Diet-Drinking Now Possible: US Mandates Calorie Content in Restaurant Booze

The Food and Drug Administration's (FDA) new rule requires chain restaurants with 20 or more outlets to list the amount of calories in alcoholic drinks, along with other foods, on menus by next November, according to an Associated Press report in Wednesday's New York Times.

A petition was sent to the government by her group more than a decade ago, calling for labeling on bottles and cans to display robust nutritional information.

However, the rules don't apply to drinks ordered at the bar or any drinks that aren't listed on the main menu.

And unlike other beverages and foods, most bottles and cans don't have to list full nutritional information.

"Alcoholic beverages are a key contributor to the calories Americans are consuming, and most of the time when people have a drink they have absolutely no idea what its caloric impact is," says Margo Wootan of the Center for Science in the Public Interest. Her group petitioned the government more than a decade ago to require that bottles and cans be labeled with robust nutritional information.

The beer, wine and spirits industries objected, arguing that they were regulated by the Treasury Department, not the FDA, a setup that dates back to Prohibition. Treasury's oversight, which includes minimal input from FDA, has "well served the consuming public," a coalition of alcohol groups wrote in a 2011 comment asking to be left out of the menu labeling rules.

In order to not make the new regulations too taxing for alcohol companies, mixed drinks will not have to be labelled at bars and restaurants are allowed to estimate the number of calories in different drinks rather than listing the exact amount in every beverage.