First lady asks restaurants to serve healthy foods

Yahoo ^ | 9-13-10 | MARY CLARE JALONICK/AP

[mlizzy]

WASHINGTON – First lady Michelle Obama is prodding the nation's restaurants to add more healthy options to menus, label those items more prominently and market nutritious foods to kids.

Speaking to the National Restaurant Association on Monday, Mrs. Obama pleaded with restaurants small and large to take a little butter or cream out of their dishes, use low fat milk and provide apple slices or carrots as a default side dish on the kids' menu.

Mrs. Obama said that Americans are spending half their food dollars outside the home and eating a third of meals in restaurants. She asked the restaurants to rethink the food they offer and reformulate their menus to help combat childhood obesity.

"We have to do more, we have to go farther, and we need your help to lead this effort," she told the restaurateurs and executives.

The first lady has delivered similar messages to schools and the nation's largest food companies as part of her effort to boost childhood nutrition. She told the restaurant industry that parents' choices at restaurants need to be easier, and healthy options shouldn't be buried on the menu.

[LatinaGOP]

I have learned a great deal more about making meals of my own over the years, I would encourage whomever is able to do so to try the same.

When my hubby and I were first married and before we had kids we ate out a LOT. As we had kids, we ate out less and less and I cooked more. Now, my family and I prefer my own cooking to the point that we are very critical whenever we eat out. I even insisted on cooking for my husband and me for our anniversary this year because the dish I had at a restaurant last year on our day was poorly seasoned and overcooked. Instead, this year I made pan roasted fillet mignon medallions with rosemary, garlic & thyme, creamy mashed potatoes and a parmesan creamed spinach over it. I think Ms. Obama wouldn't have approved the cream and butter used, but I have to say it was delicious.

[JoanneSD]

I for one am not spending half my food dollars eating out... I go to food pantries, which are plentiful, and stretch my food dollars that way... and about twice a year I go to my favorite place Burger King and get a Jr. Whopper and a value meal salad..by Mrs. BHO Jr. estimate ppl eat a third of their meals in restaurants.. that is one a day? I think she should mind her own eating habits and leave mine alone

[NEMDF]

Good question. Our family rarely eats in restaurants.

[E. Pluribus Unum]

It's all about you, Michelle.

[davius]

If I wanted a healthy, sensible meal with balanced nutrition then I would simply eat at home. If I am to embark on the relatively rare excursion of going out to eat then a major attraction of the enterprise is to experience food that is rich, flavorful, and hopefully decadent. Absent being obscenely wealthy or terminally stupid, I am hard pressed to imagine a scenario in which I would find it desirable to eat out on a regular basis. If you can taste, then you can learn to cook.

Now if you will pardon me, I for one, am off to bake an apple stuffed with cinnamon butter.

[mort56]

I don’t want the government inspecting restaurant menus.

As a recovering restaurateur, I can tell you in some locations in this country they already do!

[tillacum]

OH CRAP there goes my bellini before dinner and NO decadent chocolate cake with ice cream after the meal followed by a nice sweet, heavy cream filled coffee with good Irish Whiskey. Can’t have any fun with this couple in the whitehouse. No jobs, rotten health care on the way, higher taxes and now healthy food from restaurants. We have to get rid of them before they ruin everything!

[sodpoodle]

***Mrs. Obama said that Americans are spending half their food dollars outside the home and eating a third of meals in restaurants.***

And this is HER business!!!!!!!!

Look out all you cocaine, smack and marijuana dealers - you’ll be next on her list. Unless you are illegal aliens or vote Democrat.

[combat_boots]

[Girlene]

I for one am not spending half my food dollars eating out...

Same here...not even close. Eating out for me is purely for entertainment, and certainly nowhere near once a day. Lots of folks that work are brown-bagging it (if they can). On top of that, we have a record number of people on food stamps - over 40 million. Are they all going out to eat once a day with their kids? Hope not. That gets pretty expensive for a family, even if you go to McD's or BK or any other fast food place.

I think she should mind her own eating habits and leave mine alone. - Bingo.

[combat_boots]

I see that there’s gonna be good money in a butter and French fry black market. Good to know.

Psssst. “The Nacho guy on the street corner over there at the place by the thing. You know.”

[MrB]

“The poor”, I think you’ll find, eat out much more often than middle class folks.

It’s a symptom of the reason they ARE poor. Poor choices. Lazy.

I’ve also talked to “poor” working class people (services like hair cutting, etc) who took 3 vacations in the last year.

It’s no wonder they have no wealth built up, and never will.

[Mase]

Exactly. Most people advocating against the use of pesticides don’t realize that these plants have built in mechanisms for protection that can create toxins many times more powerful than anything we use.....and they don’t wash of. Unfortunately, trying to explain this to the organic crowd normally results in a blank stare.

[Mase]

of = off.

[Hoosier Catholic Momma]

Hmmmm? What did she say? I was too busy taking a batch of fudge brownie cookies w/white chocolate chips out of the oven for tonight’s PTO meeting.

Maybe when she takes all the junk out of her trunk, then we’ll talk.

[count-your-change]

Ahhh...but toasted tofu sticks rolled in rice bran washed down with soy milk flavored with carob pod extract. Ummmmm! Just watch the kiddies wolf this fare down!

[combat_boots]

Soon to be over there past the place where we met 4 1/2 years ago, under the bridge by the thing.

[Chunga]

That reminds me: I love great pizza. I lived in New York for two years and had the best in the world.

That being said, Sam's Club at Clairmont and I-85 in Atlanta has incredible pizza for the price at their snack stand.

One slice is dinner for two I kid you not.

[ichabod1]

Making out with her cone, is more like it.

[Dubya-M-DeesWent2SyriaStupid!]

W H A T is her fascination about this? I saw a show the other day that all public schools are banning cupcakes and junk food.

FLOTUS needs to look at her own damned self in the mirror and STFU and get out of our White House as she will be voted out she is hereby fired!

Obama can brag he created ALL new jobs in the WH for democrats.But please dear God he will be bragging from mob central in Chicago.