Mastercard Introduces Sensory Notes for Resturant menus

I am pleased to learn that Mastercard has launched an accessibility hub for Australian businesses to assist them to become more accessible for autistic customers.

As part of this hub, Mastercard have also introduced sensory notes, a way for restaurants to highlight the sensory experience of food on their menus. If you have been to a restaurant, you may have noticed symbols on menus that let you know whether something meets your dietary requirements. Similarly, Sensory Notes indicate how something tastes, it's appearance, how it's prepared, the temperature it's served at and how it is plated.

The idea is that those of us who are autistic will be able to understand if certain dishes will meet our sensory needs. I, however, can also see how this could benefit neurotypicals, as I think we have all had an experience where a dish looked different from what we thought we ordered, as the Chef decided to prepare it or plate it differently than we are used to.

Mastercard trialled the new sensory notes on menus at some of the food vendors at the Australian Open.

I am interested to know if anyone who attended the AO this year noticed these notes and if they were helpful.

You can learn more about this initiative by heading to: https://www.mastercard.com/.../mastercard-unveils.../...

I look forward to learning more about people's experiences of this new initiative.

Bryce Pace

Autism Advocate, Consultant, Speaker