Eating-In on Labor Day

Are you attending the National Day of Action to Get REAL FOOD in School Lunch?

You should!!

And chances are, there is a local Eat-In happening in your community.

The Time for Lunch Campaign is a national project sponsored by Slow Food USA, to encourage support for dramatic change to the Child Nutrition Act, which is up for re-authorization by Congress this fall. Rather than feeding kids USDA commodities (tator-tots and canned corn), Time for Lunch is built on this comprehensive platform:

1. Invest in children's health.

2. Protect against food that puts children at risk.

3. Teach children healthy habits that will last through life.

While encouraging President Obama and Congress to

1. Give schools the incentive to buy local.

2. Create green jobs with a School Lunch Corps.

You can read the complete platform here.

Show your support for changing the way American school children eat lunch, by sharing good food with new friends at an Eat In this Labor Day. A map of national locations is available here.

At the very least, sign the petition to get REAL FOOD in school lunch. They are searching for 6,000 more signatures before September 7.

Make a New Year's Kitchen Resolution!!!

For many kids, New Year’s Eve means chowing down on pizza and soda while watching movies with the babysitter.

But my childhood tradition on December 31st was very different. For me, New Year’s Eve meant driving 2 hours into New York City to shop at the specialty market, Zabars. It meant donning my fanciest dress-up clothes, costume jewelry, and experimenting with Mom’s make-up. New Year’s Eve had little to do with balls dropping or resolutions, but had everything to do with my favorite, once-a-year gourmet goodies from the Upper Westside “Epicurian Emporium”. We’re talking imported caviar on fancy rye toasts, smoked salmon with dill and marinated mushrooms, pickled herring, cured black olives, and (shhh) a few sips of champagne. Earlier in the day, I’d carefully prepare a hand-drawn menu of the evenings’ specialties and help my mom polish our proper silver and fine china. For our tiny crew (me, my mom, our dog Penny, and my stuffed animals) this was a very fancy occasion.

Admittedly I wasn’t the first child with such extravagant tastes (a six-year old in one of our after-school cooking classes lists escargot as her favorite food!). But today we tend to hear more about childhood obesity and picky eaters than kids who gorge on fancy fare.

Most American kids could use a few lessons on expanding their palate (and I don’t mean force feeding sushi to fish-hating first-graders). With busy schedules and over-worked parents, the temptation to serve chicken fingers instead of homemade pot-pie and frozen French fries as opposed to baked sweet potatoes is too great for many families. Family mealtime as Norman Rockwell would recognize it has become a long-forgotten American pastime. And in turn we are raising a generation of picky eaters who think peaches come from cans and have little interest in eating a nutritionally balanced meal.

The solution? Cook with your kids. It has been proven time and again that kids who help out in the kitchen are much more likely to become adventurous eaters. Kids with culinary instruction not only cultivate a more diverse palate, but also experience increased self-confidence, discover the important role nutrition plays in our physical and emotional wellbeing, and build the foundation for healthy life-long skills. Here are some other great reasons to cook with your kids.

In the spirit of the New Year, there’s no better time to change the way your family eats. This January, resolve to cook dinner with your family one night a week. If families that eat dinner together raise smarter, safer, and more secure kids, we can only imagine what will happen when families start cooking together! Regardless of your culinary prowess, or your tolerance for mess, this shouldn’t be as daunting as it sounds.

Here’s the plan:
Join me in making a New Year’s Kitchen Resolution! Commit to a Family Kitchen one night each week when soccer practice and PTO meetings won’t have you eating in the car. Earlier in the week, decide on a menu theme (Greek? Comfort food? No-silverware-required finger foods?) and plan and shop for the meal. On the night of Family Kitchen, make sure each family member lends a hand. Remember, this meal is much more about the process than the product. So take time, have fun, and enjoy your too-crowded kitchen. There are appropriate kitchen tasks for every family member, young and old.

With a happier, healthier family, Family Kitchen is one New Year’s resolution you’ll be grateful for well into spring. And maybe by next January when your kids watch the ball drop, they’ll trade roasted vegetables and baked salmon for those infamous chicken fingers and boxed mac and cheese.

My Dog Eats Better Than Your Kids

Hopefully this isn't true. (Though I did just poach some chicken thighs for our dog...)

But it is the title of Australian scientist Dr. Peter Dingle's new book. Dingle believes that the over-processed, chemical-packed foods that go into the average child's diet are far worse than what we feed most animals. I wondered about this. The brands at my pet store include: Nature's Logic, DogsWell, Halo For Pets, Party Animal Organic, BG (Before Grain) and Wellness. And the ingredients on Auggie's food are all easily pronounceable, all natural or properly fortified, and include familiar items like "duck, lamb, sweet potatoes, corn, and zucchini". I wanted to compare the dog food label to those darned spicy cheetos... but you won't be surprised when I tell you there just weren't any in our cupboard.

Nonetheless, Dingle might be on to something. Dogs are eating better than kids. Except when they're not:

Last year Americans were outraged to learn dogs and cats were becoming sick from contaminated dog food manufactured in China. The FDA scurried to create new federal positions to inspect imported goods, pet food recall lists swarmed the Internet and pet store shelves, and veterinarians treated many an ill dog.

It's a well known fact that four of the top six leading causes of death in the United States can be attributed to our Western Diet. Chronic diseases like cancer, diabetes, and heart disease are literally killing us as we continue to eat, well, "contaminated food". But unlike the contaminated dog food scare, there's not enough outrage. The FDA, happily in cahoots with big agribusiness, scurries to do nothing. And there's certainly no "recall list" posted on supermarket shelves reminding us to skip the trans-fat fries, Olestra-laden bbq chips, and Splenda-ridden "sugar" cookies. Unfortunately, the only similarity between the dog food crisis and our nation's current food crisis, is the increased number of visits to medical professionals.

Cookbook author and New York Times columnist Mark Bittman is outraged. Listen to him call for a dramatic change in the way Americans eat, in his talk:

What's Wrong with What We Eat:



Having trouble viewing it? Click here to go to see the video on ted.com.

Other Things I'd Like to Vote For

I've managed to live in two of the few states that put propositions on the November ballot. With confusing wording and lengthy legalese, it can leave even the most informed citizen baffled. Let alone your average Joe. (Plumber or not.) Californians today cast their vote for a wide range of topics, from constitutional amendments about same-sex marriage, the rights of a chicken, renewable energy, and parole rehabilitation. In Santa Monica, we also weighed in on traffic congestion, rent control leadership, building development, and a cell-phone tax.

I don't mean to disparage our great civic duty, or dismiss the truly electric energy that buzzed through my polling place today. But after waiting in line for 20 minutes, and spending many more inking my voice in nearly 35 different bubbles, I realized that there were actually a few more things for which I'd like to cast my vote in favor. Here's my list. Feel free to dream yours.

Prop EAT: A Provision for a Healthier, Happier America:

School Lunch Reform
Stricter Cafeteria Standards
Nutrition and Culinary Education
Junk Food Consumption Limits
Massive Reduction in Global Warming and Fatal Diseases Currently Attributed to Agriculture and Livestock Production
Teaching Kids the Value of a Good Meal Enjoyed with Friends and Family Teaching Those Same Kids How to Cook It
Elimination of "Ingredients" like Hydrogenated Oil and Red No. 40 in the Food We Feed Our Children
An Opportunity for Kids to See How Food Grows and Where It Comes From with the Likes of a School Garden
Access to Fresh Fruits and Vegetables for All, Regardless of Economic or Geographic Restrictions
Dramatic Increase in Fruit, Vegetable, and Whole Grain Consumption
Limits on the Distance a Tomato Should Travel
A nation that Eats Food, Not Too Much, Mostly Plants

I'll keep dream voting... but that first poll is closing and it's time to see the real changes that will be made today.

What Happened to Home-Ec?

Our dog goes nuts for kids. Babies in strollers, toddlers with mom, awkward teenagers -- they're all Auggie's best friend. For a real treat, some mornings I take him on the "school tour" in our neighborhood. We pass 1 middle school, 3 pre-schools, 1 elementary school, and a community college. We also encounter numerous treat-bearing crossing guards. Auggie gets more pets and attention in that 45 minute walk than your average mutt does in a week.

This morning we passed several groups of middle-schoolers ambling towards class. And most of them were still working on 'breakfast'. (You know, the most important meal of the day.) Hot cheetos. Caramel popcorn. Jolt, Vault, Monster. (Engery drinks, in case you weren't sure.) Chicken nuggets. I was so appalled I think I would have been relieved to see some breakfast junk food of yesteryear. Think Pop tarts, Egg McMuffins, and breakfast sausage Hot-Pockets.

In reality, I guess I wasn't too shocked. In fact, it was watching too much consumption of hot-cheetos before 9am that propelled me into the kids' cooking and nutrition business anyhow. As a middle school teacher, I was all too accustomed to the sugar highs and lows these junks foods caused, especially during first and second period. The implications for students who start their day with a healthy breakfast is astounding, from test scores to type 2 diabetes to behavioral and attention disorders. And by now, it seems teachers, nutritionists, doctors**, and (some) parents all know this.... so who's telling the kids???

The lack of health-education (it's not just sex-ed) and life-skills classes in our schools is devastating, and is no doubt one of the many factors contributing to our nation's growing obesity rate. When I was a kid, I was taught the difference between Fruit Loops and fruit salad. Sure, I loved my annual birthday box of Fruit Loops. But I understood why I ate fruit salad the rest of the year. Kids today are simply not receiving the requisite nutrition and culinary education to make good choices about what they eat. Not only are schools not teaching it, they're not serving it either. Nearly 80% of US school cafeterias do not meet the USDA nutritional guidelines for school lunch (how can they when they get just $1.00/child?), and many offer items from Taco Bell and Pizza Hut. Kids aren't dumb; they probably know that a Double Whopper isn't the best thing for them. But I don't think they realize the lifelong ramifications of the food choices they make.

With a quick search on google for "home economics in schools today", I could hardly find an article or website that discussed cooking and health education in American schools. (The most relevant was from 2001.) Of course, there are some exemplar school district programs, like Alice Water's-influenced Edible Schoolyard in Berkley. And there is excellent curricula for interested teachers, such as Dr. Antonia Demas' Food Is Elementary. But we've yet to come close to anything as radical as UK's recent mandate which requires secondary schools to teach health education and cookery to all the country's children.

In previous political campaigns, I've gotten pretty fired-up when the candidates debate education reform. During Wednesday's final debate, it got barely a sound bite as the last topic posed by Bob Schieffer. And you can be sure that building kitchen classrooms, planting school gardens, improving the nutritional quality of cafeteria food, and home-economics classes weren't in either of the candidates' responses.

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**In fact, only 40% of medical schools require doctors to take a nutrition course, and 6 of the top 16 US hospitals have fast food in the cafeteria.

They'll Even Eat Radishes

There's been a lot of research lately which suggests children involved in preparing their own meals are far more likely to cultivate a diverse and nutritious palate.

Of course, those of us who cook with children don't need fancy studies to prove this. We see it every day. Like when a self-proclaimed salad hater devours his "Let-Us Rap" romaine leaf, stuffed with dried fruits and nuts, and quickly makes a second.

Today's New York Times has gone ahead and called "sending children out of the kitchen during meal time [to be one of] the most common food mistakes parents make". In fact, parents who choose to make dinner in the cloak of secrecy are actually doing their children a considerable disservice. In this latest study from Teachers College, children who learned to prepare their own whole grains and vegetables were even more likely to choose those same foods in the cafeteria. Yup, bitter radishes included.

So don't get stuck as a short-order cook, get cooking with your kids today.

Whole Foods Venice

Truth be told, I've never been a Whole Foods shopper. I've subscribed to the "Whole Paycheck" theory, and I'd much rather buy local than 2000 miles-away-organic. I'm pretty loyal to high-quality, cost-effective Trader Joe's, and the local farmers' markets.

But I'm afraid that's all about to change. Well, I'll at least have a new stop on the grocery circuit. The 48,000-square-foot Whole Foods Venice opened yesterday, and I was there.

What blew me away wasn't the impeccably organized fresh produce, the fish smoker, or 2 counters of domestic and imported cheeses. (Though the hand-pulled mozzarella demo and tasting was pretty neat.) The prepared foods section was like a gourmet global buffet in Vegas on steroids. I was overwhelmed by such things as a rice pudding bar. A chocolate fountain surrounded by dozens of fancy dessert creations. A taqueria. Learning that every egg used in on-site food production was laid by a cage-free chicken. A Korean BBQ and sushi counter. Did I mention the wine bar with a tapas menu? The gelato bar? Or the local artisans' area next to the shoe wall? Indeed, I get overwhelmed in a store of this caliber. Too many choices; too much variety! Can you imagine finding in Italy, a country made for foodies and locavoires, an entire grocery wall devoted to yogurt? I also worry about the corporate effects: how will the mom and pop bakery fare, the local taco truck, the pizzeria?


And the prices? $4.99 for a custom made burrito isn't bad. $2.49 for a cup of soup. $3.49 for a gallon of milk. 1 1/2lbs. of Fair Trade organic coffee beans for $9.99. Not bad. And while it might just be a marketing ploy discussed recently in the New York Times, I was impressed with the 24 page newsletter, "the Whole Deal", which emphasizes budget friendly ways to prepare healthy, gourmet food for your family. Whole Foods even offers a weekly Value Tour, which walks the savvy shopper through the store on a best deal mission. (Though I probably won't be starting date night as the publication suggested: gorging on appetizers at home, so I can save money on dinner out.)

For take-out and bulk grains, little can compare. I'll need to make a few more trips to really evaluate our new culinary show-stopper for groceries. But with such variety and eco-friendly values in my backyard, it's certainly something I look forward to doing.

If you've got little ones Growing Up Gourmet...
check out the Whole Foods' Mommy Mixer for new moms on Thursday, September 11 featuring organic baby food samples and cooking demos. Back to School Kid's Day, Sunday, September 14, 12-4pm. Value Tours are schedule for Sundays at 11 and 3. More info here.

Three Scoops, Please

A running joke in our house involves the headless overweight shopper on a busy Manhattan street corner. You know him? Perhaps you'll recognize him better as the headless overweight beach goer carrying a cooler of coke and cheese puffs. Before the housing crisis took over the nightly news, the waistlines of these headless men and women played a key role on American television screens nearly every night.


Now, the headless and overweight are kids, seriously at risk of developing lifelong health problems and type II diabetes. Time Magazine's special health issue in June was dedicated almost entirely to the juvenile obesity epidemic, reporting the staggering statistic that the percentage of 6-11 year olds classified as obese has tripled in the last 25 years. This summer, the growing BMI of American kids has piqued the media's interest. In the New York Times, Tara Parker-Pope writes about how summertime and summer camp leads to long days of (wiffle ball? flashlight tag?) cheese fries and ice cream sundaes. A CNN blog posted tips for parents to help their kids order-up a healthy plate and active lifestyle this summer.


Providing kids with nutrition education and accessibility to fresh fruits and vegetables are the single most important steps in changing the course of this national health crisis. Unfortunately school districts continue to face budget cuts in areas such as physical and health education. Worse, it was announced this week that the cost of school lunches will rise 12% this fall. With such a price increase it seems even the best intentioned districts will struggle to put local fruits and fresh veggies on the menu. What does this mean? Moms and dads, friends and family, coaches and teachers, community leaders and clergy... YOU need to make a difference in the lives of America's overweight kids.

Nutrition 101

I am just days away from completing my first graduate-level course in nutrition. Throughout the semester, "Nutrition for a Healthy Lifestyle" reminded me just how complex the human body is, and how important it is we nourish it with the right foods. I've still got lots to learn, but the overview -- from antioxidants to zinc -- will serve as a solid foundation for understanding what we eat and why we eat it. Now that I'll be spending less time pouring over my textbook, I hope to share more ruminations about nutrition for kids on this blog. But after all the tests, and all the lectures, the most important take-away message is something I've known at heart all along: eat fresh; eat balanced; eat variety.

As a final project, I developed an informal website for kids: "Eating the Alphabet: the kids' guide to the WHY of nutrition". If your kids are tired of being scolded to...

"Eat your carrots!"
"Finish your milk!" and
"Don't eat those cookies!"

...and would like to learn why they should -- or shouldn't -- eat those goodies, this site is for them. It's a work in progress, but kids will learn about protein and carbs, iron and vitamins. Also, you'll find lots of links to other resources on kids' nutrition, including KidsHealth and MyPyramid for Kids.

The Kitchen Classroom

When the editors of Tastybaby.com contacted me about writing an article for their fabulous site, I was happy to accept. Perhaps you've heard of Tastybaby's exquisite line of natural, delicious and organic baby food like "Peas on Earth" and "Hip 2 B Pear". Did you also know their website is bursting with tasty and touching articles, too?

At any rate, I thought the most fitting story to share with health-conscious moms who want the very best for their children, would be about turning the family kitchen into a global classroom:

I’ve taught children in lots of fabulous places: three year olds on the ski slopes of Park City, Utah, high schoolers from a working-class suburb of Florence, Italy, hormonal adolescents in a public school classroom. But I founded Kitchen Kid, a Los Angeles-area culinary school for kids, because I think the best place to teach kids is in the heart of every family’s home: the kitchen.

So I’ve composed the top 10 reasons why you should stop cooking for your kids, and start cooking with them.

10. They call it culinary arts for a reason. Cooking is a tasty and tangible way for kids to express their creativity. Children experience success, independence, and increased self esteem when they put dinner on the table, all by themselves! And quite simply, cooking is a fun adventure for all the senses!

9. Kids love the prep work you hate. Washing potatoes? (Fun with water!) Trimming asparagus? (Snap off that 3rd grade aggression!) Chopping herbs? (Meticulous results with craft scissors!)

8. The kitchen is a classroom, and school becomes delicious! Kids hone skills like… Geography – find the Mediterranean Sea when you make hummus; map out the Silk Road when you stir fry. Language – steak frites anyone? Farfalle with prosciutto? Math – cups are in thirds and tablespoons in halves way before fractions are introduced at school. And science. Consider the chemistry of egg whites and whipping cream post electric mixer. Not to mention reading comprehension, sequencing, and one of my favorites, following directions.

7. Healthy snacks and yummy meals have thankfully begun to replace vending machines and drive-thrus. With the help of your tiny chef, roasting chicken and making snack bags won’t seem like such formidable tasks.

6. Kids are empowered to make their own wholesome choices when engaged in honest dialogue about nutrition. Teach them to eat a rainbow of colorful foods each day. They’ll be glad to know sweet potatoes fuel their brains, bananas boost their energy, milk makes them grow strong, and strawberries fight a cold.

5. An appreciation of where food comes from fosters an interest in local, sustainable, and organic ingredients. Long after they forget the nursery rhymes of barnyard animals, kids clamor to track the journey from farm to fork.

4. Your child’s palate will expand well beyond the limited fare of nuggets and buttered pasta. Children are much more likely to eat – and enjoy – foods which they had a hand in creating. In countless Kitchen Kid culinary classes, I’ve seen picky eaters chow down happily on foods they previously feared. Vegetables, fish, and funny textures included.

3. Dinnertime becomes family time once again. Kids and parents who cook together dine together. Norman Rockwell rests in peace.

2. You might just score a really delicious breakfast in bed this Mother’s Day.

1. Watching five year olds mix, mash, and measure is pretty entertaining! As one toque-touting tot-chef explained to me during cooking class, “I love to be shoe-chef!”

Dinnertime Challenges for Mom, Top Chef Style

Is it just me, or was the elimination challenge on Bravo's Top Chef last night hardly, well, a challenge? The task: cook a nutritious, simple, and kid-friendly dinner that American families would be happy to re-create. Oh, and spend $10 or less. If this seems an impossible feat, as Chef Andrew quipped, it's worth noting these astounding figures reported in Chef Tom Colicchio's blog: 10% of Americans rely on food stamps. Food stamps allocate just $1/meal per person. That means cooking a simple, nutritious, and kid-friendly dinner for your family of 4 for just $4. And the cost of food continues to rise...

Anyhow, it seems this 'challenge' -- or should I call it a 'regularly nightly task' for most American moms -- really stumped these talented chef-testants. So I've decided to critique each of the chefs so they'll be ready when they have hungry kids of their own.

Mark: I agree with the judges on this one. Your sweet curry entree lacked essential carbs and protein. Gail was right, sweet potatoes are a great source of vitamins, but a dinner of "just vegetables" doesn't work on the family table. How about mashed sweet potatoes with turkey burgers?

Dale: Good thinking. Pre-cooked sausages are a quick, inexpensive staple in the family kitchen. But your kids may find brats and cabbage to be the 'worst'. How about smoked chicken and apple sausage instead? Or an Italian turkey sausage kabob with sauteed red peppers and broccoli, with a side of brown rice?

Spike: Few kids get excited about olives and capers. But pasta with red sauce will always be a quick, inexpensive, and nutritious family meal. Jessica Seinfeld's been known to sneak some unique vegetables in there, too. I loved your idea for carrot soup -- I wish more American moms knew how easy and rewarding it is to make homemade soup.

Nikki, Richard, Stephanie, and Lisa: Lots of roasted chicken. Definitely a healthy, delicious way to feed a family. Think outside the BSB (boneless, skinless breast): it's a lot cheaper to buy whole chicken, thighs, or even bone-in breast. I liked Nikki's easy clean up plan and wished more chefs had considered using just 1 pan. Richard did a nice job introducing hot pink beets. Kids love the sweet taste and bright color when they are roasted. But left whole the texture is intimidating. Try running the beets through a food processor and toss with pasta and cheese. Though Stephanie's dish was deservedly on the bottom, whole wheat couscous is a great, quick kid-friendly grain. Mixed with some leftover chicken, chickpeas, and snow peas, it's one fast dinner.

Andrew: I loved this take on a 'kid classic': chicken parm. Your salad of fennel, orange, and apple was sweet and full of vitamin C. But Spike, no dad in his right mind would dare serve it on top of the chicken!

Antonia: How fitting that you, the single mom, knew how to "stir-fry" up a healthy, tasty, inexpensive kid-favorite. It's no surprise that this includes whole wheat pasta, chicken, and sweet veggies like bokchoy and edamame. I'm sure your daughter is proud!

I applaud Top Chef for inviting kids into the kitchen to help put dinner on the table: note to viewers, try this at home! And I know moms across the nation smiled in victory last night, confident their "Wednesday night chicken" or "surprise pasta bake" would have earned gushing praise from the Judges Table in this "challenge".

30 Meals in 30 Days

Cookie Magazine's online community really is "all that's best for your family." From baby strollers to beauty tips and exercise to entertaining, it's a one-stop, content-rich source for all things family. Though I am easily distracted by the "Do-Everything-Better Guides" (who wouldn't be lured by such a claim?) I of course visit the site for creative new ideas in the kitchen.

A must-read for any mom in the "What's For Dinner???" or "Feed My Family.. NOW!" slump, is Jenny Rosenstrach's article 30 Meals in 30 Days, where: "A mother of two sets out to expand her kids' palates, break out of a rut, and ultimately rediscover a small part of her old self."

My favorite part of the article is the week-by-week analysis and links for each new recipe. Rosenstrach offers helpful tips for advanced preparation, heads-up on the number of dirty dishes, viable substitutions for picky-eaters, and provides her family's report-card style rating.

If you're family's been gorging on grilled cheese, instead of Growing Up Gourmet, this is one article to read before your next trip to the store.

No Bones About It

Having dinner with my 27-year old friend the other night reminded me of one of my biggest (and silliest) 'food fears' as a child: chicken bones. My friend hesitated to order the roasted chicken, asking our waiter if it would be 'on the bone'. While I was hardly a picky eater as a child (fond of sushi and caviar by 5), I was quite picky when it came to eating chicken on the bone. Thankfully, I've come to realize just how much better chicken actually tastes when it is on the bone.

In two of my recent kids' cooking classes, we have roasted bone-in chicken breasts. Rib bones intact, the meat has been roasted with cherry tomatoes and thyme, or lemon and rosemary. The pan sauce is rich and flavorful; the meat moist and tender. This chicken was no match for it's boneless, skinless brother. Having hesitantly confronted the bone in the kitchen and tasted the results at the table, both groups of children readily admitted bone-in chicken simply yields a more complex and delicious meal. And discovered they had no problems working around the bone.

Aside from the far superior taste of chicken on the bone, my family came up with a list of other benefits last night at dinner, over you guessed it, roasted chicken.

1. It's quick. Okay, well, a 4 lb bird will take about 1 1/2 hours to roast, but it is sure quick to prepare. I was lamenting the fact I'd be roasting such a behemoth after a long day at work. But I mixed up an herb, lemon, and mustard marinade, smoothed it on my chicken, and halved some potatoes, onions and carrots to go in the roasting pan, all in less than 10 minutes. With a side of spinach sauteed in 30 seconds when the bird came out of the oven, I spent less time actually making this dinner than I would have seasoning and sauteing 4 boneless, skinless chicken breasts and some sides.

2. It's cheaper. Much cheaper. Last night's whole chicken was $1.59/lb for a free-range, organic, grass-fed bird. The boneless, skinless version would sell for nearly five times that amount.


3. It's healthier. Well, I can't promise more vitamins and minerals, but it certainly has seen less commercial processing equipment than the pre-packaged chicken tenders.

4. It feeds a family. With leftovers -- chicken sandwiches... chicken soup....chicken salad....


5. It's an age-old tradition. Roasting a whole chicken has been a culinary adventure since... no joke, the Babylonian times. Your grandma would be proud.


6. Your house will be filled with wonderful aromas that will make you feel like Julia Child.

So next time you're family is in the "chicken-rut", grab a whole bird and give it a roast.

Local Foods Meet Federal Foes

It's discouraging to know the federal government is getting in the way of feeding your family fresh, local, and organic produce -- which is typically much healthier and more nutritious than the mass-produced varietals.

If you were disturbed and dismayed to read farmer Jack Hedin's editorial "Forbidden Fruit (and Vegetables)" in the New York Times earlier this month, you won't want to miss Evan Kleiman's interview with him this week on KCRW's show Good Food. You can listen online with their new media player, Tuned In. Despite the fact that the local foods movement is growing, and the demand for pesticide-free vegetables increasing, the government would much rather support the monoculture farmers who reap rows and rows of corn, while your zucchini is trucked in from a thousand miles away.

But there's hope. Read the Fresh Mouth blog, which chronicles "a family of 5, with 1 mission to eat only fresh food or processed food with 5 ingredients or less for 30 days". This Mom's mission:

We're an average American family trying to eat better and enjoy it more. We'll convince our three little kids that fresh food is about pleasure, rituals and family - and not about red dye #40, high fructose corn syrup or hydrogenated oils.

Boxes of Fun Straight from the Farm

A tightly sealed package filled with wonderful goodies... euphoric aromas seeping from the kitchen...

No, it's not Christmas. It's your CSA box arriving weekly with freshly harvested local bounty!! But with spring's sweet treats like green peas and asparagus, it sure does seem like Christmas in March.

Community Supported Agriculture is one of the best ways you can inspire your tot-chef to chow down on mysterious vegetables and juicy fruit. And is there a better opportunity to discuss where food comes from (Albertson's? the can?) than when your delivery arrives straight from the local farm? Anticipation and wonder will radiate from your kids as they peel open the box to see what will be on the menu this week. And with truly the tastiest produce at their finger-tips, they'll be clamoring to help you cook up new recipes for carrots and beans.

If you live in the Los Angeles or San Diego area, sign up for a CSA box from J.R. Organics. The Escondido based family farm is committed to providing its members with the freshest, most nutritious vegetables around. Try them out by picking up a few veggies from their stand at many local Farmers' Markets.

Coming soon... kid-friendly recipes inspired by the weekly harvest.

Free Range -- Not a Cash Cow

No doubt you've noticed it takes a few more greenbacks to buy things these days. With gas prices soaring past $3.50 gallon, the mortgage crisis heating up, and unemployment rates rising, it's no surprise that groceries are becoming gastronomical too. The cost of eggs were up 40% in 2007; milk and coffee are 26% more expensive than they were just 6 months ago.

You may be thinking that the rising cost of living is one more reason to skip Whole Foods (deemed Whole Paycheck by many) and head to the 99 Cent Store. In fact, the LA Times offered advice last Sunday for really eating on the cheap with a review of the new 99 Cent Store "gourmet" cookbook.

But as it turns out, this might just be the best time to appreciate the free-range, organic, cage-free, grass-fed and typically more expensive goodies from organic farmers and green grocers. Why? On many organic, natural, and local farms that depend less on corn products, operating costs such as feed are staying fixed. What does this mean to the consumer? Grass-fed chicken may still cost a few cents more than their corn-fed brothers, but the price gap is most definitely shrinking. Higher-quality organic produce may not cost more for long. Similarly, industry experts are predicting that the rising price of whole foods -- those in their most natural form like eggs and milk and apples -- are beginning to peak and perhaps drop. Whereas processed foods -- those foods that require economically volatile products such as corn syrup, extensive packaging, and long-distance travel from farm to factory -- are most definitely going to be hit by price inflation throughout 2008.

You knew your heart would thank you for choosing fresh spinach from the produce aisle over a spinach and sausage Hot Pocket from the freezer section. And you knew your conscience would be thankful you chose eggs from free-range birds over those that were cooped-up.

Finally, your pocketbook is beginning to appreciate both.

Veggies: How Many are Too Many?

I can't tell you how disappointed I was to still see Jessica Seinfeld's book, Deceptively Delicious, on the bestseller rack in Barnes and Noble this week. I've long maintained that sneaking food is merely a recipe for distrust -- one that will yield even more picky eaters who harbor an illusory relationship with healthy foods.

Thankfully, two outstanding food writers continue to remind us that the anti-sneak dialogue is resounding loudly. In this month's Bon Appetit column, "Health Wise", author Mark Kurlansky compares the veggie-laden diet of China's youngsters to the "eat your spinach... or else" rhetoric echoed by desperate moms in many American homes. He considers Missy Chase Lapine's (The Sneaky Chef) and Seinfeld's cookbooks to be "the worst possible response" to the problem of kids refusing to eat their vegetables. Kurlansky poses worthwhile solutions which "foster an appreciation for vegetables," such as growing a vegetable garden. (Think Alice Waters' Edible Schoolyard on a household scale.)

And yesterday Mark Bittman wrote on his new blog Bitten, that "the funniest thing about these two books is that the public uproar wasn’t over their approach to cooking but over which author had the idea first."

With the Bon Appetit article titled, "Eat Your Broccoli", and Bittman begging "Eat you veggies", I can't help but be optimistic that the next food-fad in kids' health will be "Veggies: How Many are Too Many?"

To Sneak or Not to Sneak?

Is that really still the question?!

With the controversy surrounding Jessica Seinfeld's book, Deceptively Delicious, tricking kids into eating spinach and sweet potatoes sure piqued the media's attention recently! As you might guess, I am a firm member of the "DON'T SNEAK" camp! Why hide foods that are already delicious? You'll find my argument furthered in last month's 805 Living Magazine, where I up against Missy Chase Lapine, author of the popular cookbook, The Sneaky Chef.

If you still need a reason to roast broccoli with parmesan instead of blending it up for pasta sauce, tune in to Bon Appetit's pod-cast with editor and gastrokid.com founder Hugh Garvey, and family cookbook author Lauren Bank Deen. Listen online, or read more about an "honest kitchen" in this Boston Globe article.

It's All About the Color!

We all know green is good. And it seems like everything is 'green' these days. Lunch boxes, toilet paper, cars, lightbulbs, even fully furnished homes. Green foods are good too: spinach, broccoli, asparagus, avocados, lettuce, and peas are all rich in antioxidant vitamins, follate, and iron.

Being eco-friendly is great. But green isn't the only color your kids should be learning about. Red and pink foods (peppers, grapefruit, watermelon, tomatoes, strawberries) are filled with nutrients such as beta carotene, lycopene, and powerful cancer-fighting carotenoids. Orange and yellow foods (carrots, squash, pumpkins, sweet potatoes, apricots, melons) are high in beta-carotene, and citrus fruits are full of vitamin c. And dark blue and purple foods (blueberries, grapes, blackberries, figs, plums) are also packed with cancer and disease fighting antioxidants.

Snack time is a great time to make sure your kids are eating through the rainbow. Keep baggies -- or in the spirit of being green -- small containers in your fridge stocked with fruits and veggies of different colors. Throw a "green snack" and a "red snack" into your daughter's backpack for a pre-soccer pick-me-up, and grab a "blue snack" and an "orange snack" for nibbles in the car. At the grocery store, choose by color: assign each child a color and see what nutritious fruits and veggies they bring back to the cart!

Me-Oh-MY Minestrone

This quick minestrone is a perfect Saturday afternoon kitchen adventure. Even the youngest chefs can exercise ownership and make choices about what they are eating -- a very powerful concept indeed!

On the stove, heat 4 cups of chicken or vegetable broth with a can of diced tomatoes. Season with herbs like rosemary or oregano, if desired. On the counter, place heaping bowls of delicious "toppings" like frozen corn, kidney beans, alphabet pasta or orzo, shredded carrots, green peas, tofu cubes, spinach leaves, and Parmesan cheese. Invite your tot-chef to top their bowl of broth with the yummy vegetables. Children will help themselves to their favorites, and may even be motivated to try something new. With a little encouragement, I've seen the most hesitant bean-eater be enthusiastic about stirring in at least 1 bean! Top with a little Parmesan and a touch of olive oil to make the soup sophisticated enough for mom and dad. Make floating “croutons” by cutting-out fun shapes of whole-grain bread with cookie cutters. Brush the bread with olive oil and bake until crispy.

Your kids will love this simple cooking adventure, perfect for a winter's day. You’ll love knowing their bellies are full of healthy nutrients. And the whole family will love spending time together in the kitchen!