Tasty, Healthy Food Venture Up Next For Former McDonald’s CEO Mike Roberts

In recent years, McDonald’s has done its best to begin adopting a healthier focus, adding options to the menu for weight-conscious diners as well as making little tweaks, like adding apples to Happy Meals to appease worried parents.

But try as it might, McDonald’s is what it is — America’s fast-food giant, a comfort food shilling emporium of nuggets, deep fried hand pies, the Shamrock Shake and the inimitable McRib sandwich. When Americans don’t feel like being virtuous, they head out to the Golden Arches for some of the joyously consistent fries (best served hot) that culinary icon James Beard reportedly loved, and perhaps some Big Mac sauce on the side for dipping.

McDonald’s isn’t Per Se, Cheesecake Factory, or even Chipotle — it’s a guilty pleasure that in moderation probably won’t kill you. But for diners who need fast and affordable food, it’s not a great all-the-time option due to a whole bunch of nutritional reasons you’re already well familiar with.

So it’s interesting to see that Mike Roberts, former CEO of America’s resident Double Cheeseburger and large fries slinger, is starting up a new chain with a totally different bent — serving up affordable eats to America, but ones that are far less likely to induce guilt or more importantly, undesirable health effects.

According to The9Billion.com, Roberts’s LYFE Kitchen is planning to break into the US fast-food scene in a big way — and with a strong set of healthy eating guidelines for the menu:

“With LYFE Kitchen, his goal is to sell food made with ‘no butter, no cream, no white sugar, no white flour, no high-fructose corn syrup, no GMOs, no trans fats, no additives.’ Sounds like the LYFE abbreviation of “Love Your Food Everyday” is quite fitting. The coolest part? Roberts wants to open 500 to 1,000 locations across the country over the next several years.”

The site notes that McDonald’s quickly became the biggest apple consumer in the US, and that LYFE could do as much for brussels sprouts as McDonald’s did for apples. With the massive rise of Chipotle and similar fast-yet-healthy cuisine, the time for a health-conscious large-scale mass option could really be here.

Options like “unfried chicken,” quinoa wraps, fish tacos, salmon and sorbet abound on LYFE’s extensive menu. Would you shun traditional fast-food if there was a restaurant like LYFE Kitchen in your town?