An article in this weekend’s News Journal highlighted Senator Dave Sokola’s bill to require chain restaurants to place the calorie counts on the menus. As a dieter I would be thrilled if restaurants would include calorie counts, it’s very difficult to eat out because most of the time you don’t really know what you’re getting. Not everyone is thrilled with the idea, look at what sometimes-poster Matt Opaliski says in the article:
Matthew A. Opaliski enjoys going to restaurants to eat — not to worry about gaining weight.
“If I stop at McDonald’s and it says that the Big Mac is 300 calories … I’m getting it anyway,” the 35-year-old Greenwood resident said.
Actually, there are 520 calories in a Big Mac, but “calorie counters aren’t at McDonald’s,” Opaliski said.
I totally disagree with this statement. As someone who has participated in Weight Watchers I can tell you for sure that dieters go to places like McDonalds, and they are much more likely to go if they know they can get lower calorie foods there.
The NJ highlights that a study has shown that placing calorie counts on menus does help to curb calorie consumption at restaurants:
Calorie posting at Starbucks coffee shops led to a 6 percent reduction in calories per transaction — from 247 to 232 — according to a Stanford Graduate School of Business study published earlier this month.
…The study also found that beverage calories per transaction did not change substantially, while calories from food per transaction fell by 14 percent.
Overall, Starbucks revenues were not affected by the calorie-posting requirement.
This sounds like a win/win to me. However, Delaware’s Restaurant Association opposes the bill:
Sokola’s bill is opposed by the Delaware Restaurant Association — not because the group is against people knowing what they’re eating, but because the bill could create a “patchwork” of local and state requirements that would change from jurisdiction to jurisdiction. States such as California and cities like New York have already enacted calorie notification laws.
So, what do you think? Is this a good idea or is it more nanny state? Will it be too expensive to implement, as the Delaware Restaurant Association suggests?
I do have one caution, though. If this bill gets enacted, I hope it contains language that the calorie count be for the actual portion you’re getting served. When you’re counting calories even with labelled items, you’ll sometimes see something labelled as 2 or 3 portions when it’s meant to be eaten as one meal (like a can of soup for example).