Need a closer look at the sodium values for a side of yam fries at Chatters? How about the sugar level of a treat at Schimmel’s?
A new government program to allow diners to make informed meal decisions is allowing participating restaurants and food establishments to gather the nutritional information for their menu items.
While it has been a long time since most major chains have offered such services — notably fast food places — the ability for local restaurants to do the same, due to resource constraints, has been limited.
The program, which calls itself Informed Dining, is footing the bill to get the food analysis done. Between Smithers and the Hazeltons, there are 17 restaurants participating.
Lloyd Lane, a Northern Health environmental health officer (or, better known as a health inspector) pitched the idea to the area restaurants and was astounded with the results.
In fact, the Bulkley Valley area had the highest participation rate of all the other areas of the province.
“Smithers has such a cool culture,” said Lane about the local food scene. “[It’s] different as I’ve seen anywhere as far as really good food safety culture. They take just such pride and want to be involved and have as healthy foods as they can.”
Food analysis can be done one of two ways. One is a special kind of software, said Lane, which is approximately $100 per food item, or for more accurate readings it can be sent to a lab for a full-on analysis at $1,000 per menu item.
“The toughest hurdle is obviously the cost involved for the restaurant to get their items analyzed,” said Lane.
At the prospect of free analysis, many jumped at the chance to get in on the program.
Lane said that there was concern over the long-term support for the program. Namely that to remain in the program and receive its benefits the food items have to keep updated as far as nutritional analysis.
Lane said he’s since learned that health authorities are likely getting the software analysis tools to make the service more accessible.
When you include restaurants in Terrace and Dease Lake, there have been 21 restaurants added to the program, a record province-wide.
Food items that need to be analyzed (to be a part of the program) include items that will stay on the menu for more than 60 days. That includes beverages.
It’s good that local restaurants are jumping on the bandwagon as well because Lane has heard that legislation may be on the way to have available nutritional information set in law anyway.
Meanwhile, the success of the program locally is indicative of the health-slant that Valley residents have.
“Hands down Smithers is considered the healthiest community,” said Lane, considering all of the the area offers as far as recreation.
Information on this program is available online at informeddining.ca.