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Daily Mirror

Business

Molly Holt

McDonald's Happy Meal calories revealed - and the healthiest foods to order

Ever wondered how the McDonald’s Happy Meal stacks up against other on-the-go children’s meals?

From sugar and salt to fibre, we compared the health content of McDonald's famous kids meals to its fellow high street counterparts, following news from the fast food chain earlier this month announcing that they'll be swapping out carrot sticks for cucumber in Happy Meals for a limited time only.

While calories for kids should never come into question, many adults still opt for the kid's editions of high street meals if they fancy a smaller version of their favourite foods. Plus, it's interesting to see how the brand's food really fares in comparison to alternative options.

A kid's hamburger, with a fruit shoot and cucumber sticks is less than 300 calories per meal (Bloomberg)

If you're willing to ditch the chips and opt for cucumber sticks instead, a hamburger Happy Meal with a fruit shoot will contain 272 calories - less than the Pret a Manger Kids Ham Sandwich, which contains 300 calories alone.

But it turns out that the best Happy Meal choice to opt for if you're after minimal calories is nuggets, which have 173 compared to hamburgers 250 and significantly less salt.

A grilled chicken wrap is also (unsurprisingly) a good choice for the health conscious, with 181 calories and only 2.9g of fat, whereas both the nuggets and the hamburger have over 8g each.

Pret do sandwiches for kids - with their ham sandwich one of the healthiest (Pret A Manger)

The Happy Meal combination also compares favourably to the sandwich in terms of saturated fat and salt content, the Happy Meal totalling 3.3g saturated fat and 1.2g salt versus the sandwich coming in at 4.5g saturated fat and 1.7g salt.

While sandwiches are often touted as a healthy lunch for our little ones, it turns out that McDonald's Happy Meals can have fewer calories than a kid's ham sandwich from Pret - as long as you swap out the chips for cucmber.

Nuggets are even healthier than the burger - albeit arguably less filling (Getty Images/iStockphoto)

If you do still want the fries though, a small portion of the famous chips contains 237 calories, 0.44g of salt and 2.6g of fibre.

When it comes to nutrition, there's a lot to take into account, with Pret's ham sandwich taking the crown for its fibre and protein content compared to all of McDonald's Happy Meal items, containing 4.5g of the former and 17.7 of the latter.

McDonald's let you swap out your chips for vegetables or side salads if you want (Getty Images)

Meanwhile Pizza Express's Piccolo Margherita Pizza has 4.8 of fibre, albeit with 448 calories, 6.9g of sugar and 2.3g of salt.

Leon's Children's rice box fares pretty well too, with 299 calories per box, plus 4g of fibre and 0.8g of salt and 3.3g of sugar.

We've got the full list of statistics below.

Marie Emery, Head of Family Marketing at McDonald’s UK&I explains “We are always working on ways to improve our Happy Meal and the introduction of cucumber sticks is an exciting step in this journey.

It can be tricky to get kids to enjoy their recommended fruit and vegetable intake but customers told us cucumber is a popular choice for families. More than a third of children already eat it between 2 and 3 times a week, so we’re delighted to be able to offer it as part of our Happy Meal.

We’ll continue to listen to our customers and give them choices that work for their families.”

McDonald's Happy Meal Hamburger