “Healthy Dining in San Diego,” and a Los Angeles version is in the planning stages. The company plans to update the guides each year.

Accents on Health, founded in 1988, is a San Diego-based company that provides nutritional and lifestyle counseling to doctor-referred patients with diet- and stress-related problems. Jones, who has a master’s degree in public health, said the company found that clients could be trained to prepare more health-conscious meals at home, but the vagaries of restaurant dining remained a problem.

Jones pointed out that a 1989 survey by the National Restaurant Assn. showed that 39% of respondents are concerned about nutrition when dining out, and an additional 29% are concerned about nutrition at least some of the time. The problem, she said, is that diners are not provided with the information to make nutrition-based choices at most restaurants.

For both the San Diego and Orange County guides, Jones was joined by co-authors Esther Hill, a physiologist, and Simone Ferreira, who holds a bachelor’s degree in health sciences. There was also extensive input from medical professionals, in addition to the hard numbers provided by the laboratory analysis.

Restaurants, she said, have been for the most part very cooperative. Many establishments, Jones said, want to provide options for health-conscious customers but lack a background in nutrition. By participating, she said, the restaurants are “showing that they’re doing something extra for customers.”

All the restaurants in the book will provide “healthy dining” menus on request. For information on the book, call (619) 541-2049.