Posting calories on restaurants menus: Is it a good idea?
Recently, the New York Department for health and mental hygiene imposed a new rule to post calories on fast food restaurants menu. Why and who should follow this? Let’s find out.
What is posting calories on menu?
According to this rule, all fast food chain restaurants should post calories of a food item in its menu or menu board.
Why to post calories on menus?
Most of the fast food restaurants have the calorie details of the food items posted on their websites, brochures, posters, wrappers, tray liners, and handouts. The new requirement will enable he customers to take more informed decisions.
Why should people be aware of calories?
Most of the additional calories people have from outside home food. The awareness of calorie intake among general public is very less. A mere 100 calories a day may add up to 10 pounds an year. People are generally consuming 1000 calories in their lunch time. Extra pounds result in obesity, diabetes and heart disease.
Who should post calorie details?
This rule is applicable for restaurants that are standardized for portion size and content. Further, if the restaurant has fifteen or more food service establishments under the same name, this establishment too must post calorie details on the menus.
Where to post the calorie details?
- Menu boards
- Menus
- Item tags
- Any desk or window where the order is taken
This rule does not apply for menu items that are listed on the menu board for less than 30 days in a calendar year.
Find out more information on complying with the regulation on posting calories.
Is it useful?
It is indeed a good idea to track your calorie intake and this will add to your weight loss plan. While, some people believe that this new rule would not affect their food intake, I personally trust that the new rule will increase the health awareness in public. As a result, the fast food restaurants may see a reduced business. 
What do you feel? Use the form below to post your comments on this rule.
by Prasanna on July 22, 2008
Published in: General
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Tags: Diabetes, food service establishments, FSE, heart diseases, item tags, menu boards, menus, obesity, posting calories
Jane Daniels Said,
January 19, 2009 @ 1:22 pm
I feel this is a very dangerous road to go down. Every one assumes that the people looking at calorie information are either overweight or generally interested. What they don’t realise is that we have a growing number of young (usually) people suffering from anorexia. The constant emphasis on weight and calories only serves to feed their illness.
I nearly lost my daughter to anorexia last year and, at the height of her illness she could name the content of every single morsel of food she ate (calories, fat content etc.) I feel that the obsession our Government has in treating the whole population as uninformed, unintelligent people who are unable to assess for themselves whether food is healthy or not. The labelling on all food packaging creates huge problems when someone is suffering anorexia as they are no longer looking at the information in a rational way. If this extends to restaurant menus I feel that even recovering anorexics may relapse as everyone knows that certain choices in restaurants are less than healthy but to have the calorie count alongside the choice would just emphasis the importance of every meal.
Please please can someone help our young people by stopping the ‘nanny’ culture and allowing them to grow up independently. If adults cannot be responsible for their own choices (and the internet allows enough access to this information if self education is necessary) then how can we expect them to take responsibility for their health?