Evaluation of the quality of meals served in a popular restaurant

• Autor(a) principal: Ramos, Sabrina Alves
• Data de Publicação: 2020
• Outros Autores: da Fonseca Carvalho Lima, Jordana, Medeiros de Carvalho, Ana Caroline, Soares, Gabriela Cristina, Andrade Batista, Joyce
• Tipo de documento: Artigo
• Idioma: por
• Título da fonte: HU Revista (Online)
• Texto Completo: https://periodicos.ufjf.br/index.php/hurevista/article/view/28417
• topic: Collective Feeding; Food and Nutrition Security; Nutrition Programs and Policies; Food Guide; Menu Planning; Alimentação Coletiva; Segurança Alimentar e Nutricional; Programas e Políticas de Nutrição e Alimentação; Guias Alimentares; Planejamento de Cardápio

Introduction: The Popular Restaurant program aims to offer healthy meals at affordable prices, thus reducing the number of people in a situation of food insecurity. Objective: Verify the nutritional, sensory quality and type of processing of food used in the preparation of meals of a Popular Restaurant in the city of Belo Horizonte/MG. Materials and methods: Descriptive and qualitative case study. The nutritional and sensory quality of meals served from February to May 2018 was evaluated using the Qualitative Evaluation of Menu Preparations method. The criteria evaluated were the frequency of leaves, fruits, sweets, equal colors, foods rich in sulfur, fatty meat, frying and sweet associated with frying. The menus were then classified into as excellent, good, regular, poor or very poor. The type of processing of food used in the preparation of meals was evaluated according to the recommendations of the Food Guide for the Brazilian Population. Results: The menus were classified as good by the offer of leafy vegetables (89.3%), preparations with equal colors (10.7%) and fried foods (10.7%); regular for the presence of fruits (57.1%), sweets (42.9%), sulfur-rich preparations (27.4%) and fatty meats (26.2%); and excellent for offering sweets associated with frying (0%). Most of the ingredients used were in natura or minimally processed (75.6%), the average per capita oil/fat was adequate (8.3 mL), but salt was high (7 grams). Conclusion: The menu offered in the popular restaurant presents good sensorial quality and met in part the food recommendations by the Food Guide for the Brazilian Population. Thus, it is necessary to review its preparation techniques to reduce the amount of salt and ultra-processed fats used to provide the provision of nutritionally appropriate meals to people who are socially vulnerable or who feed outside the house.