New York City officials have come up with a new way to help people lose weight: force chain restaurants to post their food caloric content directly on the menu.
With two thirds of Americans overweight or obese, and Americans averaging of a third of their caloric intake in restaurants, it does make sense that they know what they are eating. Studies have shown that most people can’t guess how many calories are in a menu item and often underestimate what it contains, so labeling foods with the caloric content will provide consumers with more tools to control their diet and their weight.
This strategy is gaining public support as an avenue to help people change their chain food eating habits. The California Center for Public Health Advocacy commissioned a telephone poll in 2007 and discovered that 84% of those polled supported requiring chains to post caloric content on their menus and boards, and California became the first state to enact statewide labeling legislation in September 2008.
Menu labeling laws are appearing throughout the country. California and New York City are requiring it, and soon Tennessee and Philadelphia will post calories on the menu board too. Though many chain restaurants currently list the nutrition facts for their menu items, they are often hard to find, lost or in an inconspicuous place. By having calories posted on the board, consumers will be better prepared to make split-second decisions about the healthier choice. Especially considering most people eat out for convenience and because they are in a hurry, health typically takes a backseat, as it’s not efficient to wait ten minutes for the manager to dig up a dusty nutrition pamphlet.
Some critics complain that posting calories ruins their enjoyment of their favorite childhood foods, but that can be countered by the thought that you don’t have to stop eating higher calorie foods. You just may want to limit the frequency and quantity of these items in your diet. It can also tell you that if you must have Dunkin’ Donuts, having a glazed doughnut rather than the honey bran raisin muffin will save you 280 calories.
Of course, calories posted on a board do not paint the whole picture of how healthy (or unhealthy) a food is for you. Take avocados, for instance. A medium avocado contains anywhere from 250- 350 calories, but also contains nearly 20 vitamins and minerals, including antioxidants and essential fatty acids. It is doubtful any foods found in a chain restaurant will have this high of nutrition content, and worse, if many of these items were thoroughly examined for their “nutrition content”, we’d find that they likely aren’t worth eating at all.
However, reading calories can help you quickly gauge if a dish is right for you, and is a good strategy to minimize calorie intake. If the controversial health care reform bill passes, restaurants with at least 20 locations throughout the country will be required to post calories on menus, and other nutritional information, such as fat, sodium and carbohydrates, will have to be in writing somewhere in the restaurant (of course, there’s only so much room on a menu board).
Some restaurants serve over 2,000 calories in an appetizer alone! If you knew that before ordering, would you still want it? Examples of the worst foods to eat out are:
- Chili cheese fries from Outback, which contain over 2,000 calories in one order
- P.F. Changs “healthy” chicken noodle soup contains 759 calories
- Spinach and artichoke dips from chains range from 930 calories to 2000
- One author ranked On The Border Firecracker Stuffed Jalapenos with Chili Con Queso as the worst appetizer in America, coming in at 1,950 calories, 134 g of fat (36 grams saturated) and 6,540 mg of sodium!
Obviously, some of these items are unabashedly unhealthy, containing gobs cheese or having a heavy cream base. So what are the healthiest chains in America? Rather than advise a “healthy chain” (if such a radical concept even exists), we remind readers to use your best judgment when ordering. Of course, this can be tricky, as TGIF’s pecan-crusted chicken salad contains 1360 calories and unknown quantity of fat and sodium (because they refuse to disclose that information). Point? Sometimes a salad is not just a salad.
Your healthiest bet is to make your own food at home. Use fresh produce, whole grains, lean meats and healthy nuts. If you must eat out, make sure you are looking at every aspect of the meal to determine if it is healthy: salads are supposed to be good for you, but not if your protein is battered and “crispy” and you drown it in ranch, bleu cheese or any other cream based dressing.
Order meats broiled, vegetables steamed with sauces on the side, and get a side salad to start with no cheese and oil and vinegar for the dressing (or get their dressing on the side). For soups, pick something with a broth base rather than cream, and skip the processed white crackers. If you don’t live in an area that posts calories on the menu board, ask to see their nutrition facts or research their menus online in advance. When you are eating out, keep in mind how much portion size has increased in restaurants, and plan on eating half, and packing the other half to take home.
America’s national pasttime of eating out can be a mine field, so arm yourself with as much information as you can before you walk into it.
I like the idea of restaurants posting the nutrient (or lack thereof) content of their food. However, I would prefer a free-market evaluation of the nutrition, rather than a forced government evaluation. As the article stated, there is more to the food than its calories – so making a judgment based on calories alone can indeed be a misjudgment. Focusing solely on the calories in fast food dangerously glosses over the hydrogenated oils, high fructose corn syrup, GMO usage, food coloring and additives like MSG, etc that are rampant in fast and processed foods, so it is potentially misleading. If I ordered an item that had all of those elements above, but the sign said only 200 calories – is that healthy? Apparently, the government wants us to think so.
By its nature, an independent company would be more responsive to the customer’s health needs and wishes, and would strive to meet those with a comprehensive evaluation of the food content. I would be infinitely more willing to patronize a restaurant with an open, independent, full nutrient review, than a fast foods restaurant with simple calorie counters.
A concern that occurred to me while reading this article is that if the health care reform bill passes and requires all chains to post the calorie content in their foods, then they will most likely focus on cutting calories to make their foods appear healthier. I am not a scientist so do not know how they would do this, but I am sure with the millions of dollars resting on it, they would find a way to cut the calories while making the menu even less healthy (most likely chemicals replacing real food substances).
I would enjoy seeing the calories and nutrition facts prominently displayed so I could see if a muffin has 600 calories, or a bagel has 1,000 calories before I order. I recently stopped at a Subway and asked to see the nutrition facts for their pizzas (they display their nutrition facts proudly on their menu after all), and low and behold, none to be found. I even waited to ask the manager, who simply said they never received any information on the pizzas. It told me the pizzas must be terrible for you, and I chose a turkey breast 6 inch.