Healthy Eating in Seattle: Calories in Ivar's, Dick's, Salmon and Teriyaki, and How to Order

What does Seattle actually eat?

Seattle's food is shaped by the water and by the communities who settled around it. Nearly all US sockeye salmon is caught off Alaska and Washington, and the fish counters at Pike Place Market have been part of the city since 1907. Japanese immigrants began arriving at the end of the 1800s and built Nihonmachi along Main Street, and Seattle grew its own sweet style of teriyaki. Vietnamese families who arrived after 1975 built Little Saigon around 12th Avenue South and South Jackson Street, and pho reached the city in 1982 with Phở Bắc. Add Dick's Drive-In's 1/8-lb burgers, and a coffee habit that costs $6.64 a cappuccino on Numbeo's October 2026 average, and you have the menu a Seattle diet has to work with.

This guide puts published calories and protein on the dishes that matter, using the restaurants' own nutrition sheets and NOAA's seafood data. Where nobody publishes a label, as with most teriyaki shops and pho kitchens, we tell you how to order rather than invent a number.

How many calories are in Ivar's fish and chips?

Ivar's fish and chips in Seattle run from 570 to 1,020 calories a plate, by the nutrition list for its Seafood Bars, the chain's walk-up counters. Every fried entrée below comes with French fries. The spread is huge, and the order you pick at the window changes your day by up to 450 calories.

Three things stand out. The grilled salmon dinner has 12 g more protein than the fried salmon for 180 fewer calories, and it carries 430 mg less sodium. The plain-batter cod is the lightest fried plate at 570 calories, while the panko version of the same fish jumps to 900. And the clam plates are a poor deal if you're watching protein: Clams gives you 22 g of protein for 940 calories, less than half the protein per calorie of the grilled halibut.

Chowder, tacos and salads at Ivar's

The Salmon BLT is the standout on Ivar's menu for anyone building muscle: 38 g of protein for 380 calories, 10 g of protein for every 100 calories. The white clam chowder Seattle is known for is 320 calories a cup with only 6 g of protein, so treat it as a side, not lunch. The salads are where people get caught out. Ivar's lists its Caesar dressing at 360 calories per 66 g portion, which is why a Crab Caesar comes to 640 calories. Ask for the dressing on the side and use half.

Can you eat Dick's Drive-In on a diet?

You can eat at Dick's Drive-In on a diet if you order the small burgers and skip or share the fries. Dick's, whose drive-ins include Broadway on Capitol Hill, Holman Road and Lake City, publishes a full nutrition sheet (last updated spring 2025). Its burgers use fresh 1/8-lb patties on locally made buns, and the fries are hand-cut from Pacific Northwest potatoes and fried in high oleic sunflower oil.

A Deluxe with fries comes to 910 calories and 33 g of protein. Two Hamburgers instead of a Deluxe give you 30 g of protein for 520 calories, 1 g more protein for 30 fewer calories, and half the saturated fat (6 g against 12 g). The fries are the trap: 360 calories with 4 g of protein, more calories than a Cheeseburger. If you want them, split an order. The 12 oz milkshakes are a treat, not a recovery drink.

How much protein is in wild Pacific salmon?

Wild sockeye salmon has 21.3 g of protein and 168 calories per 100 g raw, according to NOAA Fisheries, with 8.56 g of fat that NOAA describes as a good source of omega-3 fatty acids. Nearly all US sockeye comes from Alaska, and the West Coast catch is mainly in Washington. NOAA says it's sold fresh in summer and early fall, and frozen, canned and smoked year-round.

For a Seattle kitchen, that makes sockeye the easiest high-protein dinner in town. A 170 g (6 oz) raw fillet gives you about 36 g of protein for about 286 calories before oil. Buy it fresh at Pike Place Market, open since August 17, 1907 and visited 20.9 million times in 2023, or frozen from any grocery the rest of the year. Bake it on a sheet pan with vegetables and skip the glaze, which keeps the sugar and sodium down.

How do you order Seattle teriyaki and pho when you're cutting?

Seattle teriyaki is a local institution: Toshi's Teriyaki opened in Lower Queen Anne in 1976 as the city's first standalone teriyaki restaurant, and by 2010 more than 83 restaurants in Seattle had “teriyaki” in their name. The Seattle style differs from Japanese teriyaki. The sauce is usually sweet, sometimes made with pineapple juice, often with sesame or garlic, and the plate is grilled chicken over a mound of white rice with a small salad or slaw.

Most teriyaki shops are small independents that don't publish nutrition labels, so we won't print a calorie figure for a plate we can't verify. What we can tell you is where the calories in a teriyaki plate come from, and how to change them:

• The sauce: a sweet, sugary glaze poured over the meat. Ask for sauce on the side and use a spoonful.
• The rice: usually the biggest part of the plate by volume. Ask for half rice and extra salad, or save half the rice for tomorrow.
• The meat: if the shop offers white-meat chicken teriyaki, it's leaner than dark meat for the same protein.
• Double meat: where the menu offers it, a second portion of chicken is an easy protein boost on a muscle-gain week.

Pho works the same way. A bowl of pho is broth, rice noodles, thin slices of beef and herbs. The broth is light; the noodles carry most of the calories. In Little Saigon or the Chinatown–International District, order a size smaller than you think, ask for extra beef or brisket rather than extra noodles, and pile on the bean sprouts, basil and lime. Go easy on the hoisin, which is sweet. Again, the pho kitchens we know of don't publish nutrition, so use your own hunger as the gauge.

What does a fat-loss day of Seattle food look like?

A fat-loss day of Seattle food can use restaurant meals as long as you pick the high-protein ones. Here's an example built only from items with published figures, leaving room for breakfast and vegetables you make at home. Your calorie target depends on your size and activity; your coach will help you set it.

That's 62 g of protein for 826 calories, which leaves plenty of room for eggs or Greek yogurt at breakfast, a piece of fruit and a big plate of vegetables. Picking the red chowder instead of the white saves 120 calories, and the tacos instead of a 3-piece cod plate save 230.

And a muscle-gain day in Seattle?

A Seattle muscle-gain day is about stacking protein, and the city's waterfront menus make that easy. This example gets past 120 g of protein from three sourced meals before you count breakfast or snacks.

Add breakfast, a teriyaki plate with double chicken on a training day, or Ivar's Salmon BLT (38 g of protein for 380 calories) as a second lunch, and you're well into the range most people need when they're lifting three times a week. Keep the Dick's fries and the white chowder for the weekend.

How does a live coach help you eat better in Seattle?

Food and training work together, and a coach who knows both can keep your plan realistic. Our lead coach, Kumar Abhishek, is a Human Performance Nutritionist (K11 School of Fitness Sciences) as well as a qualified personal trainer. In your first MakeMyFitness session, your coach asks what you actually eat: whether that's teriyaki twice a week, a Dick's run after the game or salmon from the market. Then they build training around it, not a meal plan you'll drop by Thursday.

MakeMyFitness is live online personal training. Each session is 45 minutes on video with a certified coach who watches and corrects your form. Our coaches are based in India, so Seattle sessions run 5:30 to 10 PM and 5 to 6:30 AM Pacific time all year. A 6 PM session after work, then a salmon dinner, fits a Seattle weeknight with time to spare.

For what an in-person trainer costs in the city, see personal trainer prices in Seattle. For where to run between rain showers, read how to stay fit in Seattle. Our Seattle page shows a coached evening hour by hour, and the US page lists every city we cover.