Adult meals at full-service restaurant chains are extremely high in calories and salt, a new study says.
Researchers analyzed menus from 21 full-service restaurant chain outlets in Philadelphia, including Dennys, Pizza Hut, Red Lobster, Olive Garden and Perkins. Adult meals averaged 1,500 calories, or 75 percent to 100 percent of a person's calories for an entire day, CBS News reported.
The meals also had an average of 3,510 milligrams of sodium, which exceeds daily recommended levels by 153 percent, according to the study in the Journal of Nutrition Education and Behavior.
The researchers noted that a plan was put in place to reduce salt in processed and restaurant foods by 25 percent by 2014.
"However, current sodium levels at full-service restaurants are so high that even after a reduction of 25 per cent, mean sodium in a la carte entrees would still be about 1,300 milligrams," wrote Amy Auchincloss of the Drexel University School of Public Health and her colleagues, CBS News reported.