Coffee Chains Push Better-For-You Options

CANTON, Mass. and SEATTLE -- Coffee chains Dunkin' Donuts and Starbucks Corp. are both starting off the New Year with a focus on better-for-you offerings.

For the first time at Dunkin' Donuts, all participating restaurants throughout the country are offering guests the option of ordering any breakfast sandwich or Wake-up Wrap with egg whites.

Dunkin' Donuts' also has expanded its DDSMART menu of better-for-you foods and beverages to include a new Low Fat Cranberry Orange Muffin. Filled with cranberry and orange flavors, the new muffin has only three grams of fat. The introduction of the new Low Fat Cranberry Orange Muffin follows the recent launch of Dunkin' Donuts' Low Fat Apple Caramel Muffin that was available for a limited time throughout the fall.

In addition, Dunkin' Donuts is offering consumers looking for value an offer of an egg and cheese sandwich for 99 cents with the purchase of a medium hot coffee or beverage at participating Dunkin' Donuts restaurants, in select markets for a limited time.

"Our delicious new menu options allow our guests to make better-for-you choices without compromising taste or quality," stated Executive Chef Stan Frankenthaler.

Dunkin' Donuts' DDSMART menu includes food and beverages that meet at least one of the following criteria: 25 percent fewer calories; 25 percent less sugar, fat, saturated fat or sodium than comparable fare, and/or contain ingredients that are nutritionally beneficial.

In related news, Starbucks Corp. said beginning Tuesday, it will sell snack items with 220 calories or less, including all-natural potato chips, fruit snacks, snacks made of nuts, and granola mixes.

The coffeehouse chain also will sell four versions of a Panini sandwich that each have less than 400 calories, as well as transition to new Tazo teas and sell 10 new teas, all of which don't have any calories, the Puget Sound Business Journal reported.

"Saving just 100 calories a day adds up to about 10 pounds of weight loss per year. And we know cutting calories should not mean depriving customers of great taste," Katie Thomson, Starbucks senior nutritionist, said in a statement.

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