What's inside a school lunch burger (and a lot of processed veggie burgers)?

Here's an interesting this video from NPR about the unnecessarily long list of ingredients in a school lunch burger. The food scientist in the video argues that children who don't have three balanced meals a day need the extra ingredients in the burger. But I don't think anyone needs thiamine mononitrate, disodium inosinate, and pyridoxine hydrochloride added to their food. Most or all nutrients our bodies need can be found by eating whole, unprocessed foods.

How many types of tomatoes existed 100 years ago?

Something I didn't think about for most of my life was what type of tomato I was eating. I didn't know there were different varieties. I just thought a tomato was a tomato. I could tell the difference between a big tomato and a grape tomato, but that's about it. But as I started reading and learning more about healthy eating, I realized that there are tons of tomato varieties I had never seen before. Now, when I go to the farmers market or a healthy eating conference, I always hear people gushing about the particular type of heirloom tomato that they love the most. There are, in fact, 79 different types of tomato seeds that can be found in the National Seed Storage Laboratory. Different tomatoes have different flavors, shapes, and textures, and some types are better for cooking certain dishes than others. The image at the right shows some of these types.

But tomatoes aren't the only food with this much variety. There are also 28 types of cabbage, 36 types of lettuce, and 16 types of cucumbers. There are 25 types of peas, and 17 different beet varieties. Needless to say, I had no idea, and neither do most people, because grocery stores often carry just one or two varieties of these fruits and vegetables. Consumers are used to getting the same type of food everywhere they go, so a grocery store in California is expected to carry the exact same type of tomato as a store in Kansas. We are used to perfectly red tomatoes, gorgeous orange carrots, and big purple beets. But striped tomatoes, purple carrots, and orange beets exist too.

Unfortunately, these varieties are disappearing quickly. As this National Geographic image shows below, we used to have way more variety. A hundred years ago, we had almost 500 varieties of lettuce, 400 types of tomatoes, and 338 types of muskmelon. Now our seed variety has dwindled drastically.

This lack of vegetable variety doesn't just mean less colorful grocery shelves. It means that farmers have learned to grow just one type of lettuce, corn, or tomato on their farm fields. They have acres and acres of the same food, which increases the likelihood that the crop will be wiped out by a disease or insect. This practice of growing only one type of crop, called "monocropping" or "monoculture," is bad for the soil as well. But it's what farmers do, because it's what we demand at grocery stores.

Increasing the variety of seeds we grow in the U.S. is important. Different varieties of food offer different tastes and different nutrients. It's also fun to figure out how to cook with new types of foods. There are ways we can help increase the variety of seeds that farmers grow. I have been wanting to get a CSA share for years, so it will force me to try out different types of fruits and vegetables. Shop at farmers markets if possible, and buy new types of fruits and vegetables there. At the grocery store, look for more unusual varieties of the foods you usually buy. The more people demand a variety of fruits and vegetables, the more likely these varieties will stick around for the next one hundred years.

Image source: Readyplanted

Guest post: Food for thought

An amazing friend of mine recently had a baby boy, who is one year old now (and incredibly adorable). She also recently started a blog called Real House Mom where she writes about the challenges and joys of being a parent. I asked for her permission to republish her latest post, which discusses how and why to make baby food from scratch. So here it is!

I remember getting stressed about how I would transition Bentley to solid foods.  There are so many things to consider: What foods do I start with?  How much should I give him?  Which brand do I trust?

It’s amazing how these things just worked themselves out without me needing to calculate much of anything.  Bentley, like most babies (I’m assuming), was eager to eat solids and easily slipped into a routine of when and how much he ate.  A factor that I firmly believed made things easier was that I pureed his food myself.

It sounds like a laborious task, and yes, chopping sweet potatoes or squash can be extremely tedious, but the benefits are worth it.  First of all, there are no additives to preserve the food.  Also, the food you make on your own is not cooked in mass quantities like store bought food, so there is a significantly stronger taste.

You might be thinking, “But I work full-time, there is no way I’d have time for this.”  Well, with that kind of attitude, you most certainly won’t have time.  But think about the benefits for your child and maybe sacrificing a night or two a week won’t seem so bad.  In fact, I know working moms who have done just that and still manage to stay sane.  So, you can do it.  If you want to.

You might also be thinking, “Ugh…I hate cooking.”  I had that exact feeling.  I still don’t like to cook.  But making food for Bentley was more like a project than a chore.  I also felt a great sense of pride and accomplished when I was done…and it was an even better feeling if he liked the food!

I normally made two batches of food over the course of two nights per week.  Different foods require different amounts of time, but usually the entire process was 90 minutes (this includes peeling & chopping, which can take a long time for a novice like me). Here is a breakdown of the cooking process:

• Wash, peel (if needed), & chop food
• Steam/boil food (a steamer is best, but I boiled my food)
• Transfer food to a blender & puree (some people use a heavy duty machine…I have a blender)
• Pour pureed mix into ice cube tray, freeze overnight
• Dump cubes in a freezer safe ziplock bag, keep frozen until use

See???  It’s not that bad.  As your child gets older and becomes a pro eater, the recipes can get more complicated, but they also get more fun (and tasty).  Making your child’s food is truly a labor of love.

As a result of this process, I am very passionate about skipping the “Graduate” foods altogether. Nick and I have not made a single baby food purchase (besides rice cereal), and we don’t think Bentley is missing out.  The baby food industry would probably hate me for saying this, but your child does not need that stuff…he/she can eat whatever you’re eating as long as it’s not a choking or allergy hazard.

If making food isn’t for you (and I understand not everyone wants to do this), please make sure you read the nutrition labels.  I was disgusted when I compared “Banana Yogurt Bites” (made for babies) to dried banana chips (made for kids/adults).  The yogurt bites listed “sugar” before “banana puree” whereas the chips had one ingredient: bananas.

And remember, you are what you eat.  Your child is depending on YOU to make him the best he can be.

Image via mush: homemade baby food, which seems like a pretty cool blog as well

Why does a salad cost more than a Big Mac?

This image was published a while ago, but I recently saw it recirculating around Facebook so I thought I would post it. Why a salad (and fresh fruits and vegetables in general) costs more than a Big Mac is because the federal farm bill arranges it that way. Federal subsidies give money to farmers who produce certain crops. As of right now, "specialty crops," which include fruits and vegetables, receive less than 1% of the subsidies. The rest, as you can see, goes to meat, dairy, corn, and soy, which end up in our school lunches, grocery stores, and fast food restaurants, for cheap:

Now, there are lots of issues going on with the farm bill. A large percentage of the corn it subsidizes goes to producing biofuels, which means less food for hungry people. The richest 5% of farmers receive the majority of subsidy payments, and 3 in 5 farmers receive nothing. Very little money goes to subsidizing organic farmers. And on and on. But the issue I most find upsetting is the lack of support for farmers that produce fruits and vegetables. This is what we need more of in our diet, and the farm bill doesn't make it easier for farmers to produce these crops.

For more information on the farm bill, see here, here, and here. And if you're so inclined, contact your representative to tell them to support more funding for the growing of fruits and vegetables. We need these healthy foods to be more ubiquitous and more affordable.

p.s. Most of the information I wrote here I learned last weekend at a conference called Everybody Eats: Cultivating Food Democracy. I went to a talk hosted by Michigan Senator Debbie Stabenow's assistant. Senator Stabenow is the chairperson of the Senate agriculture committee and seems to be doing some good things to fight for funding for specialty crops. Who knows what Congress will end up doing though...

A simple way for people to know what's healthy

With a dizzying array of food products available at the grocery store, it can be hard to know what's healthy and what isn't. Some foods are labeled "natural," but may not be any healthier than an "unnatural" food. Some foods that are labeled "low-fat" may actually be really high in sugar. There are good fats and bad fats, different daily values for different people... It's confusing, and even though packaged foods have nutrition labels, people aren't motivated to turn the package around and examine the label. How many of us have the time to interpret nutrition labels on every product they're buying? I don't. They're long and confusing.

The food industry doesn't want things any simpler though. If labels were simpler, it would be pretty obvious that frequently buying a huge bag of "all natural" sour cream and onion chips is a bad idea. Or that a giant bottle of "throw-back" soda "made with real sugar" isn't actually good for you. If labels were easier to understand, the food companies would lose money on unhealthy products, which is their worst nightmare. Last year, the Institute of Medicine was really pushing food companies to put simple labels on the front of packages. Here's what the food industry decided to go with:

While that label looks pretty, it's really just as confusing as the nutrition label on the side of the box. All those numbers and categories don't tell you whether or not the food is good for you. I really don't think they are going to discourage busy adults from buying things that are bad for them. And kids? Even with nutrition education, there is no way these labels will help them learn what to eat.

But there is an alternative! Check out this really interesting study posted on Feedback Solutions for Obesity. Researchers labeled foods in a hospital cafeteria with one of three labels. A big green dot for healthy foods, a yellow dot for somewhat healthy foods, and a red dot for foods that are bad for you. Like this:

And it turned out to be so simple that it worked! Sales of the red dot foods went down, especially with unhealthy beverages. Sales of green dot foods (the healthiest ones) went up. They also did another study where they made the green dot foods more prominent on the shelf. That helped more, decreasing sales of red dot foods even further.

I am a huge fan of this labeling method. The simple dots mean that people will immediately know which foods are healthiest for them. The red dots catch your attention and make you think twice about buying that product. No, there is nothing wrong with buying a red dot food sometimes. You won't get penalized, no alarms will go off, if you buy a red dot food. But theoretically it could make you think twice about how often you buy those red dot foods.

Unfortunately, the biggest barrier to using this dot system will be getting people to agree on what qualifies as a green dot food and what has to be labeled a red dot food. I can definitely picture Pepsi throwing a fit when their soda is labeled with a red dot. But at some point they'll have to come to terms with the fact that they put a lot of money into foods that are bad for us.

What the new school lunch menus will (hopefully) look like

The USDA put out a proposed before/after menu for schools, comparing what old lunches look like (hot dogs, pizza, tater tots...basically baseball game food) to what the new ones should look like when schools start following the new guidelines. Hooray! The new menu looks fantastic. These are the types of meals I would like my students to be eating. But, like I said in my previous post, now kids need to be taught how and why to eat these new healthy foods. Otherwise they won't eat them.

Here is some other coverage of the new lunch regulations:

Marion Nestle on Food Politics (who says kids need to be taught where their food comes from for this to work)
NY Times (which says that the potato industry is apparently still upset that "the potato is being downplayed in favor of other vegetables." Good.)
Fed Up with Lunch (who says kids need more time to eat these healthy lunches...currently they get about 15 minutes at most schools)

Healthy school food needs to come with healthy food education

Today Michelle Obama announced the new nutrition standards for public school lunches. The standards call for doubling the amount of fruits and vegetables, offering only whole-grain foods, and reducing fat and sodium. She had a great quote, saying

When we send our kids to school, we have a right to expect that they won’t be eating the kind of fatty, salty, sugary foods that we're trying to keep from them when they're at home. We have a right to expect that the food they get at school is the same kind of food that we want to serve at our own kitchen tables.

She is right. Parents do have a right to expect healthy food be served at their kids' schools. But I don't think that kids will automatically eat these more nutritious lunches. Kids are very used to the fatty, salty, sugary foods that are so bad for them. Thus, when healthier foods are introduced, they're less likely to eat them. It's not just because "kids are picky eaters." Yes, some kids are picky eaters. But for the most part, kids will eat foods they are familiar with. They are very familiar with pizza, and chicken nuggets, and french fries. Why? Because this is what they are eating at fast food restaurants, at school, and sometimes at home. Most kids are NOT familiar with eggplant, couscous, kale, and garbanzo beans. So they don't eat them. (Would YOU eat a strange-colored, squishy and/or crunchy food that you had never seen before?)

Fortunately, this is not an insurmountable problem. With healthy lunches should come healthy food education. Kids need to be thinking about healthy food, learning about healthy food, getting excited about healthy food. The earlier a child is introduced to healthy eating habits, the more likely she is to keep these healthy eating habits.

Schools need to bring in chefs, farmers, and nutritionists to talk to their students. They need to model healthy eating habits by eating school lunches (or their own vegetable-packed homemade lunches) right next to their students. They need to make vegetables, fruits, and other unprocessed foods seem more familiar, more appetizing. And last, they need to be teaching kids about food on a regular basis. This means teaching them how to cook it, how to grow it, how to eat it.

Middle school students design a poster
explaining why green foods are so good for you

I have been working with Seven Generations Ahead, the farm-to-school organization in Chicago that I have mentioned before, to help create a food curriculum for teachers of 5th-8th grade students. The curriculum, called Linking Plants and Food, hits on all the important aspects of healthy food education: how to cook it, how to grow it, how to eat it. It also delves into issues of food justice and access and sustainable farming. This curriculum will get students thinking about food and developing healthy eating habits. Our hope is that, while school lunches slowly become healthier, kids will slowly become healthier eaters who understand where their food comes from.

Linking Plants and Food is set to be released in the next few weeks. I am so excited to see it, and use it in my classes. For more information on Linking Plants and Food, see sevengenerationsahead.org or contact act@sevengenerationsahead.org. I will repost as soon as it is officially released!

Hunger in America, represented on Sesame Street

A friend of mine sent me a link to a story that surprised me. Apparently Sesame Street will be debuting a new Muppet character, named Lily, who is food-insecure (which is the government's word for "hungry"). This makes me simultaneously sad and happy. Sad because the number of hungry children in the country is so great that it necessitates a TV character to represent it. Happy because children who are not hungry will learn about those that are, in a gentle and powerful way.

Hunger is a huge and basic issue for so many families in America. 49 million Americans live in food-insecure houses, which includes 16 million children. And evidently, food pantries are struggling to feed people, both because the number of hungry people is increasing, and because their budgets are being cut. Hunger is a problem in big cities, and it's also a problem in the suburbs.

But primarily, hunger is a problem of poverty. Forty percent of families below the poverty line are food insecure. Children who are hungry are more likely to do poorly in school, have developmental problems, and suffer from illness and depression, conditions which presumably increase the likelihood that they will stay poor. With one in six people hungry in the U.S., this might just be the biggest problem that many (including myself) haven't been paying attention to.

To learn how many people are suffering from hunger in your state, click on this map and hover over your state. And click here for ideas on how to help.

the Meat Eater's Guide to Climate Change and Health

The Environmental Working Group just put out a really great resource called the Meat Eater's Guide to Climate Change and Health. It doesn't tell you not to eat meat, but instead recommends which types of meat and protein are best for your health and the environment. Below is the graphic they use to show the greenhouse gas emissions of twenty common foods. Surprisingly, cheese is listed as the third worst food in terms of environmental impact! Chicken, fish, and eggs are much better (less impactful) sources of protein than cheese, beef, and lamb. To see the graphic up close, as well as the rest of EWG's report, click here.

Meatless Monday: an easy, gradual step towards a healthier diet

I want to preface this post by telling you that I am not a vegetarian. At a work party earlier this week, everyone was shocked when I helped myself to a hot dog. All year long, I taught healthy eating classes to 4th and 5th graders, and everyone at the school (including the kitchen staff) assumed I was a vegetarian. Health-conscious eaters are often assumed to be vegetarians, but it's not true that a healthy diet can't include meat. Various kinds of meat can be a rich source of protein, omega-3 fatty acids, and delicious flavor.

That said, Americans often make and order meals that are centered around meat, resulting in consumption of large amounts of beef, pork or chicken (larger than the recommended deck-of-card-sized portion) in almost every meal. This type of meat-heavy diet has a large carbon footprint. Large farms, where most grocery store and restaurant meat is produced, have hugely negative impacts on the environment. Higher consumption of red meat is also associated with diabetes and obesity.

While no one should expect Americans to eliminate meat from their diet entirely, a new idea called "Meatless Mondays" is catching on across the country. The NY Times recently profiled the city of Aspen, which is encouraging the idea in its restaurants and schools. Oprah's studio, Toyota's U.S. branch, and the U.S. Department of the Interior have all gone meatless one day a week. More interestingly to me, many universities and school districts, including UC Davis and Baltimore Public Schools, have eliminated meat from their menus on Mondays.

There are also lots of individuals who have taken on this challenge. Why do this? First of all, it's an easy and gradual step to reducing your meat consumption. There's no need to stop eating meat if you enjoy it. But avoiding it one day a week means you'll be more likely to fill up on vegetables, fruits, and grains. It means you'll save the water and fossil fuel energy that goes into producing your meat. And it means that, on the days you do eat meat, you'll enjoy it that much more. And who doesn't want to savor their food?

Not sure what to cook on your meat-free day? Here's a huge list of recipes from one of my current favorite magazines, Eating Well: Meatless Monday

Thanks to MeatlessMonday.com for many of these resources.

Photo credit: Run with Kate

How to find real food at the supermarket

Just came across this flowchart. It's funny, and it does a great job of illustrating the confusing nature of shopping in giant grocery stores that have shelf after shelf of processed food. Thanks to Summer Tomato for the image. Their website has a lot of great articles on healthy living.

Why we need to ban Happy Meals

So, there is a debate raging in the public health world about Happy Meals. Health advocates are trying to  ban McDonald's and other fast food restaurants from handing out toys with kids' meals, since the meals are completely unhealthy and the toy prize just makes kids want them even more. The fast food industry, on the other hand, says that the government shouldn't decide what kids eat, their parents should. (Conservatives, I should add, also strongly agree with this statement. It fits in so well with their fear of a "nanny government," and any attempts at regulating the crap that children are encouraged to eat. For a golden example of this, recall when Sarah Palin handed out cookies to school children in order to mock Michelle Obama's anti-obesity campaign.)

Honestly, at first I wasn't sure where I stood on this issue. I understand that parents are leery of elected officials deciding what their kids eat. There is something sacred and private about the meals we eat at home. But after a long time thinking about it, I now whole-heartedly agree with the public health advocates who are pushing to ban Happy Meals. Happy Meals are not something we eat in the privacy of our family kitchens. They are high-calorie, unhealthy meals that are marketed deliberately towards children on TV, billboards, stores, and other public places.

Let's take a closer look at what's offered in the Happy Meals at McDonald's. The choices for a Happy Meal are a hamburger, a cheeseburger, or chicken nuggets. They come with a soda and fries. Well, McDonald's also offers other choices for drinks (milk or apple juice) and a side (apple slices). But the default Happy Meal comes with the soda and fries, which automatically means fewer families will order the healthier option. (See this article on why it's important to make healthy meals the default at restaurants.)

Let's pretend the kid chooses the chicken nuggets meal option, with fries and chocolate milk. This means she is eating a meal that gives her 580 calories, 26 grams of fat, 710 milligrams of sodium, and 25 grams of sugar. To put this in perspective, this one small meal provides 41% of recommended daily calories, 65% of daily fat, 60% of daily sodium, and 200% of recommended daily sugar intake. In other words, way too much.

Now, I don't have an issue with children eating these meals every now and then. But for many families, especially those in food deserts that have many fast food restaurants and few healthier options, these meals are a regular part of the diet. They're cheap, they're fast, and kids love them. Happy Meals come with a toy. Seriously, what kid turns down a meal that comes with a free toy and box with a huge smile on it? As a matter of fact, what kid wouldn't beg for that meal?

There aren't two ways to look at this issue. We don't market cigarettes to kids anymore, because cigarettes are terrible for kids. Happy Meals are terrible for kids. They shouldn't be marketed towards them.

Either fast food restaurants need to step up and offer healthier meals with their free toys, or we need to ban Happy Meals altogether.

Sources: McDonald's, Los Angeles Times, Mayo Clinic 
Photo Source: Gunaxin

More kid posts

One of our healthy eating activities,
discovering and graphing the number of
seeds in cherry tomatoes

Here are some more essays from the 4th/5th graders on how to live a healthy life. The first one is a letter from two doctors to a patient seeking health advice. I especially love the final tag-line.

Dear "troubled person,"

Hi! So, you may have a problem. If all other diets fail, and you want to help yourself, you've come to the right place. You should start by finding a workout schedule. Then start going outside more! (It gives you Vitamin D.) Then throw out all of your "junky stuff" and start counting calories. Then come to me and my assistant. You should ask us about proper vitamins and what foods give you what.

For instance, you should eat orange and yellow food because it has Vitamin A and makes your skin, hair, and eyes healthier. Red foods have Vitamin C. Blue foods have antioxidants. White foods have potassium. Green foods have iron, antioxidants, and fiber which makes you feel full and digests your food. So, make a rainbow salad!

Thank you for having service with us. Remember, lose that flab and trade it with ab.

This next essay is written by three 5th grade boys who describe how they stay healthy. It makes me wish I could list "climbing trees" as one of my health strategies!

The way we stay healthy is we do bike rides, chin ups, pushups and sit ups. Also on Wednesdays and Fridays we run about one mile. We try not to eat junk food. I am giving up ice cream and other fattening foods. Also we climb trees and other outside things. We eat fruits, vegetables, and meat for protein, and different vitamins.

Some of us get 8 hours of sleep and we don’t drink those sugary sports and soda drinks. We play sports and do jujitsu.

Nutrition advice from the 4th and 5th graders

Students made tomato, basil
and mozzarella creations

Here is some more advice from 4th and 5th graders, this time about how to choose healthy foods. 

One thing you can do to make yourself healthy is exercising and eating organic foods. You can look for organic foods at farmers markets and local food stores. Good healthy snacks are things you grow in your garden. Things you get from local farms are also good for you. 

Here are good snack foods: Wheat Thins, apples, oranges, bananas, grapes, fruit salad, tomatoes, nuts, and organic ice pops. Healthy drinks are: v8, orange juice, apple juice, milk, water, and 100% juice.

And some more advice from the doctors to their patients:

Playing with our healthy food

To have a better life, you need to have a better diet. This is what we like to call the "Sidney and Co. Routine." One thing you could do is eat healthier like eating fruits and vegetables. Green foods will help you stop eating so much because it has so much fiber in it and fiber makes you full so you don't get so tempted to have more. Another food that will help you is purple and blue foods because if you are feeling lazy and tired, that could be symptoms of a sickness. So the antioxidants in the purple and blue foods will help keep you from getting sick. You should have red foods because they have Vitamin A which helps you when you are sick, so your immune system feels better. You should have all of these foods because they will all help you to have a healthier life.

Students reflect on how to live healthy lives

Learning to make healthy snacks

For the next few days, I'll be posting short essays on how to live a healthy life written by 4th and 5th graders at Poughkeepsie Day School. In the class I teach called "You Are What You Eat," my students learn about all aspects of healthy eating, including the importance of eating a rainbow of colors (different colored foods give you different nutrients), how to make healthy snacks, and what foods to eat in moderation.


Some students wrote about what steps they take to live healthy lives. Others pretended to be doctors giving health advice to patients. Read on to hear their simple and inspirational advice.

Dear patient,

You can feel better if you eat fruits and veggies and get some more sleep. Also get more exercise. These things will help you feel a lot better than you did feel. Start doing these things as soon as you get this. And for snack, lay off those sweets. You can eat things like apples, blueberries, oranges, strawberries, pears, carrots, tomatoes, salad, bananas, and homemade soup. Put in your schedule to go to the gym every day. No slacking, not at all, you! There are a lot of things that can help. You should eat these things because they will help you grow and feel better.

I hope you feel better soon.

From,

your doctor

Why isn't obesity an election issue?

As I've mentioned multiple times before, obesity is a huge issue affecting millions of people. Fully one third of Americans are obese or overweight, and one in five elementary school children. This is a shocking statistic that should have us all running around like crazy trying to find a solution, no matter the cost. But our politicians, with the valiant exception of Michelle Obama, are basically ignoring the situation. One of my favorite bloggers, Yoni Freedhoff of Weighty Matters, wrote this excellent article that I just had to share. While he writes from a Canadian perspective, the situation in the U.S. is almost identical. Thanks to Mr. Freedhoff for his permission to reprint it. I haven't changed any words except when inserting "Americans" for "Canadians."

So here we are in [America] in the midst of an election. Promises are being made, platforms are being unveiled, and politicians are prowling the land.

So let's pretend for a moment there was this problem in [America]. A public health problem, and it was a biggie.

Let's say there was a virus out there, and for arguments sake, let's say it was killing 25,000 [Americans] a year while afflicting millions. And if that's not bad enough, lets say that this virus was a particularly nasty one, in that if it didn't kill you, it markedly increased your risk of getting a whole slew of other medical conditions. Worse yet, this virus wasn't silent. Infection with this virus was visible to the naked eye, and consequently sufferers became regular targets of societal bias. Infection also lead many to suffer with marked fatigue, and also made completing activities of daily living more challenging, with difficulty rising with degree of infection.

Let's say too that while there was no vaccine or treatment that worked for everyone, there were both public health and medical interventions that might make a difference, if even just to combat the rising negative bias in society, as sufferers were ridiculed regularly, and even had their visible affliction leading them to lower salaries and fewer promotions. Let's also say that amazingly and shockingly, medical schools and other health care professions weren't being taught how to deal with this virus, and that the media had a bad habit of blaming those with it as being personally responsible for contracting it.

And let's say that one quarter of all [Americans] were infected.

I'm guessing that virus would be one hell of an election issue.

And yet the leaders and parties are virtually silent on obesity, a chronic relapsing disease that kills, sickens, stigmatizes, and challenges millions of [Americans]. Our medical schools don't teach our young doctors how to deal with it, and our government spends comparatively nothing on it. 

... Someone's got to stir things up! 

We need politicians to see this as a priority, and we shouldn't elect those that don't.

Friday Feature: Interesting reading on the obesity epidemic

It's been a while since I posted! I'm currently working on a schedule for posts that is more predictable and organized. More on that later. For now, here is this week's Friday Feature. I'm not sure if you'll find that reading about the obesity epidemic sweeping across the country is exactly inspirational, but I find it quite intriguing. In fact, shocking statistics about the obesity levels in American children is part of what keeps me dedicated to teaching children (and reminding myself) about the importance of healthy eating and exercise.

One in five children ages 6-11 is obese, and the numbers are even worse for adults (one in three). But what makes me saddest of all is that one in ten preschool children is obese, and the number is even higher for low-income preschool children. This is the first generation that has a shorter life expectancy than their parents. These facts make me frustrated and furious. Thus, when I see them, I become newly motivated to teach children how to eat healthy and get moving. I'll be posting some ways that teachers can help kids learn about these concepts in later posts.

For now, here are some of the blogs, articles, and reports on obesity that I find particularly interesting.

1. NY Times writer and cookbook author Mark Bittman has become one of my new personal heroes, and he has a great blog that gives information on current political events related to food, obesity, and public health in general. 
2. Weighty Matters is a blog written by a Canadian doctor who specializes in obesity medicine. His posts often touch on Canadian politics, but obesity levels in that country are on par with American levels and his posts are often very relevant.
3. Feedback Solutions for Obesity is written by a PhD student at Simon Fraser University in Vancouver, who I was lucky enough to meet on a recent visit to the city. The author is researching the complexities of obesity and instant feedback (like apps that monitor your weight), and often posts about new research on various concepts related to health and weight.
4. The CDC of course has endless information on obesity in America. If you have time to look at only one thing, check out these graphs that illustrate the spread of obesity across the country from 1970 to today. It's shocking.
5. And, just for fun, here's a website that shows some of the RIDICULOUS fast food entrees that are available for under $4 in the U.S. Like, for example, the Krispy Kreme burger. That's right, a hamburger (plus cheese and all the fixings) in between two donuts. It doesn't get much worse (or better?) than this...

Friday Feature: Podcasts on health and nutrition

This week's Friday Feature focuses on podcasts that you can listen to while driving, riding the train, or exercising. I also like to listen to them while I'm cooking dinner. I try to choose carefully which podcasts I spend time listening to. There are hundreds of podcasts out there, so I try to limit my listening to programs that inspire me to live a healthier life. Here are a few of my favorites that focus on health, nutrition, and food:

Earth Eats: This podcast is usually less than ten minutes, and gives a healthy recipe using seasonal ingredients. A chef cooks the food and gives information on the process as he goes along. My favorite part is the first two minutes of the podcast, when they provide news on food politics and legislature.

Nutrition Diva: Another short podcast (from the Quick & Dirty Tips podcast series) that features one nutrition-related question each time. They're almost always questions that I'm interested in, like "Are organic vegetables healthier?" or "How much protein should you eat?" You can search the archives for topics that interest you.

NPR: Your Health: I am an NPR devotee so of course I listen to a lot of their news shows. This one is usually about a half hour, and gives multiple stories on the latest health news, everything from popular diet fads to new medical research. It's less motivational and more informative. NPR also has another program called NPR: Food, which combines weekly stories related to cooking and food politics.

Nutrition Tidbits: This is a new one for me, so I haven't incorporated it into my listening routine yet. But the topics I've downloaded all seem interesting: Are GM foods here to stay, Why do we overeat, Olive Oil 101. Along with eating advice, it also seems to feature interviews with food professionals, which are always fascinating.

Earth Eats photo taken from prx.org website.

Friday Feature: Blogs on the politics of food

So, in the tradition of many other bloggers, I've decided to choose one day a week to highlight other resources out there, including books, blogs, and organizations, that are dedicated to healthy living. I'm calling it the "Friday Feature." The amount of resources on the internet and in bookstores can be overwhelming, so I'm hoping this will help narrow it down to the particularly useful ones.

This week's Friday Feature is focused on food blogs. There is an endless number of food blogs out there, and even more cooking blogs. So, in the interest of time and space, I've chosen three essential blogs that report on food and, more specifically, on food politics. These websites are great to read if you are concerned about issues of food safety, federal funding for food programs, and nutrition research. They also feature quite a few stories of food "renegades" who are fighting to change the food system, including inspirational gardeners, lunch ladies, and politicians. Here are the blogs...

Civil Eats: If you had to choose just one website to read about food politics, I would choose this one. The blog is updated regularly, and features a whole host of writers from various organizations. The stated mission of the site is to "promote critical thought about sustainable agriculture and food systems as part of building economically and socially just communities," and I believe it does just that.


Food Politics: This website is written by Marion Nestle, a professor at NYU who has authored a whole host of books on food politics and how to choose healthy, safe foods. She's a well-known and outspoken critic of industrial agriculture, but she isn't over-the-top about it. She posts about all sorts of food news, from recent food recalls, to controversial food policies being enacted by our lawmakers.


Fed Up With Lunch: This blog is written by an anonymous Chicago public school teacher, who spent one year eating school food with her students. She photographed every meal, and blogged about the (sometimes disgusting) foods that were served. Now that the year has ended (and she has no desire to continue eating the school lunches), she writes about other issues of school food and federal funding for healthy food initiatives.

The challenge of eating healthy

Here is a passionate essay from Kevin, a community planner in Madison, WI. He writes about the challenges of eating healthy in our fast-food culture, and gives some excellent principles to live by when working towards a healthier diet.

The challenge of eating healthy is significant and undeniable.  Life is consumed with pressures and triggers that push us towards eating convenient, fast, processed, mass produced food.  Advertisements on television and other media show us ground meat glistening with grease and topped with gooey melted cheese, wrapped in a flour tortilla.  We all have seen the commercials for the new double burger from Burger King topped with two slices of melted cheese, bacon, and hot peppers, and a side of steamy golden French Fries.  Or the endless ways large pizza chains are trying to inject cheese into every square inch of our pizzas - now we have pizza where the crust breaks off into little stuffed cheese balls.  Sounds delicious, huh?  This is all pretty powerful stuff.  I am often sucked in, and it is hard to resist.  

There are teams of expert marketers and advertisers behind those commercials and advertisements.  The stuff is just delicious, and it is fast and available by just traveling to my local corner or making a quick phone call for delivery.  Mass produced food is perfectly designed and engineered to key in on all of our desires when we eat – salty, fatty, sweet, etc.  Food scientists and food companies know what people crave and respond to, and they design and manufacture their food with consistent and repetitive formulas and mechanisms that match all of our cravings and taste sensors.  There is a reason why a cheeseburger at a McDonalds in New York tastes the same as the McDonalds in Alaska.  Combine this with endless flavored sodas and juices packed with calories, and aisles of boxed snack and other food at the grocery store, and these foods are at our fingertips.  We all lead busy lives and these foods are perfect for our lifestyles.  They are quick, tasty, cheap, and convenient, and it is not hard to see what eating these foods has become the default option for many Americans.

That all sounds like a daunting set of pressures to overcome, but I assure you it is not.  Eating healthy is a challenging, yet rewarding endeavor, and it can be done with some simple steps and behavior changes.  Here are some principles that I try to live by when it comes to food, some of which I have read or heard about elsewhere, in no particular order:  

Eat foods with as few ingredients as possible

Avoid processed food with a long list of strange ingredients like disodium phosphate.  These are the wonders of chemistry, manufactured food additives that are meant to add flavor, texture, and create the “ideal” food.  Try eating foods that are as minimally processed as possible.  This obviously includes fruits and vegetables, but also includes beans, oils, nuts, cheese, milk, butter, meats, and the like.  Also, try to avoid processed foods that still require cooking like rice and flavorings from a box, instant potatoes, etc.  These types of foods are more nutritious, more filling, and are more versatile for cooking various dishes.    

Learn to cook

Learning to cook is the most enjoyable, rewarding, and easiest way to healthier eating.  Learning to cook is a tremendous life skill, one that gives you an appreciation for ingredients, an understanding of what ingredients and foods go well together, and a powerful source of camaraderie among those you share your cooking and meals with.  It doesn’t have to be complicated food, or a difficult process.  The most important thing is to have the inspiration, the right equipment, basic skills, and you should be all set.  The most important equipment is a good quality and good size sauté pan, a good knife for slicing meats and cutting vegetables, and a working oven and stovetop.  

With this basic equipment, and basic knowledge of cutting vegetables, sautéing, and baking, you can cook a wide range of tasty and simple meals.  Cooking at home is all about preparing what you like, but it is helpful to have a sense of ingredients that go well together.  We all know about peanut butter and jelly, but how about pork and fennel, cucumber and mint, tomato and basil, and mustard and white wine in sauces?  These are the kinds of ingredient pairings that make food interesting, fun to prepare, and delish.  The joy and feeling of accomplishment of creating a filling, interesting, and nutritious dish that you can eat yourself or share with others is tremendous. 

It’s all about simple foods with simple ingredients

Start slowly and begin with some simple dishes.  One of my go-to dishes that is simple is stir frying vegetables such as garlic, onion, red peppers, broccoli and others in a pan and adding cooked whole wheat spaghetti.  Try adding peanut butter, soy sauce, sesame oil, rice wine vinegar, or other Asian-inspired flavors for more taste, and adding chicken, beef, tofu, or maybe cooking an egg in with the stir fry to make it more substantial.  Once you learn to cook basic meals such as this, become more comfortable with using various herbs and spices, and properly prepare things such as baked potatoes, chicken breast, or pork, you will be able to add to and build your repertoire to add more complex pairings, sauces, techniques, and flavor combinations.  Don’t be afraid to use REAL ingredients such as butter, eggs, and the like.  These are the foods that our grandparents ate and there is nothing wrong with any of them as long as they are used properly.  Just experiment and have fun! 

p.s. For more information on learning to cook from scratch, see my post on Basic Recipes for Health.