Calorie Counts in NYC

So, those of you not in NYC may not have heard about this, but recently chain restaurants in the city have been made to post calorie counts on their menus. There was and still is a lot of controversy over this. Now that the calorie counts have started to be displayed I find myself, as other New Yorker’s do, a bit unhinged by what I am seeing. Now, I consider myself to be relatively educated when it comes to nutrition, but I certainly wasn’t prepared for the shock of what I saw.

It’s no surprise that at Burger King a whopper with cheese, medium fry and medium coke are 1360 calories. We’ve known for a while now that these foods are not healthy. Rather, what’s surprising is what we thought was on the healthy side. For instance, I had the same experience as this blogger at Starbucks. I thought I was doing a good thing by getting the bran muffin, when it has nearly as many calories as the sausage, egg and cheese sandwich. I was astonished! However, one of the commentor’s makes a point, the substance of those calories needs to be taken into account in addition to the calories. The nuts in the muffin increases the calorie count significantly, while adding nutritional value to the muffin. But, also I’m sure that even with the bran, apples, raisins, and walnuts there’s lots of sugar and processed flour. I’m still convinced that it’s a healthier decision over the breakfast sandwich. But I do stop and think about my decision to get the muffin, and maybe eat only half of it.

What’s more surprising than the calorie count of the bran muffin, are the number of calories in smoothies. Looking at the small lemonade at Jamba Juice, it not only has 300 calories but 66 grams of sugar! A large Peanut Butter Moo’d Smoothie (30 oz) has 1170 calories and 169 grams of sugar! (Granted only the calories are posted in house, but I found the amounts of sugar online and was aghast!)

The restaurants are, of course, opposing this because if people actually saw the amount of calories they were consuming, it would shock them. I definitely find the counts useful at chain restaurants. I don’t eat fast food due to ethical reasons, not that nutritional reasons don’t factor in. But, I do stop at Starbucks regularly and some other similar places. When it comes to regular restaurants, I don’t know if I want to know how many calories are in, for instance, that brunch I had just the other day. Some days I just want to enjoy the food and company, and forget about the rest. But, for a society that’s trying to become healthier, we should know what we’re putting into our bodies.