A group of doctors is advising the Ontario government to enact regulation that would force  restaurants post the caloric content of their food alongside the price — giving consumers the full cost of their meal, if you will. I know that most restaurants would shudder at this — and I grew up in a family that owned a restaurant, so I empathize  — but I don’t entirely disagree with it. Here’s the thing: there are SO many more calories in restaurant food (in general) than you think. One day I decided to check out a major-chain-pub’s website for their nutritional information, on a whim, really. It was pretty mind blowing. As it turns out,  the burger I had was probably the most reasonable thing on the menu. The chicken sandwich I’d normally have — to be “good” — had a whopping 80 grams of fat and like 900 calories. For a 5’2 person like me, that’s a catastrophic amount of calories and fat for one meal. (And yes, I know that red meat isn’t the best substitute either.)

People often genuinely wonder why they gain weight (and that includes me), thinking they are being okay even when eating out and making what they think are good choices. There’s really no way to know what goes into food someone else prepares, like the globs of butter, oil and cheese that pack on all those pounds. Maybe it is time that we post the full price of the meal on a fast-food menu board so that people can understand the true cost of what they are purchasing. Would it change their behaviour? Maybe. Would it make them choose to not buy anything at all? Maybe. But at least they would know.