Calories on Menus. Will it go into effect? If so, when?

[AvalonXQ]

This.
Roughly 20-25% of people in the West (depending on country) are smokers. They continue to do so despite knowing the health risks and looking at pictures of blackened lungs each time they get their cigarettes out. By the same token, I reckon calorie data on menus will not stop the obese (i.e. those most addicted to overeating) from choosing whatever high-calorie food they want in that moment. It's the sort of information that will be poured over by the already calorie-conscious members of society, who tend to be as skinny as Jennifer Aniston already.

Several friends that I go out to eat with are struggling with their weight, and pay attention to calorie information when it's present on the menu -- taking their best guess when it's not. It's often quite surprising what's really going into food and where high-calorie additions are hiding. And I know first-hand that a calorie listing has persuaded a friend more than once to change their menu selection.
There's a significant middle ground between the Jennifer Anistons and those who have completely given up caring. Most people I know are in that middle ground. These changes help us make better choices.

 

[rjh01]

This.
Roughly 20-25% of people in the West (depending on country) are smokers. They continue to do so despite knowing the health risks and looking at pictures of blackened lungs each time they get their cigarettes out. By the same token, I reckon calorie data on menus will not stop the obese (i.e. those most addicted to overeating) from choosing whatever high-calorie food they want in that moment. It's the sort of information that will be poured over by the already calorie-conscious members of society, who tend to be as skinny as Jennifer Aniston already.

It used to be the majority of people smoked. Now people are giving up smoking. This measure will not be a cure all. It will be just one small step.It only takes a small percentage of the population every year to stop eating high calorie food to make a huge difference long term.

 

[blutoski]

Because every time the chef has a new dish they don't want to have to send samples to a lab to test it.

Well, it's not that bad. They would probably just need to estimate from the USDA online database based on ingredients.

Which would be work.

And they couldn't substitute for when certain items come in and out of season/availability.

Of course they could... but they'd have to update the calorie estimate.

Which would be work.

To require such would be expensive, and the result would be the same menu all year long, using only ingredients they know will be reliably available.

Probably true.

I really doubt anyone's mystified why they're so fat they can't tie their shoes any more, let alone see their feet.

Few people have a good ability to estimate how many servings of each ingredient are in a meal if they haven't prepared it themselves. I think that's pretty normal.

I suspect when people go to restaurants, they're temporarily suspending their calorie-counting habit.


Franchises would have to do the same work per product, but their per-unit-sold burden is much lower because of economies of scale.

 

[blutoski]

You really think the regs would allow the retaurant to do this in-house?

Of course. The national brands don't subject samples to get tested in bomb calorimeters. I'm not sure where you get that impression.

All vendors can use the USDA food composition database to make a reasonable estimate based on ingredients and preparation method.

I'll bet most of the ingredients come from suppliers who have documented this information as part of their commercial wholesaler regulations in the first place.

eg: the salad dressings in a restaurant could be bulk Kraft products, with accurately known fat and calorie composition. The restaurant wants to standardize the servings to customers, so they have decided in advance approximately how much of this ingredient is in the dish.

Anything off-menu should be exempt, of course. eg: "extra sauce, please" - not even McDonald's is required to document the infinite permutations possible with custom grill orders.

 

[blutoski]

Do not see why they would need to test the final product. Packaged food should contain the energy level. Fresh food you can look up on a website for the energy level. All what the chef would then need to know is how much of everything they are putting in the meal and there is the answer. Put everything in a spreadsheet and you can soon see any discrepancies between what they are using and what is being sold. That means inputs vs outputs.

Unless cooking alters the numbers?

Cooked foods would have different composition than raw foods, for sure.

The USDA database includes variations to be more precise. eg: raw vs baked potatoes. lean vs fattier cuts of meats.

Essentially, this is what a dieter would do if creating estimates from scratch. The regulations are asking to merchants to prepare this themselves, instead of the constomer.

Some proprietary diet plans are built around this principle. An example being the Jenny Craig, which has prepackaged foods of known composition by design.

Others have a reference table with, say, icons that represent 100calorie blocks. Icecream is 4 stars, pepperoni pizza is 4 stars per slice. You are entitled to so many stars per day depending on gender, exercise, current weight. The point is that they've looked up the calories so the consumer doesn't have to.

 

[rjh01]

Good posts blutoski.

Next question is how do we get this done for the rest of the world?

 

[blutoski]

If a company is fighting to avoid disclosing the caloric qualities of their food, you have to wonder why they are hiding it. People may or may not change their eating habits if they knew how many calories their choice foods contain, but I see nothing wrong with letting them know.

I do sympathise for the merchants, though.

This regulation carries a real economic cost.

I understand this reason for objecting to this regulation, and don't consider it evidence of anything sinister.

 

[blutoski]

Since the discussion has been concentrating on the exemption for small businesses, I now wonder exactly what percentage of all restaurants would qualify as a member of a "restaurant chain with 20 or more outlets".

I'm going to take a guess that it's maybe half and half (or maybe 60 non-chain to 40 chain), maybe a better Googler than I could track down some numbers.

You might be able to get a pretty good estimate from the region's small restaurant owners' association.

They should have that statistic pretty much at their fingertips.

This regulation is for NYC?

 

[This is The End]

You might be able to get a pretty good estimate from the region's small restaurant owners' association.

They should have that statistic pretty much at their fingertips.

Well, I'll give Googling for the average nationwide chain/non-chain restaurant ratio another shot myself. I'll see what small restaurant owner's association links turn up.

This regulation is for NYC?

If you are referring to the 'calories next to the price on menus', it is nationwide. It was/is part of the new health care bill passed this year.

 

[gumboot]

While displaying nutritional information is an interesting exercise (already compulsory here), all I can do is scratch my head at these increasingly pointless approaches to dealing with a population that is increasingly, let's be honest people, fat.

Here's a tip:

EAT LESS FRIKKEN FOOD AND DO MORE FRIKKEN EXERCISE

Problem solved. No calorie counting necessary. The mind boggles that money is spent trying to pass stupid regulations like displaying nutritional information when the problem is not poor healthy people ignorantly munching on too much food. The problem is a fundamental lifestyle failure. We're lazy and greedy.

The best way, nay, the only way to reverse the trend of ever fatter, lazier, greedier westerners is to begin from the bottom up with a total overhaul of how our culture approaches lifestyle.

 

[blutoski]

If you are referring to the 'calories next to the price on menus', it is nationwide. It was/is part of the new health care bill passed this year.

Got it. Sorry: I'm not American. I did remember reading that NYC had passed a law about that, and thought it was expanding just in that state.

Nationwide. Interesting.

Here in Canada, I'm unaware of any region that has this type of regulation, but most big chains already provide the information on wall posters everywhere here already.

I suppose they had to create these charts for the NYC market, so why not deploy them everywhere else. It's evidence that this type of information doesn't impact sales.

 

[AvalonXQ]

"Eat less and exercise, you moron!" is about as useful to getting people to lose weight as "Don't have sex, you moron!" is for fighting STDs and pregnancy.
The holier-than-thou attitudes I see on this issue are repulsive to me.

 

[WildCat]

Of course. The national brands don't subject samples to get tested in bomb calorimeters. I'm not sure where you get that impression.

All vendors can use the USDA food composition database to make a reasonable estimate based on ingredients and preparation method.

Why are you so sure about this? I know there are companies out there, such as this one, whose sole business is analyzing foods for labeling purposes.

And this document from the FDA is very specific on how the data for food labeling must be gathered and analyzed. And it involves taking samples and having them analyzed in a laboratory.

You don't just get to estimate based on some table somewhere.

 

[LTC8K6]

Some will probably reorganize to get under the limits for having to do this. Split your chain up into smaller chunks.

 

[rjh01]

Why are you so sure about this? I know there are companies out there, such as this one, whose sole business is analyzing foods for labeling purposes.

And this document from the FDA is very specific on how the data for food labeling must be gathered and analyzed. And it involves taking samples and having them analyzed in a laboratory.

You don't just get to estimate based on some table somewhere.

My reading of the document suggests that if you know what is in the ingredients
then there is no need to submit anything to a lab. Sample quote

Another type of nutrition labeling data base is an ingredient or "recipe" data base that is comprised of nutrient data from several sources. For such data bases, software is used to calculate label values derived from the nutrient content of ingredients that comprise a product's recipe, while taking into account nutrient losses during processing.
<snip>
The agency has not and does not intend to prescribe how an individual company is to determine nutrient content for labeling purposes.

 

[JJM 777]

Calories on menus next to the price?

McDonald's has been doing it for long time already.

More essential would be actual freedom of choice in restaurants to choose your portion size. The menu says Meal Z, price Y, calories Z. You should have the option to make it 25% or 50% bigger or smaller, so you don't need to eat only salads and carrots if you want to get fewer calories than the standard menus contain.

 

[WildCat]

My reading of the document suggests that if you know what is in the ingredients
then there is no need to submit anything to a lab. Sample quote

The data bases referred to are those developed by the company themselves, using the testing already done. And even then it requires periodic testing to ensure the information is accurate.

"Any association or manufacturer with an ingredient data base should also have a comprehensive quality management program which includes audits of ingredient nutrient data, product recipes, the software program, and final product analysis. Another crucial element is an ongoing program that compares nutrient data derived through laboratory analyses to ingredient data base calculations for finished products. Such comparisons are critical to cross validating the data that are used in a data base and to maintaining its integrity."

Bold emphasis mine.

 

[bokonon]

McDonald's has been doing it for long time already.

More essential would be actual freedom of choice in restaurants to choose your portion size. The menu says Meal Z, price Y, calories Z. You should have the option to make it 25% or 50% bigger or smaller, so you don't need to eat only salads and carrots if you want to get fewer calories than the standard menus contain.

Or you could do like my cats do when confronted with portion sizes that are too large: eat some now, eat some later.

I've heard that, in some of the larger cities, supermodels can get exotic things like "Doh ghibags" and "Tous gho". Sadly, I doubt such marvels will ever be shared with the massive masses.

 

[This is The End]

Calories on menus next to the price?

McDonald's has been doing it for long time already.

In Finland they do? I'm pretty sure none of the ones in North America do this yet.

(Or, perhaps you are mistaking having a flier (or a sign) available with having the calories next to the price on menus?)

 

[PogoPedant]

EAT LESS FRIKKEN FOOD AND DO MORE FRIKKEN EXERCISE

Eating less food is usually a good idea. However, if you don't know the calorie-count for your food, eating less could involve getting more calories.

Silly example time: Let's say you used to eat half a kilo of apples a day (47 kcal/100g gives 235 kcal worth of fruit). Now, you decide to cut down to lose weight, and you substitute 500g of apples with 100g dried banana. You've gone down to a fifth of your normal intake of food. Now you're consuming 360 kcal of fruit, or about one and a half times your previous level.

In other words: more knowledge is not necessarily a bad thing.