Children's menus at the UK's leading restaurant and pub chains are often "unhealthy and unimaginative", and are still dominated by nuggets, burgers, sausages, ready meals and fizzy drinks, with little fresh fruit or vegetables on offer, it was claimed on Wednesday.
The campaigning charity the Soil Association, with organic baby food brand Organix, sent "secret diners" to 21 popular high street restaurants and pubs and ranked their opinions of the offerings for children.
Jamie's Italian, launched five years ago by chef Jamie Oliver, Wagamama and the Wetherspoon pub chain were placed highest, while Burger King, KFC and Prezzo came bottom.
Launching the "Out to Lunch" campaign, the charity and its partner are calling for all young diners to be routinely offered the choice of children's portions of adult meals.
They say all food should be freshly prepared in the kitchen and kids' cutlery should be standard.
Research for the campaign also found that 40% of parents say they eat out as a family once or more in a fortnight, yet 66% think that food provision for children in restaurants is not good enough.
The assessments of the high street food venues were compiled after a panel of 40 families surveyed menus, sourcing policies and children's facilities over a three-month period, with further input from another 1,000 families, the charity said.
Researchers said more than half the restaurants and pubs – 12 out of 21 – offer children's menus dominated by nuggets, burgers and sausages. Eight failed to include vegetables or salad in the majority of their children's main meals, while 10 did not serve any fruit in any children's puddings.
Only 11 out of 21 chains were willing to tell researchers if their food was freshly cooked and where it comes from. Of the 11, only four were actually making and cooking the majority of their children's food in the kitchen – Jamie's Italian, Wagamama, Carluccio's and Cafe Rouge.
In the wake of the horsemeat scandal, only one chain – Jamie's Italian – could tell the secret diners where its meat came from, the charity said.
Joanna Lewis, head of policy at the Soil Association, which promotes organic food and farming as well as certifying products, said: "Our investigation reveals that most high street restaurants are not even meeting the most basic standards families should expect when they eat out.
"Most are still churning out children's menus dominated by the usual suspects – burgers, nuggets and pizzas – turning the table into a battlefield for any parents wanting their child to eat well."
She said restaurants made assumptions about what parents and children wanted, "with very little creative thinking going on. We are talking about unhealthy and unimaginative menus.
"It is not simply a choice between turkey twizzlers and a superfood salad. Restaurants need to raise the bar and listen to parents who are saying they want fresh food not ready meals for their children – and the same kind of variety you would expect as an adult."
Fast food chain McDonald's was ranked mid-way at 11th. It came second to Jamie's for its sourcing of British food – 100% British and Irish beef, free-range British eggs and 100% British organic milk – but could extend its healthy options for children, the charity said.
The appearance of Wetherspoons, which has 883 outlets in the UK, in third position may have surprised some, but the chain's senior food development manager, Jameson Robinson, said: "Wetherspoons serves more than 2 million children's meals each year across our pubs and appreciates the importance of sourcing UK ingredients and offering balanced meals.
"We know that there is still more work to do to enhance the menu further, including offering varying portion sizes, and we will be working towards this."
Jamie Oliver said: "Since the first Jamie's Italian opened, we've always kept things kid-friendly … so to come top of the table is a fantastic achievement, and more importantly, confirmation that we're doing things right.
"We believe that the quality of the kids' food should to be right up there on the same level as the main menu."
But companies trailing in the table took issue with the methodology and questions used.
A spokesman for Prezzo, which came 19th, said: "We are disappointed with the findings of the survey and believe it is not a true reflection of the children's meals served at Prezzo.
"We have served almost 400,000 meals from our children's menu in the past six months and the quality of these meals is very important to both ourselves and our guests.
"The children's menu dishes are made in-house, and our bolognese sauce is made using our own recipe, using fully traceable British beef and fresh ingredients."
Burger King, which was caught up in the horsemeat scandal when some of its burgers were found to be contaminated, and which came bottom of the table, said: "We are committed to offering a welcoming environment for families in our restaurants, and to providing parents with a range of options to allow them to make healthy choices for their children. This includes offering them apple fries, milk, water or juice in our kids' meals."
The campaign is the latest collaboration between the Soil Association andOrganix. The twohave worked together since 2008 campaigning for better nursery and hospital food.
