Nutritional Information in Restaurants-PETITION

[KatyF]

Hello All,
I hope you are all well.
I have been Type 1 Diabetic for 26 years and really like to eat out, but as I’m sure you all know eating out comes with a certain amount of guesswork for giving insulin (especially to those on the DAFNE scheme) or just for how much to eat because we don’t know the nutritional information.

I have noticed recently some chains have a started to make full Nutritional Information available and I personally think it’s brilliant!

So I have started a petition to make nutritional information available in all restaurants.

I would really appreciate any support and signatures/sharing of it as I really think it could make a huge difference to us as a community.

https://petition.parliament.uk/petitions/321249

Thank you.

 

[Robin]

I have mixed feelings about this. I certainly think pub/restaurant/hotel chains should do this, where food comes prepacked from some central kitchen where it is cooked to exactly the same recipe and portioned up evenly before being sent out to the branches. But I'd be prepared to carry on eyeballing a dish and estimating the carb count in independent, family run restaurants who vary their dishes depending on what’s in season/available in the market that day, so we don’t end up with ubiquitous precooked meals with no individuality or flair allowed.

 

[KatyF]

Thank you for your feedback. I completely understand your concerns regarding restaurants that change their menu depending on local produce.

I still believe (and may be wrong) that they have some form of portion control in their establishment which is the base of beginning carb counting so personally feel (as someone who weighs and carb counts every meal) that it’s not too big of a step to supply nutritional information.

I am absolutely not expecting to get 100% restaurants to do this immediately and would be very happy if we began with large chains.

I have mixed feelings about this. I certainly think pub/restaurant/hotel chains should do this, where food comes prepacked from some central kitchen where it is cooked to exactly the same recipe and portioned up evenly before being sent out to the branches. But I'd be prepared to carry on eyeballing a dish and estimating the carb count in independent, family run restaurants who vary their dishes depending on what’s in season/available in the market that day, so we don’t end up with ubiquitous precooked meals with no individuality or flair allowed.
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[JJay]

While I fully endorse the principle of your petition, I too would be concerned about yet another economic burden on small businesses, especially in the current situation. Many small, excellent restaurants & cafes are on the edge as it is. Unfortunately it is time-consuming and therefore costly to produce the information required (ask the ones who had to do the allergy information). Unless the government are prepared to offer financial assistace towards compliance, I fear it would be a non-starter.

The economics may not be such a problem for chain restaurants (although some of them have already gone to the wall) but I fully expect strong resistance from some quarters if they are obliged to make the true "nutritional value" of their offerings public! (Not to mention a reduction in political donations😉)

You refer to DAFNE but surely part of the purpose of that course is to teach you how to cope with these situations, ie guessing the carbs? Armed with DAFNE knowledge it would be difficult to get it drastically wrong, and getting it slightly wrong once in a while isn't going to do any harm, so long as you err on the side of caution.

Nevertheless, your petition will at least bring the issue to government notice and I wish you success with it,

 

[KatyF]

I appreciate your feedback and I do sympathise with small/family run restaurants. However the government have recently put into law that calories have to be provided in certain sized restaurants and the information required for that is the same as required to count carbohydrates. I am biased but I also feel that I have the right to know information about food which directly affects my health like people with allergies do (although the affect is not as immediate I appreciate).

Regarding DAFNE when I did the course (a few years ago now admittedly) the advise for eating out was to take your own scales and weigh the food you eat, which for rice etc is useful but when you don’t know the actual ingredients (eg. For sauces) or the food is mixed together in pasta dishes or paella etc weighing it is not really effective.

 

[grovesy]

I appreciate your feedback and I do sympathise with small/family run restaurants. However the government have recently put into law that calories have to be provided in certain sized restaurants and the information required for that is the same as required to count carbohydrates. I am biased but I also feel that I have the right to know information about food which directly affects my health like people with allergies do (although the affect is not as immediate I appreciate).

Regarding DAFNE when I did the course (a few years ago now admittedly) the advise for eating out was to take your own scales and weigh the food you eat, which for rice etc is useful but when you don’t know the actual ingredients (eg. For sauces) or the food is mixed together in pasta dishes or paella etc weighing it is not really effective.

I believe they just proposing bring it into law. Laws them selves take alot longer to be debated and passed through the commons. Which is on summer recess.

 

[everydayupsanddowns]

Welcome to the forum @KatyF

Best wishes for your petition.

 

[SB2015]

I have found that in all the chains that I have been into, if I have asked for the carb info it is available, and more often available online if I wanted to use a phone in the restaurant.

In our local family run cafe, where I asked about crabs for which they did not have the info, they found out for me, and gave this info next time I was in. Funnily enough that is where I now go for coffee and cheese scone (25g for half a scone) after Pilates. They were so helpful and it is good to being back to them after lockdown.

I work on the principle just ask. In London they had the info per 100g, so I got them to get me some scales and weighed the cake I wanted.

Good luck with your petition.

 

[KatyF]

Thank you that’s really great to hear I’m pleased you’ve had a good experience.

Can I ask what you ask for because I’ve tried asking for nutritional information before and been met with blank stares and no understanding of what I’m actually asking for?

I often search online and rarely find anything specific to the restaurant I’m in. (I have found for a few so I’m not saying nobody supplies the information)

 

[HenryBennett]

IMHO it’s a further burden on chef-patron restaurants that will probably encourage some of them to throw in the towel.

 

[Barbie1]

I, ok so I’ve been doing it for a while, am more than happy to eyeball the food I eat, where ever that might be. and I do get it wrong occasionally. But so what?
I agree that adding to the burden of smaller struggling restaurants will probably put them out of business altogether.
Most prepackaged or pre-portioned food certainly will come in with info on the pack. But I wouldn’t want to eat that if i‘m out for a meal.

 

[JJay]

The Government's plans, which are directed towards tackling the obesity crisis rather than providing assistance to any particular sector of the population, are to require only restaurants, pubs, cafes and takeaways with more than 250 employees to put calorie information on menus, but there is still no indication of when this will come into force.

That does at least relieve smaller establishments of a potential burden, and rightly so, as it would clearly be counter-productive for legislation to lead to the demise of establishments providing imaginative, healthy, well-cooked food as opposed to chain-restaurant cr*p.

I think with experience you know if you are choosing a carb-y meal or not. With regard to specific ingredients, any decent restaurant will be able to tell you what is included in a particular dish. There's plenty of info available on carb content from the net, Carbs & Cals and other apps (personally I use Nutracheck) and for most dishes you can find a near equivalent if not the dish itself.

I didn't do DAFNE but a carb-counting course run by the local Community Diabetes Team, which I have to say was extremely pragmatic in its approach - more so than the DAFNE course by the sound of it - I would think there was little more likely than producing a set of scales to kill a fun evening with friends stone dead!

For "obvious" carbs I would have no need to weigh what's provided because I would just eat my normal portion and experience tells me what that looks like! And if I'm a few grams out in my estimate it's not the end of the world - test, compensate as appropriate and move on.

 

[everydayupsanddowns]

What I’d really welcome is an end to that thing where the pack contains detailed nutritional info per 100g, but absolutely nowhere does it give any indication of how heavy the item is.

Infuriating!

 

[JJay]

What I’d really welcome is an end to that thing where the pack contains detailed nutritional info per 100g, but absolutely nowhere does it give any indication of how heavy the item is.

Infuriating!

Packaged food has by law to be labelled with the quantity thereof. Extract from Weights and Measures (Packaged Goods) Regulations 2006 -

"Quantity labelling requirements

All packaged foods of 5 g or 5 ml or more (except herbs and spices where there is no minimum threshold) are required to comply with FIC. [Food Information to Consumers]

These packages must display:

• the net quantity (g, kg, ml or l) directly on the package or an attached label
• drained net weight and net weight for foods packed in a liquid medium

Quantity information must:

• be accurate, clear and easy to understand
• be labelled in the same field of vision as name of food and alcoholic strength
• not be misleading"

If you find any goods which don't comply, take 'em to Trading Standards!

Returning to nutritional information, the one change I would like to see is for Sugar to be replaced with Carbohydrate in the "traffic light" system.

 

[Lilmssquirrel]

Hello

Whilst the petition seems to have some good points in principle, many restaurants already offer good nutritional info and I totally agree with other posters about the burden this would place on smaller businesses.

Please don't 'stone me' but I run a small cake business from home, doing celebration cakes and cupcakes which I've been doing for around two years. My 10 year old daughter was diagnosed with T1 three weeks ago.

I understand from my Environmental Health Officer that from October next year, there is an expectation that all businesses such as mine will be required to provide full nutritional information per serving. For me, this is really hard because most of my cakes are bespoke so whilst I provide a full ingredients list including allergens, I don't religiously decorate every cupcake in the same way (I do a range of elaborate, flower bouquets with quite intricate buttercream flowers that vary based on customer requirements or my mood)so to be able to work out accurate nutritional information, I will either have to drastically reduce my designs and flavour range to allow me to have standard labelling or I will just throw in the towel.

I totally get that labelling would make life so much easier but as someone who fits this business in around being a full time mum to a T1D warrior and a 40 hour per week job that pays the bills, sadly I'm never going to be able to continue my business to make it my primary income source.

Good luck with the petition.

 

[Robin]

What I’d really welcome is an end to that thing where the pack contains detailed nutritional info per 100g, but absolutely nowhere does it give any indication of how heavy the item is.

Infuriating!

I once shot myself in the foot. I emailed and complained to our local garden centre that their delicious prewrapped chocolate brownies had the nutritional info per 100g but not the weight of the brownie, and explained why I needed to know . They emailed back saying they took my point and were investigating. Next time I visited their tearoom, they no longer sold them!

 

[everydayupsanddowns]

Returning to nutritional information, the one change I would like to see is for Sugar to be replaced with Carbohydrate in the "traffic light" system.

I sent many messages, and tried to get others to do the same to tackle exactly this during the last consultation. Received a deafening silence!

 

[JJay]

I sent many messages, and tried to get others to do the same to tackle exactly this during the last consultation. Received a deafening silence!

Why am I not surprised? The everover-powerful food industry lobby strikes again!

 

[JJay]

Hello

Whilst the petition seems to have some good points in principle, many restaurants already offer good nutritional info and I totally agree with other posters about the burden this would place on smaller businesses.

Please don't 'stone me' but I run a small cake business from home, doing celebration cakes and cupcakes which I've been doing for around two years. My 10 year old daughter was diagnosed with T1 three weeks ago.

I understand from my Environmental Health Officer that from October next year, there is an expectation that all businesses such as mine will be required to provide full nutritional information per serving. For me, this is really hard because most of my cakes are bespoke so whilst I provide a full ingredients list including allergens, I don't religiously decorate every cupcake in the same way (I do a range of elaborate, flower bouquets with quite intricate buttercream flowers that vary based on customer requirements or my mood)so to be able to work out accurate nutritional information, I will either have to drastically reduce my designs and flavour range to allow me to have standard labelling or I will just throw in the towel.

I totally get that labelling would make life so much easier but as someone who fits this business in around being a full time mum to a T1D warrior and a 40 hour per week job that pays the bills, sadly I'm never going to be able to continue my business to make it my primary income source.

Good luck with the petition.

Quite so. We need to encourage individual and original food producers, not bland corporate conformity. Long may your business flourish!

(BTW I think your EHO may have it wrong - as far as I know the regulations coming into force in October 21 only refer to allergen labelling)