2,900 calorie cheese fries at Outback Steakhouse
The last time I wrote about restaurants offering huge portions of unhealthy calories, one kind commenter referred to me as "food Stalin."Well now I'm at it again. Fortune Small Business reports that Outback Steakhouse sells 2,900 calorie cheese-fries. A new law in New York requires that the company and other large chains post the calorie information on the menu, and other states may follow suit.
Of course, there's nothing illegal about offering 2,900 calorie cheese-fries. But I have to say: I think it's at least socially irresponsible to offer serving sizes that are by definition unhealthy for anyone to eat.
Whether disclosure laws will do anything to temper people's appetites is doubtful. The amount of knowledge/information that consumers have about nutrition has done nothing but increase over the past 50 years -- and has our nation's collective waistline.
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Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
5-02-2008 @ 3:08PM
Sher said...
Since when did anyone eat an entire cheese fries from Outback in one setting? Oh, and putting the calorie information on the menu is not going to help the small, but valuable, percentage of young women who suffer from anorexia win control over their fear of food - it will only make their disorder more prominent.
It's not the food that is making people fat -- it is lack of physical activity
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5-02-2008 @ 4:02PM
Jack (SFC: 4983 4617 3409) said...
Woah, woah, woah. I'm sorry but I have to politely disagree with you.
Since when does an anorexic girl eat cheese fries anyway? Giving away VALUABLE information is a good thing. To want to keep people ignorant is just plain stupid I think.
And while yes, the lack of physical activity is PART of the problem it is no way the same thing. If you're eating 2,900 calories a meal you'd have to be Mr. Universe to actually burn up all of them.
5-02-2008 @ 3:09PM
Jack (SFC: 4983 4617 3409) said...
"food Stalin"?
Dude, you're providing a public service. Please keep it up!
I hope we can get a similar law passed in California. It disgusting what they give to people. A WHOLE DAY'S WORTH of caloritic intake in cheese fries. Don't get me wrong, I'm sure they're great tasting but good god, 2,900 calories is well more than any American needs to be eating.
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5-14-2008 @ 4:19PM
Darkangel8436 said...
Exactly that is over a day's worth of calories alone. Can you imagine what else that person has eaten in the same day. That person would be exercising a long while just to burn off only the cheese fries. Instead of the just exercise, restaurants really need to learn how to cut the calories to a reasonable amount.
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