This July, the National Restaurant Association partnered with Healthy Dining to form Kids LiveWell. This is a new program that highlights meals available at participating restaurants that are considered healthy meals for children. The healthy meals will have an apple icon next to the item, in order to alert parents to healthy meal options available for their children.
In order for a meal to be considered a healthy option in the program, it must contain: * a beverage, * 600 calories or less, * less than 35% calories from fat, * less than 10% calories from saturated fat, * less than 0.5 grams trans fat, & * less than 35% of calories from sugar, & * less than 770 milligrams sodium.
Participation in the Kids LiveWell program is voluntary. Participating “inaugural” restaurants include Au Bon Pain, Bonefish Grill, Burger King, Burgerville, Carrabba’s Italian Grill, Chevy’s, Chili’s Grill & Bar Restaurant, Corner Bakery Cafe, Cracker Barrel, Denny’s, El Pollo Loco, Friendly’s, IHOP, Joe’s Crab Shack, Outback Steakhouse, Silver Diner, Sizzler, T-Bones Great American Eatery, & zpizza. The Healthy Dining company states more restaurants are expected to join with an expanding list of healthy dining options for children.
Restaurants can submit requests to the Healthy Dining website so that apps can be better able to list the nutritional values of their foods.
Update: 9/16/19:
It seems the Kids LiveWell Program has been canceled. I can no longer find any updates regarding this program. However, in 2017, Forbes released an article, “Voluntary Initiative Fails to Improve Restaurant Children’s Menus.” It appears that as a result, the National Restaurant Association has canceled this program.
