It's lunch time, and the lasagna on the menu is tempting. But you're trying to cut down on fat, so you go with the chicken Caesar salad instead.
After all, after years of warnings about cholesterol and salt and fat content, you probably think you know a thing or two about healthful choices.
But it turns out that what Californians "know" about the nutritional value of the food they order in chain restaurants may be the stuff of mythology.
When more than 500 Californians were shown lists of four dishes served at chain restaurants and asked to identify the one with the most fat or the least salt or the fewest or most calories, 68% of them chose the wrong item every time.
Just 27% got only one of the multiple-choice questions right. And not one of the 523 Californians who were surveyed aced the test.
The four-question quiz -- which focused on food served at Denny's, Chili's, McDonald's and Romano's Macaroni Grill -- was commissioned by the California Center for Public Health Advocacy, a nonprofit group based in Davis, and conducted by Field Research Corp. The findings were the same, regardless of education or income levels.
Even the center's executive director, Harold Goldstein, flunked the test, despite holding a doctorate in public health.
"More and more fast-food restaurants are claiming that they are providing healthy choices, and commonly the choice will have a word like 'salad' in it," Goldstein said. "But you could be blindfolded throwing a dart at the menu board, and you've got a better chance at making the healthy choice."
The findings do not bode well for a state in the middle of an obesity epidemic, said Alecia Sanchez, a Sacramento-based spokeswoman for the American Cancer Society. More than half of California adults are overweight or obese and at risk of diabetes, heart disease and high blood pressure. One in three cancer deaths is related to poor diet, inactivity or obesity, Sanchez said.
Goldstein's center is using the survey results to lobby for a bill, introduced by state Sen. Alex Padilla (D-Pacoima) that would require chain restaurants in California to include nutritional information on their menus, much as the U.S. Food and Drug Administration requires nutritional labeling for food sold in grocery stores.
The center's survey found that 84% of those polled supported such a law.
