National Post (National Edition)
ALL YOU CAN EAT
The worst menu items at U.S. restaurants offer a day’s worth of sugar, salt and fat in a single meal
While some chain restaurants have made progress in offering more healthful options, this year’s list of Xtreme Eating award winners shows there’s no shortage of work to be done.
From an order of pancakes that’s like eating nearly a dozen doughnuts to a milkshake that’s nutritionally identical to slamming 15 Oreos blended with half a cup of animal fat, the “extreme” moniker seems like a gross understatement.
Since 2007, the nonprofit Center for Science in the Public Interest (CSPI) has been compiling its annual list of the worst of the worst menu items in the U.S. Each of 2019’s eight offending meals contains “1,500 to 2,300 calories and at least a day’s worth of sugar, salt, or saturated fat.”
Among the egregious entries is The Cheesecake Factory’s Cinnamon Roll Pancakes. Why choose between a cinnamon bun and a stack of pancakes when you can have both? Eating a single order is equal to 11 Krispy Kreme Original Glazed Doughnuts. At 2,040 calories (a day’s worth), it has nearly three days’ worth of added sugar (an estimated 137 g), two and a half days’ worth of saturated fat (51 g) and more than a day’s worth of sodium (2,950 mg).
Sonic’s Oreo Peanut Butter Master Shake — complete with whipped cream and a cherry on top — represents nearly a day’s worth of calories (1,720), almost two and a half days’ worth of saturated fat (48 g) and more than a day’s worth of added sugar (an estimated 62 g). That’s for a large, which is nearly a litre (32 oz) of shake.
The saltiest of the offenders is an oversized sub containing more than three days’ worth of sodium (7,720 mg) and a day and a half ’s worth of saturated fat (29 g). Jimmy John’s Giant Gargantuan is hefty (40 cm/16 in) with all the deftness of the indecisive: It’s stuffed with an obscene array of luncheon meats — salami, capicola, turkey, roast beef and ham — as well as provolone cheese, onion, lettuce, tomato, mayo, and oil and vinegar. It’s hard to imagine eating three Subway Cold Cut Combo footlong subs in a sitting, but if you could, they would be its peer.
“Pancakes with syrup or cheeseburgers are never a health food, but it seems like The Cheesecake Factory, Chili’s and other chains are trying to outdo each other to make them worse,” Lindsay Moyer, CSPI senior nutritionist, says in a statement. “Although the 2019 Xtreme Eating winners are nutritional nightmares, plenty of other dishes are as bad or worse. The good news is that all chains with 20 or more outlets are now required to list calories on menus and menu boards, and expanded nutrition information upon request.”