In an action likely to rock the fast-food industry, McDonald's Wednesday said it will post calories for all items on its menu boards and drive-thru menus in the U.S.

The move by the world's largest fast-food chain comes as consumers, regulators and activists are pressuring the industry to improve food quality and share more nutritional information with consumers.

As the fast-food behemoth, McDonald's (MCD) gets the most attention and criticism for its actions, and the rest of the industry often follows its lead. Industry rivals are expected to quickly follow McDonald's menu changes, which start next week.

"It's the right thing to do," says Greg Watson, senior vice president of menu innovation for McDonald's. "It's what a leader would do."
Other factors are also in play. President Obama's health care reform includes a proposed regulation still under review by the Food and Drug Administration that would require many chain restaurants to post calories on menus and menu boards. But no one expects any action on that front until well after the presidential election.

"It's an important step forward," says Michael Jacobson, executive director of the advocacy group Center For Science in the Public Interest, which has been a long-time critic of McDonald's. "The other fast-food chains will feel the competitive pressure to provide the same information."

McDonald's has been a leader, but a "reluctant" leader on several nutritional fronts in recent years, Jacobson says. The company was among the first major chains to knock the trans fat out of its french fries. It was among the first to put fruit into kids' meals. And it was early to offer an array of salads.
Panera was the first major chain to post calories on menu boards back in April 2010. "We knew that posting calories on our menu boards could only help us because it helped our guests," says founder Ron Shaich.
Not everyone is applauding.

"They fought and fought and fought against this, and now they act like they wanted it all the time," says Kelly Brownell, director of the Rudd Center for Food Policy & Obesity at Yale University.
Not so, says McDonald's spokeswoman Danya Proud, who insists that McDonald's supported a clear, federal regulation but objected to all of the different local regulations in places like New York City and Southern California

McDonald's isn't stopping here, either, says Watson. It plans more seasonal fruit and veggie options, such as blueberries and cucumbers. And it's testing an egg-white breakfast sandwich on a whole grain English muffin.

SEVERAL AMERICAN fast food chains are to set up shops in the breakaway regime, according to the Cyprus Today newspaper.

“It comes as part of an embargoes’ smashing increase in popular brands available in the country”, the paper alleges. 

Cyprus Today claims that “Popeye’s Louisiana Kitchen” and New York pizza chain “Sbarro” will be opened by Levent Food firm across the north of Cyprus.

The paper publishes statements by the general director of Levent Food, Ekrem Ergil who stated that these two chains along with “Burger City” will be opened at the 11.000 square meters Lemar entertainment complex which will be built in occupied Famagusta.

Currently no international retail chains operate in the Turkish occupied north, but several dozen ‘fake’ McDonald’s style called ‘Big Mac”, complete with the famed golden arches restaurants do operate.

A mammoth bacon cheeseburger in the US has taken the crown as the world’s biggest burger.
While incredibly unhealthy, the record breaking one-ton bacon cheeseburger is the ultimate food craze. At 2,014 pound and a 10-foot diameter, a Minnesota casino managed to enter the Guinness World Record book with a bacon cheeseburger that had to be lifted with a crane.

It seems only yesterday that the previous world’s biggest burger was being announced, weighing in at 352kg. But on 2nd September 2012 at the Black Bear Casino Resort in Minnesota, that record was blown out of the water, with a Guinness World Record breaking 2,014 lb burger!

To break the record, the bun and burger must be cooked on the same day and so a specially constructed outdoor oven was used to cook the bun (7 hours) and the burger (4 hours) before the 2 were combined with: 60 pounds of bacon, 50 pounds of lettuce, 50 pounds of sliced onions, 40 pounds of pickles and 40 pounds of cheese!

Finally together, the behemoth of burger was announced as a Guinness World Record breaker: “What I saw today was a feat of remarkable teamwork that resulted in a world record burger that actually tastes really good,’ said Guinness Records rep. Philip Robertson (slightly surprised that the burger actually tasted good by the sounds of it).

The remainder was cut up and fed, for free, to guests that had congregated around the mammoth of meat. A reasonable reward after watching people cook a giant burger bun for 7 hours we imagine. No word on whether it included a drink and fries.

You either love it or you hate it, according to the slogan.
And if you are a Marmite fan, the good news is that one of its main ingredients may fight superbugs.
A study found that at very high doses, vitamin B3, also known as niacin, drastically increases the body’s ability to fight the MRSA bacterium, which can cause life-threatening infections if it enters the bloodstream via wounds.

US researchers believe the ingredient – which is also found in beer, bread and other foods containing yeast – could be used to develop new drugs.
Researchers carried out a number of experiments on both rats and human blood, the results of which were published in the Journal of Clinical Investigation.

Overall they found that high doses of vitamin B3 increased the number of neutrophils, a type of white blood cell that kills bacteria.

Adrian Gombart, of Oregon State University, said: ‘This is potentially very significant, although we still need to do human studies. It’s a way to tap into the power of the innate immune system and stimulate it to provide a more powerful and natural response.’
But the scientists urged caution, as the research used extremely high doses of the vitamin – far more than is in Marmite or vitamin supplements.
Co-author Dr George Liu, also from Oregon State University, said: 'This vitamin is surprisingly effective in fighting off and protecting against one of today's most concerning public health threats.'
Dr Gombart stressed that so far there was no evidence to suggest normal diets or conventional-strength B3 supplements could help prevent or treat bacterial infections.
Ten years ago he discovered a human genetic mutation that makes people more vulnerable to bacterial infections.
Further work showed that niacin has the ability to "turn on" anti-microbial genes that help the immune system fight off bacteria.

Dozens of people rolled up their sleeves yesterday in Mexico City to help create a monster sandwich. 
Measuring an impressive 53-metres in length (173-feet) the massive sandwich didn't break the world record, but still manged to become the biggest that Latin America has ever created. 
Local authorities and 55 local business rolled up their sleeves to prepare the sandwich - known as 'torta' in Mexico.
Thousands of pieces of bread, lettuce, onion and tomato were mixed with more than 70 ingredients, including hundreds of litres of mayonnaise, mustard and spicy sauces. 

According to the Guinness Book of World Records, the largest sandwich ever made was in 2005 in the United States and weighed 2,467.5 kg (5,440 lb), while the honour of the longest sandwich goes to two Italians who constructed a sandwich over 630 metres (2066 feet) long in 2004.
For organisers, the sandwich exceeded the record they set one year ago when they prepared a baguette some three metres (9 feet) shorter than Wednesday's (August 01) effort.
'It's great that they broke the record; I think it was 53 metres and the torta is very tasty,' said fair participant, Ivon.
With large crowds waiting for a taste of the mammoth sandwich, torta lover Paulina Barrera gave chefs the thumbs up for their creation.
'It was worth waiting; it is delicious. I'm eating the turkey, delicious, very good,' she said.
The long torta challenge is part of a three-day fair that looks to support the traditional Mexican sandwich and more than 20,000 local businesses across the country dedicated to producing the delicious baguette.
Event organisers expect more than 350,000 visitors during the fair and hope to sell hundreds of thousands of tortas.

We have just implemented the Top Fans application onto our page. Every month the top fan will be awarded a free takeaway up to the value of €10 .Top fans is an external application added on the LetsEat Facebook page.

We have no control how the winner is chosen. We thought we would explain in detail what the application is and how it works. Based on user participation people are awarded points for likes, comments and posts.

How does the point system work?

Posts, comments and likes are all worth 1 point each. But don’t just try to create the most posts and comments. Your score is weighted by the quality of your participation. Higher quality activity (on topic and engages with the community) will earn extra points. Lower quality activity (off topic and spam) will earn less points. And consistent activity over time is more valuable than repeatedly performing the same action, such as clicking the Like button on every post.

How many points did I just earn?

When you post or comment or Like while on Booshaka, we’ll let you know right away how many points you earned. But keep in mind that those points will keep growing if the community rallies around you! On the other hand, if your activities are repetitive or off topic, then they’ll be worth less overall.

Do I get points for posting directly to the Facebook page?

Of course! Although your score won’t be updated until the next day.

How often do you calculate the rankings?

The rankings for each page are calculated once a day. The rankings reset at the end of each month. So you can always climb to the top!

So if you would like to win a ‘FREE’ takeaway up to the value of €10 at the end of each month start being an active member of our Facebook community now.It could be you that wins the free takeaway.

Increase the wholesale price of milk in half-liter pack of four to six cents, the dairy industry due to cost and power

The calcium in milk prices will rise thirteen cents.

The senior officer of the Ministry of Commerce, Marios Drousiotis said the Competition and Consumer Protection initiated an investigation.

The executive secretary of the Pancyprian Association of Supermarkets, Andreas Hadjiadamou, said the supermarkets where you can absorb the increases.

Recorded an increase in prices for dairy products