You can count on menu calorie labelling to spoil all the fun

A law change last month means that hospitality businesses employing more than 250 people now have to state the calorific count of each dish.

I had my first experience of this in a pub a few days ago. Having just delivered my new novel to the publisher, I was in celebratory mood and fancied a steak, but the menu told me this amounted to 1,700 calories. All right, it came with a sauce, garlic butter, potato dauphinoise and a fried mushroom, but still, 1,700 calories isn’t far off a woman’s daily allowance. Glumly, I mulled over the spinach gnocchi instead (a mere 546). Isn’t it a nonsense to list the calorie counts of

every item and not drinks, given that the average glass of wine is about 170 calories? I ignored it in the end and ordered the steak, but I did feel a lurking guilt waddling home. As Basil Fawlty would say, another avenue of pleasure closed off.