Don't super size me

The most loudly promoted item on the menu at McDonald's these days is the Go Active Happy Meal. Designed for adults, it contains an entree salad and a bottle of water. Instead of a toy, you get a pedometer. Clipped to belt or waistband, it measures how many steps you take. The pedometer's chintzy composition doesn't inspire much confidence, but that's OK, since most McDonald's customers pick up their meal at a drive-through window anyway.

In introducing healthy options, Mickey D's is not alone. The Subway chain now has meal-sized salads on the menu, as does Burger King. Not to be left out, KFC is offering a version of the Colonel's Secret Recipe that is roasted, not fried.

McDonald's premium salads are made with mesclun and come with packets of dressing from Newman's Own, a popular line of natural products. Burger King's fire-grilled salads borrow from Californian or Mediterranean styles, with packages of hot grilled shrimp or chicken, iceberg lettuce, cherry tomatoes, red onions, and baby carrots. KFC and Subway both feature wrap sandwiches, and the "Atkins friendly" salads at Subway include such ingredients as roasted red peppers and baby spinach.

With more up-market ingredients -- and endorsements from At-

kins and Oprah Winfrey's personal trainer, Bob Greene -- these fast-food items are reaching out to new customers while offering regulars some ostensibly healthy choices. With lawsuits, new reports on the obesity crisis, and films such as "Super Size Me" mocking fast food, the chains needed to do something quickly about their image. Enter mesclun lettuce and grilled shrimp.

Although McDonald's has had salads on its menu for 15 years,

they've never been entree size. Company spokesman Bill Whitman says they're "responding to the customers' wants and needs" with the new items. "Our intent is to provide customers with choice and options," says Whitman. At Subway, which has long positioned itself as a healthy and fresh alternative to other fast-food chains, spokesman Kevin Kane agrees. "We just want to provide choices for people," he says. Fast-food restaurants' offering choices is nothing new, says Ellen Ruppel Shell, author of "The

Hungry Gene: The Science of Fat and the Future of Thin." What's changed is the motivation behind the new meals. Salads have long been one way to avoid what Shell calls the "veto factor." That is, if one member of a lunch group is on a diet, he or she may veto fast-food as an option. Today, however, the veto factor is less of an issue than litigation and public criticism. But before salads eclipse Whoppers and McNuggets, they must meet fast-food expectations of convenience, value, and taste. Salads don't have the shelf life of a hot sandwich, and their flavor quickly turns lackluster. Their cumbersome packaging -- they're bigger than something in a bun, there's always plastic and styrofoam involved, and the diner needs a fork -- hardly suits eating on the go. In addition, most salads cost a few dollars more than a burger-and-fries meal.

If you decide to trade in your dollar value for nutritional value, you'll find that in some cases the new choices are only marginally better than the standards. On the Fiesta Salad at McDonald's, for example, the mesclun is topped with seasoned ground beef, shredded cheese, and crisp tortilla strips. With the optional sour cream and salsa, the salad has 450 calories, 27 grams of fat, and 920 milligrams of sodium. A cheeseburger and small french fries combined have 550 calories, 25 grams of fat, and 940 milligrams of sodium. The salad and the burger-fries combo both have 5 grams of fiber.

But at least customers can have a choice -- and, if they want it, a pedometer (for a limited time only).