Two years after Chicago’s City Council made it legal for cooking on board food trucks, the Windy City’s pushcart vendors are making a renewed push to legally sell cooked food.Chicago remains one of the country’s only major cities that ban street vendors from selling anything more than frozen desserts and uncut fruits and vegetables. That…

The fight over salad bars v. fried mozzarella sticks continues. It was just a few years ago that the U.S. Department of Agriculture carved out healthy lunch standards after Congress passed the Healthy, Hunger-Free Kids Act of 2010. The Act set rules on fat, calorie, sugar and sodium limits on foods in the lunch line…

It’s the three-year mark for the compliance deadline for the California Food Handler Card law, and thousands of the state’s foodservice workers are due to have their cards renewed. The new law requires food handlers to undergo food-safety training and pass a test to earn a card. It also mandates that employers maintain records and…

The National Restaurant Association and the Restaurant Facility Management Association are collaborating on an Energy Star performance score for restaurants. The effort is being conducted in partnership with the U.S. Department of Energy’s Better Buildings Alliance and Pacific Gas & Electric’s Food Service Technology Center. However, industry data regarding energy and water use is needed…

Seven years after it shelved a plastic-bag ban in favor of a roundly ignored recycling compromise, Chicago plans to ban plastic bags within its city limits—unless you are in the restaurant business or a small independent retailer. Restaurants were excused from the ban to eliminate a legal argument that triggered a lawsuit in Seattle charging…

In the age of Instagram and YouTube and instant video upload, it’s no surprise that a bill has been introduced in New York’s City Council which would require foodservice health inspectors to wear a camera on their chests or collars, providing operators with video footage that could be used as evidence in rating disputes. The…

It’s the final review process, finally, for the menu labeling requirement already pro forma in many foodservice chains. After several postponements and delays, the federal government has moved that piece of the 2010 Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act to the final step in the review process. According to the U.S. Food and Drug Administration,…

They’re taking it to the streets in Toronto. The city, which has long confined its street food to hot dog and sausage carts, is on the brink of expanding to the wider culinary world. Last week, Toronto’s licensing and standards committee voted to overrule city officials and loosen proposed curbs on the operation of food…

Milwaukee is weighing whether to become Wisconsin’s first city to institute a restaurant grading system. If the proposed ordinance—which directs the city’s health department to set up a grading system—passes, Milwaukee would join several other major cities and states that have embraced posting inspection grades despite strong opposition from the restaurant industry. Much is up…

Louisiana, considered in many studies as the most obese state in the nation, is considering legislation that takes menu-labeling requirements a step further than those required under the 2010 Affordable Care Act. The ACA requires nutrition labeling of standard menu items at chain restaurants with 20 or more locations doing business under the same name.…