From Nando’s to Domino’s and Harvester – we reveal the most fattening meals at Britain’s biggest food chains

Katy Docherty

Published: 21:00, 4 Apr 2022
Updated: 11:38, 5 Apr 2022

ARE you carefully counting the calories whenever you dine out?

From tomorrow, food chains with at least 250 employees will have to include on their menus how many calories are in each item.

As the cost-of-living crisis begins to bite, many people are likely to dine out less often anywayCredit: Shutterstock

The new rule comes with the Government aiming to crack down on obesity and promote healthier eating.

Obesity-related illnesses cost the NHS more than £6billion every year, while one in three children leave primary school with excess blubber.

But is adding calorie-counts to menus a helpful step that will give customers the information they need to make healthy choices, or a case of the “nanny state” spoiling our enjoyment of a meal out?

As the cost-of-living crisis begins to bite, many people are likely to dine out less often anyway.

Do calorie counts on menus ruin your evening?

Yes, says Emily Fairbairn

ON a recent visit to my beloved Franco Manca, I was not expecting to be served a big slice of reality alongside my freshly baked pizza.

But that’s what I got with the new-look menu. Not a single pizza on it was below 780 calories, unless you count the one without cheese (which I do not).

Seeing the calorie counts in black and white certainly left a nasty taste, writes Emily FairbairnCredit: News Group Newspapers Ltd

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Obviously I was not deterred. (No one really thinks pizza is a health food.) But seeing the calorie counts in black and white certainly left a nasty taste.

Eating out is meant to be a treat, not a reason to feel bad about yourself.

I’m no calorie-counter. But even so, some of the joy was replaced by guilt.

And it made me worry about those for whom eating is rarely a carefree experience. There are 1.25million men and women with eating disorders.

Many of those in recovery say that until now, restaurants were a rare place of escape from an obsession with calories. Not any more.

According to the eating disorder charity Beat, 93 per cent of current or former sufferers said putting calories on menus would negatively impact them.

And there is little evidence to suggest the move reduces obesity generally.

People who really should be monitoring their calorie intake will ignore the new numbers but those who would love to ignore them will not be able to.

Wouldn’t it be nice to take this ghastly conundrum off the table for good?

No, says Oliver Harvey

AFTER a decent cooked brekkie, I had wandered to my South London local to be confronted by the new-fangled horror of menus with calories.

“Elf’n’safety” and its tragic twin “wellbeing” had struck again. I thought: “No thanks. None of your business what I eat.”

I thought the calorie count would ruin my night - but it made it better, writes Oliver HarveyCredit: News Group Newspapers Ltd

Then I scrolled down the menu at the gut-bloating calorific content of the Sunday roasts on offer.

Roast pork belly? More than 2,600 calories. Roast beef? Nearly 2,000 calories.

Even the vegan Wellington was almost 1,800 calories. The NHS reckons a bloke should eat around 2,500 calories a day.

What with the brekkie, the cider I was quaffing and the red wine I was eyeing — plus the evening toastie I would need to soak all that up — I would be lucky to keep under double that figure if I had a roast.

Further down the menu was the baked potato gnocchi which, last week, I would not have looked twice at. Even with an added side portion of broccoli, that came in at a full 1,000 calories less than even the vegan roast.

So I went for it. On its bed of spring greens and toasted sesame, the gnocchi went very well with a glass of montepulciano.