Food service launch for kids' healthy ready-meals

Annabel Karmel, the creator of the Eat Fussy range of healthy ready-meals for children, has teamed up with food service supplier Brakes to launch a new range of meals into the restaurant market.

Karmel, who is also an author on cooking for babies, children and families, has developed the menu with Brakes' manufacturing business Creative Foods.

It includes four main courses and two desserts and is focused on the kinds of foods children like, while also being nutritionally balanced.

Restaurant chain Tootsies, part of the Clapham House Group, is set to introduce the meals at its 18 units at the end of this month and Little Chef and London's Rainforest Café are also thought to be interested.

Karmel told Caterer: "Restaurants tend to serve very stereotypical meals for kids, such as pizzas and chicken nuggets, and the quality is often really bad.

"If a child does not like the taste of food served at a restaurant, parents will not return. My menu is designed to give children the type of food they like while giving it a healthy twist."

Clapham House chief executive Paul Campbell said he expected the range to be a huge success. "Healthy eating is so important, and we're really following an ever-increasing trend in the market," he said.

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