Food For Thought

News on the Blogfront

noreply@blogger.com (Kim) — Fri, 12 Dec 2008 15:13:00 +0000

Come January 1st I will be taking more time to post here on Food for Thought. Unfortunately as I've multi tasked myself into writing three-blogs and shooting an online episodic every week, something had to give and for the most part it was my keeping up with Food for Thought. Sorry. I shall be tardy no more, well no more after New Years!

You may also notice that my template has changed, I'm still in search of a good (and cheap) designer or strikingly awesome free design I can grab. If you know anyone, let me know.

I'm still writing daily blogs over at Elastic Waist. While I try to keep up with food news here; my other blog The Kim Challenge focuses on diet and exercise. I post their daily, so if you enjoy Food for Thought but also like spying on what others are eating or hearing the latest exercise dirt-check it out.

Thank you all for reading, and I hope there are even more wonderful blogging experiences to come!

"Oh, Wall Street you're so corny"

noreply@blogger.com (Kim) — Fri, 06 Jun 2008 15:35:00 +0000

Will the global food shortages mean more room for genetically modified foods? If Monsanto has anything to do with it, YES. This is all coming at a time where global investors are seeing the plight of millions to get enough to eat as a cash cow. Billions of dollars are being invested in farming. But that’s what we need right, more investing in farming? Oh the mixed emotions!

Monsanto pledged this week that they would double yields of corn, soybeans and cotton by the year 2030. How they are going to do that in a time of global drought, soaring gas prices and increasing poverty levels is genetically modified seed. They would magically create seed that would require 30 percent of both land and water to grow. This announcement coincided nicely with the United Nations summit in Rome to discuss global food shortages. How convenient.

Okay, so I’m a little biased about genetically modified foods, but I’m not alone. Many countries in Europe and Asia have sanctions against genetically modified foods; leading to sanctions on US imported agriculture. Monsanto may be using the global food crisis to it’s advantage in this case, trying to garner approval for foods that at any other time are shunned by the global community (except of course America that happily imbibes all sorts of foods unknowingly). But what’s better: people starving to death or people eating Frankenstein corn/tomatoes/whatever? Frankenstein. Hands down.

Besides of course the issue with not really knowing the long term consequences of playing with the DNA of our food supply, my problem with Monsanto stems from their somewhat bully-like business practices. I really recommend renting/netflixing The Future of Food, a documentary about genetically modified foods which can explain much better than I the business and science behind these foods. Back to the bully though; plants cross pollinate. That’s what they do. I mean it’s basically plant sex and plants are promiscuous. The problem here is that farmers who use genetically modified corn pay Monsanto for the privilege. So if Farmer Joe has a farm that uses Monsanto seed, but his neighbor Farmer Lydia (what, girls can farm!) uses seed that her farm has created from years of expert farming and cross pollination among her own crops; but those slutty plants start cross pollinating with each other and little Farmer Joe/Farmer Lydia hybrid plants are born on Farmer Lydia’s property; Monsanto can sue Farmer Lydia. It’s true and trust me Monsanto has sued many farmers for unwittingly having plants with their genetically modified seed on their land. All this culminating in American farmers losing their land to Big Agra through settlement fees and legal fees; or having to sign exclusivity contracts to Monsanto to only use their products. [Insert angry waving fists and mean face here.]

Monsanto isn’t the only company cashing in on the food crisis. While much of Wall Street is in the pooper, agriculture stocks are through the roof. Investment firms and private investors are investing heavily in crops, land for farming and farm technologies. This is a very good thing in the sense that it will hopefully be a boon in production, create global jobs and bring all the benefits of boosting the economy like better schools, hospitals, social welfare agencies, etc. It’s a bad thing in that agriculture is fickle, farming is reliant on a lot of things that industry can’t control, and if investors are only in it for a quick buck and pull out when times get rough it could do more harm than good to the struggling farm economy. Farming is an industry that needs a steady hand, constant support, and an understanding of the ebbs and flows of the trade.

I have decided to be cautiously optimistic about this scenario. While I tend to have a mistrust of big business in conjunction with food; we are at a time when they may just be each others saving grace.

Childhood Obesity: There's Good News and There's Bad News

noreply@blogger.com (Kim) — Thu, 29 May 2008 18:59:00 +0000

The good news is that childhood obesity rates in this country have leveled off at 16-17% since 1996, holding steady since 1996 even declining slightly between 2003 and 2006. Another 16% of children are considered overweight but not obese, and those numbers have remained constant since 1999. This means that 32% of our children are either overweight or obese, that’s a lot. (It’s actually of a decent comparison to the national average among adults as well, adults coming out at 54% overweight or obese.) All these numbers seem big and scary, but they are a good thing, a good thing because they’re not increasing.

I for one am all for size-acceptance. I believe in loving yourself and your body no matter package you come in. I do however; have a problem with childhood obesity. Acceptance comes with maturity and kids as victims of chronological-circumstance are lacking in said maturity. Size acceptance doesn’t usually materialize until years of social pressures and unrealistic expectations are hashed through. Back to eating habits for a second though, I write constantly about the evils of processed foods, high fructose corn syrup especially, and in a world where you can buy blue French fries it becomes obvious that we’re marketing the worst possible foods to kids; foods that will foster poor food choices for the rest of their lives. With new studies proving that we maintain the same amount of fat cells from the beginning of puberty till the end of our life, it becomes increasingly more important that we monitor the weight and eating habits of our children.

There are many schools of thought on the origins of obesity, one of them being that obesity is the result of environment and evolution and those people with the propensity toward obesity will most likely never win the battle of the bulge. This theory is what Rethinking Thin by Gina Kolata discusses. Kolata’s book follows a two-year weight loss study originated at the University of Pennsylvania that aimed to compare the health benefits of a traditional low fat diet and the Atkins diet. She also cited copious other studies, including those comparing percentage of body fat of adopted children and their biological parents. What was eventually revealed, much to the surprise of everyone involved was that massive permanent weight loss is virtually impossible to sustain. Those that do sustain their losses live the rest of their lives eating at starvation levels. Genetic comparisons proved that adopted children had the same body percentage as adults as their biological parents regardless of the health and eating habits of their adoptive families. Studies where normal weight people were fed excessive amounts of calories to try to induce obesity were unsuccessful. Participants would gain some weight but once their eating habits returned to normal they returned to their normal weights, their metabolisms even speed up to accommodate the extra calories. It also showed that those considered obese have no different eating patterns than their thin counterparts contrary to popular belief. With all the weight related prejudice out there I really think this is an important book. I would highly recommend it to anyone, and I don’t do that often.

So, Rethinking Thin makes the case that obesity isn’t something we can naturally control. Those that have a biological propensity toward high body fat percentage may never achieve svelte physiques. Are all those 16% of children that are obese doomed to a life of obesity? Although I agree with the majority of what Kolata says, I don’t think the situation is as quite so cut and dry. I seriously doubt that 54% of our population is predestined to be overweight. If that were totally true why are there strikingly lower obesity rates in other similarly developed countries? A major part of this puzzle is the types of food we’re eating. It may be that the processed foods we eat while our bodies are still developing effect the way that we process foods for the rest of our lives, hence the findings that those prone to obesity may never achieve a normal weight. Dr. Cynthia Ogden, epidemiologist for the National Center for Health Statistics doesn’t know where are stall in obesity levels came from, perhaps as Kolata’s book would suggest evolutionarily we’re right where we are supposed to be:

“It may be that we’ve reached some sort of saturation in terms of the proportion of the population who are genetically susceptible to obesity in this environment,” Dr. Ogden said. “A more optimistic view is that some things are working. We don’t really know.”

Childhood obesity has been in the news for quite some time now. I would like to think that public efforts to positively effect the eating habits of children are working; although we won’t really know whether or not that is true until those percentage numbers actually start to reverse. In the mean time, there is validity in Rethinking Thin. Not everyone is meant to look like Giselle, and some studies have proven that people with slightly higher body fat percentages are protected from certain diseases and may have a longer life span. Is there something wrong with the ideal that we can treat everyone with respect, including ourselves, that we can stop judging people based on weight while still attempting to ensure a healthy future for the children of this country? I don’t think so; I think we’re just not trying hard enough.

You say Falafel I say DELICIOUS

noreply@blogger.com (Kim) — Wed, 28 May 2008 15:41:00 +0000

I love falafel. I crave falafel. Living in New York City means that falafel is a temptation at every corner. It is truly one of my comfort foods. Honestly, the real thing isn't soooooo bad for you, although it is deep fried. But in my ever expanding attempts to recreate my high fat favorites with more waistline friendly alternatives I shared one of my favorite recipes on The Daily Special: Baked Falafel.

Kim's Baked Falafel
1 15-oz. can of chickpeas
1/4 cup onion
2 cloves of garlic
2 tbsp. cumin
1 tsp. ground coriander
1/2 tsp. salt
1/4 cup cilantro
1/2 cup parsley
1/4 cup shredded carrot
1 tbsp. olive oil

Sauce:
1/2 cup tahini
5-6 tbsp. water
1/2 lemon squeezed

Throw all the falafel ingredients in a food processor and process until green and smooth. Form mixture into 1 1/2 inch balls and place on a greased baking sheet. Bake at 425 for 40 minutes, turning once. Place on a whole grain flat bread (warmed is great) with salad, tahini sauce and hot sauce to taste.

I make this dish maybe once a week. I'm totally addicted, and it's totally guilt free.

Corn+Gas=High Food Costs

noreply@blogger.com (Kim) — Fri, 25 Apr 2008 18:04:00 +0000

I know I have been a tardy poster. It’s true, and I’m sorry. There are copious reasons for that one of which being my other blog being a priority for one more month, and the fact that there really hasn’t been any strikingly interesting articles about food in the news. Have people lost their interest in food? Has the government stopped meddling in our digestion practices? I don’t think either of those are true, but I do think there are other things that are taking priority, like the gas crisis, the housing crisis, the recession. Whether we acknowledge it or not, all of these things have an effect on the way we eat.

Gas prices have an unmistakable impact on the cost of food. Besides leaching money from your food budget to fill your gastank, transportation of food is becoming increasingly more expensive, which means all those fresh fruits and vegetables we enjoy year round from various parts of the world are becoming more and more expensive. We are exporting corn and unbelievable rates because it’s one of the commodities we lead the global pack in. Corn is also being utilized for alternative fueling, although this is still in its testing phases, so it’s not as big as a culprit as exporting. So, how does this effect food prices again? Oh yeah, because so much of what we eat is composed of corn products, corn starch, corn syrup, high fructose corn syrup and a whole slew of other products that I can’t ramble off out of memory. Now that corn is scarcer in our local market it costs more for manufacturers to get their hands on, but trust me, they’re not taking a hit for you; you’ll see the change at the cash register.
This may sound like me pushing an organic lifestyle, but it’s not. We are who we are and we all value food differently. Organic foods aren’t ever going to be cheaper than processed and as the housing crisis continues as well as increasing costs for gas putting many of us in financial hardship, Americans will no doubt be looking to save money on food. All of this will most likely mean more processed foods, more store brands; more fast food (because buying a hamburger for $0.69, is a lot cheaper than buying ground beef, buns, lettuce, tomato, catsup, etc.) Buying food locally at green markets and food coops is a great option for those of you that want to eat organic, or close to it, without breaking the bank).

So what are we to do, when we’re all trying desperately to have enough income to feed our families, pay our mortgages, and put gas in the car, and eat healthy? Choose carefully, make informed decisions, choose the best of all evils. This seems like the most obvious and best compromise, which is why I was surprised when I heard that the law requiring all restaurants with more than 15 outlets in New York City to post their nutritional information on the menu was delayed for a second time. Law makers aren’t even asking that all ingredients are shown, just caloric values, which is why I’m so astounded by the amount of food industry back lash there is. Okay, I’m not surprised, I don’t trust the food industry as far as I can throw them, and well, I don’t have a whole lot of upper body strength. The law was passed to help consumers make educated choices while dining out, and to have a reversing effect on the obesity rates of New York City. I think that knowing calorie values is limited in how much it can help, but well it’s a great start at making the public more aware. If I were making the rules, ingredients or at least additives would need to be listed, but that won’t ever happen, so having a calorie listing would be greatly beneficial.

Opponents of the bill say that it would discourage diners from eating out. I say perhaps it would encourage restaurants to be more thoughtful and provide better choices. Glass half full/Glass half empty; either way there’s still a glass. We have always deserved to know what we are putting in our bodies, but now more than ever, when so many Americans are struggling to make ends meat (no pun intended) we deserve the right to make informed decisions. That’s my soapbox and I will continue to stand on it.

Vegan Corn Chowder, better than it sounds.

noreply@blogger.com (Kim) — Fri, 29 Feb 2008 15:22:00 +0000

I love the Cooking with Kim segments of the Daily Special, if only because I really like to feed people; the whole crew is at my apartment and when the food is done it has to go somewhere, and therefore I get to feed people. Perfect right?
Well not this time.There is such a stigma attached to vegan food, a few members of the crew wanted nothing to do with my chowder. So many things that we eat everyday are vegan, but we don't label them as such, so they don't have that stigma attached, but yeah, I still have a lot of this soup left over. If anyone wants some, come on by. I have a ton of vegetarian cook books but this recipe didn't come from any of them, I really wanted to stick with my MO of cooking easy, healthy, tasty foods, and cookbooks tend to be more labor intensive. So this recipe is an adaptation of one I found on www.allrecipes.com, and I must say that it came out really well. I don't even like corn, or creamy soups and I thought it was good, so if you are normal and like corn/creamy soups you will probably think it's fantastic.

Low Fat Vegan Corn Chowder:
6 red potatoes, diced
2 Cans of Whole Kernel Corn
1 Green Pepper (diced)
1 Red Pepper (diced)
1 Onion (diced)
1 Tablespoon Thyme
1 Tablespoon Crushed Red Pepper
2 Cups Vegetable Broth
1 package (12 oz) Lite Silken Tofu

Directions: 1-Boil potatoes for 15-20 minutes until soft. Strain.
2-In a pot combine potatoes, corn (with can water), green and red pepper, onion and seasonings: thyme and crushed red pepper. Cook for 15 minutes, then remove from heat.
3-Seperate out 2 cups of vegetable mix. Process the rest of the soup and the silken tofu in a food processor or blender, until creamy consistancy.
4-Return all ingredients to the pot, cook for another 5 minutes and serve, season with salt and pepper to taste.

Serves 6, approx. 275 calories per serving, 1.7 grams of fat, 7.4 grams of protien, 6.6 grams of fiber.

It's not you, it's me. . .

noreply@blogger.com (Kim) — Wed, 27 Feb 2008 03:30:00 +0000

I have a confession, and you may not like it. I’m cheating on you. Yes, it’s true, with another blog. I’m currently blogging my daily experiences on the SELF Challenge on a new blog. Don’t worry, this blog will always be my baby, but in an effort to investigate whether those fitness magazines actually know what they’re talking about, I’m going to take the next three months and commit myself entirely to the SELF Challenge. The good news is, the eating plan is very similar to the way I eat now, and really focuses on real foods. So, I will stay true to my convictions. Plus, if you’ve ever been interested in seeing what I actually eat. You can check to see if my money is where my mouth is daily on http://www.thekimchallenge.wordpress.com/.

Don’t worry. I’m still stalking food in the news and will keep on keepin’ on blogging about food in the news.

Snack Time: Chobani Greek Yogurt Review

noreply@blogger.com (Kim) — Tue, 12 Feb 2008 15:19:00 +0000

I may have mentioned once or twice or a bajillion times that I have a love affair with yogurt. Yogurt is good for you, yogurt doesn’t complain when you ask it to make adjustments, yogurt is smooth and delicious. If I could date yogurt I might. So, when I got an email from a publicist for Chobani Greek Yogurt asking whether I’d like to try it, I said sure. Let me clarify, that I’m contacted a few times a month by publicists for different foods and most often from diet plans, and most of the time I decline because, well, I’m not really promoting any sort of dieting here; I just believe in living a healthy balanced life and eating food that’s good for you but also non abrasive to the world. Okay, clarifying done.

I received my handy-dandy refrigerated package with 6 cases of yogurt in it, strawberry, blueberry, peach, vanilla, fat-free plain, and 2% plain. I tried all of them except the blueberry, which I’m allergic to. I agree that blueberries are a strange allergy, but there’s really nothing I can do about it, so you’re on your own in regard to blueberry my friends. So what’s the verdict? It’s really good. Chobani’s fat free yogurts are definitely richer and creamier than Fage’s, which seems to be the standard by which all Greek yogurts are compared to right now. It’s an organic product which is sort of my standard for approval and blog mention. Gold star in regard to taste for Chobani! Okay, but here’s the bad news, it’s expensive. I went to my local grocery store to check out the cost of these adorable little yogurt singles and it was $1.99 per 6 oz. container, which means this creamy refreshing yogurt is a once in a while treat and not a daily addition to my diet. I like yogurt, but I like paying my rent too. So, if you’re in the mood for a treat, I highly suggest this yogurt. If you’re on a budget, I still recommend using the ole’ coffee filter, plain yogurt trick to strain your regular yogurt into a creamier consistency.

Eat Like You Drive a Prius

noreply@blogger.com (Kim) — Sun, 10 Feb 2008 18:08:00 +0000

I’ve struggled for a while with my role in the food chain. I like meat, and that’s something that I take issue with. I once dated a guy who wrote entire book about meat and how awesome it is. I’ve read tons of books on vegetarian and vegan lifestyles, and I’d say 2/3rds of my cookbooks are vegetarian, yet I still find enjoyment in sinking my teeth into a nice juicy steak or perfectly marinated pork tenderloin. Gosh darn it, I’m conflicted. I’ve gone through copious bouts of vegetarian phases, but they never seem to stick. But, what I’ve gotten from my research and my conflict is that I am happy to live in compromise. The values that pilot me toward a vegetarian diet are those that believe that all creatures deserve to be treated humanly and that our current agriculture practices are destroying our planet. So, to appease my meat eating demons, I try to only buy locally farm raised/free-range/organically fed meat. That way I know that the animal that I’m eating had a life before it was killed, that the life it had could possibly have been easier on it than the life it may have had if we lived in a society where animals roamed free. Free of predators and the stressors of finding food. And that I’m supporting the farmers that fight the good fight and farm on a small scale. Perhaps that’s just my conscious trying to alleviate itself of guilt, but that’s the way I come to terms with my constant struggle between my values and my appetite. Also, the type of meat I buy is crazy-expensive which means I eat meat once maybe twice a week.

Okay, so where am I going with this, right? Well last week I read an article by Mark Bittman (author of How to Cook Everything Vegetarian, who also happens to not be a vegetarian, like me!) which spoke of the global impact of rising meat consumption globally(hmm, that was a bit redundant). According to Bittman, global meat consumption per year has gone from 71 million tons in 1961 to 284 tons in 2007; it is expected to double again by 2050. This raise in meat consumption did not come without cost. Raising more and more livestock for the food supply has turned our agriculture system into an assembly line. Old McDonald’s farm is more likely to look like a warehouse with animals crowded into stalls being forced to eat grain (Grain is not naturally digested by cows. It causes major health problems for them, often resulting in death Because of these health problems “ranchers” chock their cattle full of antibiotics, which are then passed on to you the consumer via their meat, effecting your immune system.)

Large quantities of livestock mean large quantities of feed are needed. Since it’s not possible to have a bazillion cows, pigs and chickens all grazing on lushes green grass, grain crops of soy and corn are in constant demand. Unfortunately, the soil on the earth is meant to rotate crops, that’s how it keeps itself nitrogen rich and ready to grow, grow, grow. Because of the constant need of grain, land is very, very rarely rotated and soil becomes arid and useless after prolonged use. Soil that isn’t growing crops is not adding oxygen back into the environment.

Large quantities of livestock also create large quantities of excrement (poop in laymen’s terms). So, isn’t animal poop fertilizer? Well, not in the quantities in which it’s being produced. Large amounts of excrement create noxious gasses that add to the greenhouse effect. Animal poop is ruining our ozone! In fact, “livestock production generates nearly a fifth of the world’s greenhouse gases—more than transportation.” Also, it seeps into the soil and then into our water supply. Yum!

According to Bittman’s article “Agriculture in the United States—much of which now serves the demand for meat—contributes to nearly three quarters of all water-quality problems in the nation’s rivers and streams.”

There’s a lot more I’m not going to get into, but I suggest that you click the link attached to Bittman’s name above and read the article for yourself. I also suggest reading Omnivore’s Dilemma by Michael Pollan, it’s goes into a lot of depth about this exact subject. In the meantime, let me leave you with some of the positives from this article. Small changes in your eating habits can make a big difference in the environment. “If Americans were to reduce mean consumption by just 20 percent it would be as if we all switched from a standard sedan—a Camry, say—to the ultra-efficient Prius.” Also, scientists in Israel and Korea are currently working on technology that would convert animal waist (poop!) into electricity. Can you imagine a world powered by poop? There are currently farmers in the US that use pig manure as fuel (see American’s aren’t so bad, we’ve got some pretty creative farmers.) Also, what Bittmman call’s “meat without feet” which is meat created in a laboratory using cultured animal cells. It’s like growing your own steak, hold the cow. Okay, I find that creepy, but I could perhaps be persuaded. It also sounds like it would super-duper expensive, but possibly a good alternative to mass breeding and slaughtering. In the meantime, I will continue to support my local farmers and battle my meat eating demons.

Diet Soda, like Darth Vader only slightly more refreshing

noreply@blogger.com (Kim) — Thu, 07 Feb 2008 21:01:00 +0000

Diet Coke, it seems like a moderately low risk vice. All those studies about lab rats getting cancer from NutraSweet, proved that unless we were attached to a proverbial saltlick of aspartame, we’d be fine with moderate consumption. It’s a zero calorie beverage that happens to be laden with caffeine; perfect for a mid-afternoon pick-me-up.

Ahhhh, ignorance is bliss, ain’t it?

The New York Times recently reported on a nine-year study by scientists monitoring men and women between the ages of 45-64 in regard to their eating patterns and likelihood of having metabolic syndrome (doesn’t that sound like a made-up disease?). In all fairness, something I feel that was completely overlooked in the Times article; men and women between the ages of 45-64 are prime examples of people who will naturally have increased levels of cholesterol, blood pressure, slower metabolism, and increased risk if diabetes—the defining symptoms/characteristics of metabolic syndrome. Okay, having cleared my conscious of common sense (pesky, I know), on to more information about the experiment. The study followed these 9,500 participants in their eating habits:

Over all, a Western dietary pattern — high intakes of refined grains, fried
foods and red meat — was associated with an 18 percent increased risk for
metabolic syndrome, while a “prudent” diet dominated by fruits, vegetables, fish
and poultry correlated with neither an increased nor a decreased risk.

But, diet soda still seems safe, right? Well according to a itty-bitty paragraph at the end of the article (are we back in the yellow-journalism era? Because the title of the article definitely said “Diet Soda”), those participants that drank one or more diet sodas a day increased their chance of metabolic syndrome by 34%. Okay, that’s a big number. I must say this article leaves me with more questions than answers. One being, why? What’s in diet soda that makes it increase your risk of heart disease by a third? Answer: They don’t really know.

I mean, I have my theories. Diet beverages are all chemicals. And although our bodies are evolving to an ever more encompassing food source at rapid rates, they still haven’t evolved to be able to digest manmade chemical compounds. The digestion of chemicals, like those found in soda, is treated in the body like a toxin, which will be processed accordingly through the kidneys. This extra tax on our internal organs would be my guess as to the cause of ‘metabolic syndrome’ (which still sounds like a made-up disease to me).

But what do I know, I’m a coffee drinker.

Scones to the Rescue

noreply@blogger.com (Kim) — Thu, 07 Feb 2008 14:24:00 +0000

I must admit that I've been a bit tardy in my posting. There's actually a lot of food in the news that I feel keen to write about, and hope to get to it soon. I've always been one to fill my plate (in regard to time, not food) to the brim. I feel most alive when I'm being torn in all sorts of directions. But lately, I must say shooting a daily show, working full time in the non-profit realm, rehearsing/performing weekly, taking a writing class, and training for a charity athletic event has left me all sorts of frayed. Alack, as I try to get my self in gear in regard writing posts in the true nature of this blog (more food politics), I leave you with one of my most utilized and most favoritist recipes ever. Low fat scones.

These scones come out to about 100 calories a peice. I've made them with fresh fruit before and must say that they come out a bit soggy for my tastes. I prefer dried fruit. They are perfect for a mid-afternoon coffee break or as a light breakfast.

Cooking with Kim's Scones makes 12 scones:

2 cups all-purpose flour (or a mix of whole wheat four and white flour)
3 tbsp.
sugar1 tbsp.
baking powder1/2 tsp.
salt2 tbsp.
unsalted butter, cut into small pieces
1 cup buttermilk
1 1/2 cup dried fruit of your choosing

Preheat oven to 400º F. Line a baking sheet with parchment paper.
In a large bowl, whisk together flour, sugar, baking powder and salt. Mix in butter until mixture is size of fine crumbs. Stir in buttermilk, then fruit.
On a prepared baking sheet, shape dough into two 7-inch circles. Cut each into 6 wedges.
Bake until cooked through and golden, about 20 minutes. Yields one wedge per serving.

Clone Free Low-Fat BBQ Chicken Salad

noreply@blogger.com (Kim) — Thu, 17 Jan 2008 17:39:00 +0000

If you've been reading my blog for a while you'll know that besides writing about food politics here, I host an online daily webshow called The Daily Special for the fantastic website Elastic Waist. One of our most popular segments on the Daily Special is Cooking with Kim, where I whip up low fat versions of higher fat meals. I promise that these are all foods that I actually do eat on a regular basis and they are just as easy to make in real life as they look on the show.

On Today's episode I shared one of my favorite salads. After years of slobbering over BBQ Chicken Salads at chain restuarants like TGI Fridays or Applebees, I decided that I could make my favorite restaurant style salad at home for much less fat.

Kim's Low Fat BBQ Chicken Salad
Seasonings:
Garlic powder
Cajun/Creole Seasoning

Vegetables:
Lettuce
Tomato
Corn
Black Beans
(it's a salad, add whatever veggies you want!)

Dressing:
Fat free sour cream
BBQ sauce

Optional: reduced fat shredded Cheddar and croutons add some great texture differences for the salad, but for the sake of keeping the salad truly low calorie I omitted them from the show.

Directions:
Assemble Salad with above listed vegetables, and optional toppings.
Season chicken with Cajun seasoning and grill till golden brown, slice, top salad. (The original recipe calls for fried chicken, if you prefer fried to grilled, try crumbling corn flakes, dip chicken in corn flakes and bake till done, it will provide that flaky flavor without all the oil and fat of frying. )
Dressing: combine garlic powder, BBQ sauce and fat free sour cream. Blend, let settle for 5 minutes in refrigerator.

The Creepy Factor

noreply@blogger.com (Kim) — Wed, 16 Jan 2008 16:48:00 +0000

The FDA ruled yesterday (January 15, 2008) that food from cloned animals is safe for consumption and therefore can be used toward our food supply.

Logically I know that cloned animals are just animals, and their milk and meat would still be just milk and meat. I get it, but it still makes my skin crawl. In the Department of Agriculture’s defense (did I just write that?) they asked that farmers not sell the products of cloned animals directly into the food supply, instead to only use the food produced by the offspring of said cloned animal. Does that make it cloned milk once removed? Honestly, this wasn’t a huge request on their part because farmers only clone their prized animals as a general rule and because the process is stupidly expensive. And therefore the idea of chopping up Bessie 2.0 for chuck is not all that desirable, instead they’ll save Bessie 2.0 for breeding once Bessie Genuine Draft is too hold or too warn out for all those shenanigans.

What can you expect on your local grocery shelves; the offspring of cows, pigs and goats. No other animal has been approved for consumption worthy clonage. So, don’t worry, your chicken is safe.

Those are the facts, these are the questions. What will this mean for global trade in agriculture? The United States has the rest of the world beat when it comes to slaughtering our livestock and shipping it around the world. Last year there was a major dip in exporting when Japan questioned the safety of US Beef in regard to Mad Cow Disease. It would be careless of the United States not to consider that there will be cultural objections by some if not many of the countries we export food to, in regard to the moral basis of cloning. Next question: Do we as consumers have a choice? Are there measures in place in which consumers will know if the foods they’re eating are derived from a pedigree started through cloning. Currently, there’s a huge movement in place to have genetically modified foods have mandatory labeling. Genetically modified foods have been on the market for years and still no agreement has come into place, where will animal derived products fit into this? Lastly, where does it end? What are the limits to cloning animals? Will we soon be cloning the offspring of clones, then clones themselves?
I have to say that I’m very disappointed in the FDA, just because something isn’t necessarily unhealthy, doesn’t make it a desirable addition to society. Is it the FDAs job to dictate socially acceptable practice? No, I guess not, but there is a such thing as too laissez-faire, and that is when you allow big business to create social norms. Will my grandchildren be eating the same exact hamburger I’m eating today? Is there something wrong with it if they are? I’ll go ask the FDA, see what they have to say.

Some like it Hot (and covered in Blue Cheese)

noreply@blogger.com (Kim) — Fri, 07 Dec 2007 21:08:00 +0000

The idea of being on a diet makes me automatically want to go out and buy three tubs of Ben & Jerry’s to show those diet-gods who the boss of me is. Which of course backfires on me astoundingly; and therefore, I am not a dieter. I’m an eater. But, that doesn’t mean I throw caution to the wind all day, every day. I do actually like to eat healthy, and I find it to be a personal challenge to make some of my favorite foods lighter. I happen to have a major Jones for take out Chinese food, which also happens to be some of the most inexpensive stuff out there, so actually buying all the ingredients to prepare home-made alternatives sometimes seems silly, but hey, if it helps me fit into my all time favorite jeans then so be it. There’s probably not a week that goes by that I don’t make egg drop soup and chicken and broccoli at home, easy stuff right? A little bit of chicken broth instead of oil, to fry in, and some corn starch goes a long way in making mock comfort foods.

Chicken broth and cornstarch are also key players in my low-fat buffalo wing recipe. Buffalo wings are my all time favorite food. I like to pretend that I’m a classy broad with caviar tastes, but in reality caviar grosses me out and the opportunity to watch a Pats game while downing a frothy beverage and smearing wing sauce all over my face seems like paradise. This week on The Daily Special I shared my crowd pleasing wing recipe with the masses. If you’re not down for the fake stuff, I recommend subbing in butter for broth and nixing the starch:

I must admit that I generally eyeball the sauce, so when you make it, adapt it to your tastes. Here's a basic recipe though:

1 cup fat-free chicken broth
1 Tablespoon Corn Starch
1-2 Tablespoons Hot Sauce (I prefer Frank's)
1/4 teaspoon Cayenne Pepper
1/4 teaspoon Paprika
1 Tablespoon White Vinegar

Mix cornstarch into broth before it is heated, once it is well mixed add to a sauce pan and heat. Mix in rest of ingredients and stir till sauce is thick. Should take about 5 minutes. Pour over chicken breast, wings, burgers, etc.

Yogurt by any other name. . .Well, seriously it would still be creamy dairylike delish-ness

noreply@blogger.com (Kim) — Thu, 15 Nov 2007 18:40:00 +0000

I have a confession. I eat a lot of yogurt, A LOT OF YOGURT. But, I am not at all a fan those prepackaged cups of saccharined, soupy-like, bizarro shade of pink, yogurt-like substances found in the super market. I have a dream, a dream that one day I will have a yogurt maker and can make my own yogurt from 1% milk, milk powder and acidophilus. Until then, I buy those grandiose tubs of plain yogurt at the food coop, and doctor it to my liking. My absolute favorite thing to do with yogurt is to thicken it. I love the thick, creamy texture of Greek yogurt, but spending $3 per cup is seriously disturbing, so instead, I utilize a coffee filter and a couple of rubber bands to thicken up ye olde faithful cow's milk yogurt.

Below is a video from The Daily Special, a show that I host on Elastic Waist, that focuses on Body acceptance, food, life, gossip, and having an all around good time. The video actually shows my yogurt thickening technique as well as a recipe for fat-free "cheesecake."

Once my yogurt is finished draining I love to top it off with honey and walnuts, or granola. If I'm on a fruit-on-the-bottom kind of kick I'll throw in a tablespoon of preserves. This is what yogurt is supposed to taste like!

Other Yogurt Like Suggestions:
I make a fantastic smoothie with:
1 cup of 1% Kefir (a yogurt milk)
1 cup frozen berries (that's 2 of your daily recommended fruit servings!)
a dash of vanilla
and a little splenda or sugar (whichever you prefer)

Is that a pesticide in your carrot, or are you just happy to see me?

noreply@blogger.com (Kim) — Wed, 24 Oct 2007 20:23:00 +0000

I fully admit to be a bit of an “organic monger,” that is an attribute that I will neither deny nor feel ashamed by when people lecture me that it's just a waste of money, it is also one that I’m not 100% committed to. I do not buy organic broccoli. For one reason, and one reason only, and that reason is bugs. Once, after washing and steaming a beautiful head of organic broccoli I bit into it finding what seemed like millions of little black bugs (in reality millions is quite possibly an exaggeration, but since I was absolutely grossed out it is applied aptly in my eyes.) So, conventionally grown broccoli it is, a sacrifice I all of a sudden feel better about due to the handy-dandy chart below sent to me by my super-wooper (I felt like there needed to be another hyphenated-rhyming term right there) Aunt, who happens to be a chef and knows oodles about food. Broccoli it seems is one of the least pesticide laden vegetables out there. So, this is not a pontification about why the mega-food producers are ruining our bodies, it is a simple post to share with you a list of useful numbers regarding pesticides to keep in mind. Cheers, and oh, yeah, I will never eat a non-organic peach again!
Pesticide Levels in Produce The Full List: 43 Fruits & Veggies:

More to Come, I promise

noreply@blogger.com (Kim) — Wed, 17 Oct 2007 14:54:00 +0000

I must say food in the news has been a bit slowly lately, as I sift through articles about killer potpies and anorexic models being banned from runway shows: I think, "this is interesting" but not really my schtick. I will be scowering the magical world of the internet in search of relevant food news, but in the meantime if you find articles that interest you, and you'd like to see discussed drop me an email.

My New Show on Elastic Waist

noreply@blogger.com (Kim) — Sat, 29 Sep 2007 13:26:00 +0000

For more information on my show and great news about weight and health issues check out www.elasticwaist.com.

Silly Rabbit, Ads are for Kids

noreply@blogger.com (Kim) — Thu, 20 Sep 2007 14:52:00 +0000

Last week there was a somewhat pointless article in the New York Times regarding childhood obesity rates and advertising aimed at children. I have to say that one of the perks of being an avid New York Times reader is that I get that lofty feeling that comes with pretending I’m a bit more of an intellectual than I really am. So, when I read articles that are pure common sense, not a bit enlightening and basically pointless I get a bit irritated. That being said, to summarize this article; advertising aimed at children is chock full of high fat, sugar laden junk food, and if we want to save children from a lifetime of obesity we must look toward changing our advertising techniques. To this I say, “Uhhh, yeah, but kids don’t have jobs.”

I will admit to watching the occasional Saturday morning cartoon (my current favorite is The Replacements), and the most striking thing that I’ve noticed is that advertising aimed at kids hasn’t changed all that much in the last 15 years since I was in that target audience. The toy and cereal commercials are the same exact format. I remember being a child and running to my room every time a toy commercial came on that featured a toy I actually owned so I could bring my toy back and show the television. (Now that I think about it, wow, that’s really kind of perverse.) But, the one thing I remember clearly was that I never, ever, ever had the cereals and junk food that they were advertising, and sure I wanted it, but considering my sincere lack of disposable income in elementary school, my mom was pretty much in charge of what I ate. I certainly begrudged her parenting choices when I would be eating raisin bran while the other kids ate lucky charms, but the point I’m making is that advertising can only be as effective as a parent will allow it to be.

I will say right now that I do not have children, nor do I have any upcoming plans geared toward procreation, so the trials and tribulations of parenthood are lost on me, and therefore you can take my opinion for what it’s worth. I happen to have been very lucky that my parents were extremely focused on creating good eating habits. I don’t think I’d even heard of a chicken finger or mozzarella stick until I was in high school. In one of my many previous lives I waited my share of tables and was always truly shocked at the foods that restaurants offer on children’s menus, everything is deep fried. How as a culture can we tell children that they are expected to eat foods high in sugar, fat and preservatives, and then expect them to grow into healthy adults who make informed food choices? So, back to advertising, it only works because there is a market for it. If the market says, we’re not going to let our children manipulate us into letting them eat sugar coated sugar, then other options will appear. “NO”, it’s a magical word, I heard it a lot growing up, most kids do, it may suck to say but at a time when childhood obesity rates have more than tripled in the last 30 years I think we owe it to ourselves to say “no” more often. How much can we blame on advertising when we fall for it?

Waist Not, Want Not

noreply@blogger.com (Kim) — Mon, 16 Jul 2007 17:52:00 +0000

We’ve all seen them, those boxes of 100-calorie snacklets that are taking the country by storm. Forced portion control for a high mark-up. In the past three years $20 million-per-year of the countries snack food market revenue has come from these pre-portioned packages. What do I think of this phenomenon? I’m torn. I think of these little packages of pre-portioned overly processed snack foods the same way I think of all overly processed snack foods. They’re a bit gross, but a sometimes necessary evil of being American and being hungry. That having been said, the real question I pose is: Is it worth it to pay more for less?

We could all buy a box of Triscuits ® divide its contents up into 100-calorie portions and place them in sandwich bags, and have 2-3 times more for relatively the same price. That’s my obvious problem with the 100-calorie pack phenomenon. But in defense of the wee little snack bags, we’re a nation of convenience, effort is not something we dole out lightly and if a short cut is able to be taken, well then, we’ll pay an extra $1.99 to take advantage of it. We are also a nation that has for the past 20 years been exposed to gigantic portions. Portion control is a relatively new concept in regard to our culture of eating. This is where I wholly support the concept of over-priced resource-wasting pre-packaged (enough hyphenated terms for you?) foods. I think that we, as a culture of abundance are still on a learning curve. We’re on the right track, and we’re trying to figure out what normal means, but until the masses can look at a palm full of nuts and be satiated with an actual serving size then perhaps this idea of single serving snacks is heaven sent.

The market for 100-calorie snack packs is such a cash-cow that food manufacturers all over are buying into the fad. Now, not only can you purchase your favorite Oreo® or Chips Ahoy! ® products in miniature form, but Hershey’s ® is doling out 100-calorie bags of Twizzlers ® and chocolate bars, Frito-Lay ® has even started selling 100-calorie Beef Jerkey. Can I say that again: BEEF JERKY! Will the time come when everything we eat will come vacuum sealed and in 100-calorie increments? Will a typical 2,000 calorie a day diet consist of 20 clearly marked 100-calorie packages of our favorite foods? I hope not, but I can’t say that I’d be at all surprised.

If you could just puree my burger and hand it to me with a straw, that would be great. Thanks.

noreply@blogger.com (Kim) — Wed, 28 Mar 2007 15:44:00 +0000

A recent article in the New York Times brought up something that doesn’t surprise me but I really hadn’t given all that much thought to. That being that Americans like to drink, not just alcohol, we like to drink anything and everything. We’re a thirsty group. The problem with this is that we don’t just stick to water and milk, most of what we drink is calorie laden. In fact, the average American drinks 21% of their calories. For a person eating a 2,000 calorie a day diet that’s 420 calories of beverage. Do you know what else you can have for 420 calories? I'll tell you, you can have a 10 piece McDonalds ® Chicken Nuggets, or a McDonalds ® Quarter Pounder (no cheese). That’s a lot of juice/mocha-latte/soda. In fact, each day we’re drinking a full meal. The problem with this equation is that we don’t balance it out in the foods that we eat. We see our nutritional needs coming from our foods and we don’t balance our beverages accordingly.
I’ve mentioned before that I like to think back to our developmental origins when thinking about food and daily activity. Our ancestors, who spent their days looking for food (if you think you’re obsessed with food when it comes to dieting, these guys got you beat. Their whole day was built around finding food) they would drink water. That was the resource they had, and I’m guessing the lack of pollution made for some mighty tasty water. (Note: I am not suggesting anyone go around drinking water from the land. I’ve seen the East River, and want no part of it.) Perhaps they’d drink some of the dew from plants. Even when our roaming forerunners would stumble upon a tasty snack of oh, say, a honey comb and eat the whole thing which would still set them back about 800 calories. Still, sugar wasn’t really a big part of their lives except for those rare occasions. There was fruit, there was meat, and there were plants. And, that’s the way they lived. Oh, and they walked, all the time.
The idea that we drink 21% of our daily caloric intake is really astounding. What’s even more astounding is that most of those calories come from high fructose corn syrup, otherwise known as the Demon Spawn of Satan. High fructose corn syrup is evil. It’s a creation of a laboratory and it’s extremely harmful to your metabolism. Really. HFCS is this magical substance that is a sugar but reacts in your body more like fat. It is also more likely to add to your chances of obesity. HFCS has a way of completely bypassing digestion in the stomach and intestines and going straight to the liver. This results in it being distributed to your cells directly as opposed to having been broken down, the good parts used, the bad parts excreted as waste. Where do these whole globs of fructose go? A little to the brain, but mostly to the fat around your internal organs. And like inner thigh jiggle, a little padding is good, but too much is bad. In fact, the larger the amount of fat around your internal organs the higher your risk of organ failure and cancer. So, like I said, High Fructose Corn Syrup is evil.
Guess what? Water doesn’t have HFCS. Really it doesn’t, and your body needs at least 60 oz of the clear stuff a day to work at an optimal level. Juice is good, but in moderation, it’s high in sugar and as far as vitamins are concerned you’re better off with the actual fruit. The surprising winner in the article by the NYTimes was that coffee (otherwise known as my best friend in the whole wide world) is actually pretty good for you. Coffee it seems lower your risk for heart disease, type-2 diabetes, and colorectal cancer. Oh, and milk, milk is good for you (even though a lot of us can’t digest it properly), it’s actually a great way to absorb vitamins and calcium. Having said that, I’m off to absorb calcium and lower my heart disease risk, meaning: I’m getting a latte.

I'll Take a Glass of Vitamins, No Ice Please.

noreply@blogger.com (Kim) — Thu, 15 Mar 2007 14:42:00 +0000

Like soda? Like vitamins? Well, Coca-Cola and PepsiCo. have the answer to all of your problems. Apparently. This coming Spring two new diet sodas will be introduced into the market, Diet Coke Plus ® and Tava®. They will be a combination of the effervescent yet calorie free wonders we’ve come to know and love and the vitamins that we so desperately need. The drinks will be fortified with vitamins B6, B12, Magnesium and zinc. But, don’t call these two wonders of modern chemical industrialism diet soda, nope, they are certified “Sparkling Beverages.”
I’m not totally down on diet soda, I drink it sometimes, and it’s a weakness. But, for the most part I like seltzer with a little bit of juice, I tend to go for the more organic, less chemically processed approach to food. But, I find this new marketing of diet soda as a health drink a bit on the absurd side. When I drink diet soda I’m fully aware that the product I’m about to imbibe is made of nothing that I could ever pronounce or create on my own. I drink at my own risk. On the other hand, I find that the soda industries need to find healthier alternatives, a bit encouraging. In fact, in a 2006 survey conducted by financial giant Morgan Stanley, only 10% of consumers considered diet sodas a healthy dietary choice (Thank the Heavens!), which was a great drop from the 14% in 2003. Plus, my own personal favorite statistic, 30% of those interviewed were reluctant to drink beverages with artificial sweeteners in them. I consider this a huge triumph for the people of this country. Money talks in this world, sad but true, and when consumers’ demand that their foods be held up to a certain standard, the producers of food will have to respond accordingly if they want to continue earning a profit.
Coca-Cola’s CEO, E. Neville Isdell is none too happy with the fact that for the first time in many a decade the soda industry’s sales have dropped significantly. The big winner in beverage sales is the good old standby H20, followed by juice and tea drinks. Mr. Isdell is apparently baffled at how the health food industry can overlook such healthy products such as Diet Coke ®. “Diet and light brand are actually health and wellness brands,” he recently said in response to soda products being linked to the countries growing obesity epidemic. Okay, I get it, no one wants to be the bad guy, and sure diet soda might not be as big of contributor to the obesity problems we’re currently facing as say, a daily dose of fried chicken, but phenylpropanolamine doesn’t exactly grow on trees.
So, vita-soda, will I try it? I don’t know, maybe. Will I laugh at myself as I do, absolutely! I’m grateful that the junk food/beverage industry is looking to find healthier alternatives to their classically nutrient-zapping products. It’s a start, and in time they may really find natural, healthy alternatives for the public to consider. For now, I think I’ll stick with seltzer and juice, I’m pretty sure there are some vitamins in there too.

For More information- New York Times:Makers of Soda Try a New Pitch: They're Healthy

Cessation Sensation

noreply@blogger.com (Kim) — Fri, 13 Oct 2006 19:21:00 +0000

I’d like to start this entry on a personal note. Last week I was with my father as he had an exploratory heart procedure done. The doctors ran a camera through his leg up to his heart to see what was going on in there. As it turns out, my father has some significant heart damage, most likely caused by a heart attack that went unnoticed. The left ventricle of his heart now moves slower than it should, it’s not a repairable problem, but one we can try and monitor closely and keep from getting worse. He also has a 50% blockage in one of his major arteries, that he’ll now be treated for (to prevent it from getting bigger, not to decrease its size) through cholesterol medication. Having to watch what he eats is foreign to him. I’ve always been concerned about his diet, but hope that this will scare him into taking better care of himself. We are a society of instant gratification, and that comes with the good and the bad, but heart disease takes a long time to materialize to the point where active treatment is needed, and it’s something that can easily be avoided, by a diet that’s moderate in fats and high in fiber and supplemented with regular exercise.
Having said that, I read an article that I found fascinating in the New York Times, it was a diet study, done by a Marketing Analyst. The study didn’t have statistical data about good fats or bad fats, but instead turned a keen eye to the behavior of eating.
If you’ve ever been around a baby when it’s eating, you’ll notice that the baby knows when it’s satisfied. It doesn’t keep drinking till the bottle is empty, or check what the other baby’s are doing. It just turns its head and refuses to take anymore. Many dieticians say there’s a similar trigger in adults that goes unnoticed, it’s called “the sigh” (sounds very ominous, doesn’t it?) The sigh theory says that adults tend to sigh when they are satisfied, but this sign usually goes unnoticed. Try it, pay attention to your breathing patterns while you’re eating. I happen to have a hiccup, I’m very strange indeed. When I’m hungry or when I’m full, I have a single hiccup. All of my close friends and family members are aware of the hiccup, and it generally creates a fair amount of pressure to stop eating when I’m full and start eating when I’m hungry.
Now that you know an awful lot about me, back to the study Dr. Brian Wansink of Cornell University, conducts regular lunch experiments. He offers willing participants a free lunch and watches their reactions to different eating scenarios. He uses a bottomless soup bowl, rigged to never get below half full. Some participants ate more than a quart of soup in a 20-minute period. Another experiment gave movie-goers free popcorn, either large or medium in size. The popcorn they gave out was stale, and not particularly appetizing. Those with the larger sized popcorn ate 53% more stale popcorn than those with the medium sized bag. He says, “We don’t have any idea what the normal amount to eat is, so we look around for clues or signals,” he said. “When all you see is that big portions of food cost less than small ones, it can be confusing.” What is it about our society that we have completely forgotten to listen to our own bodies when deciphering what and how much we need? Basically, his studies show, we eat until we have some sort of external signal to stop, like there being no more food, or someone else has stopped eating. We eat even when the food isn’t good; we eat when we’re not hungry. Who hasn’t eaten a whole bag of chips while watching TV or eaten an entire pint of ice cream?
The positive aspect of this experiment is that food manufacturers are now trying to use this information to market things in a healthier fashion. There are now single serving sized bags of popcorn, containers of cottage cheese (I’ve never known anyone to overdo it on cottage cheese, but I’m sure there’s someone out there somewhere), there are 100-calorie pack cookies and crackers, and single serving bags of things like chips and pretzels. Trader Joe’s even sells single servings of nuts. These are definitely things that can really help to improve the public’s knowledge of what an actual serving is. People don’t intentionally gorge themselves, we live in a culture of abundance, restaurants serve gigantic portions, and we’ve began to come accustomed to eating that much. If people are constantly exposed to things in healthier portion sizes, that knowledge may start to slip into their daily life, the servings they serve themselves, and the amounts they’ll eat while they’re out.
As critical as I am of our society’s lack of knowledge about nutrition and exercise, I do believe that there are a lot of really great things happening in the world of nutrition, in our school systems and our business world that can really benefit our health in the years to come. Our bodies are capable of doing so much, and they deserve to be treated well and respected. Although I wish that societal changes brought about more changes within the world of big business, sometimes the opposite happening can be a good thing.

Let's Blame Harry Truman

noreply@blogger.com (Kim) — Wed, 23 Aug 2006 15:25:00 +0000

For the childhood obesity epidemic that the United States faces currently. Okay, no, I don’t really mean that. But he is, indirectly, at fault for the high fat, high calorie school lunches we serve to our children on a daily basis. In 1946, Truman passed the National School Lunch Act, which was meant to counteract the high rate of malnourished children in the United States (boy have things changed since then.) The National School Lunch Act guaranteed that a hot lunch would be provided by the government to all students that could not financially afford it. Today the average school lunch contains approximately 600 calories, that’s more than half of what children up to the age of eight are recommended as a daily allowance. Combined with a school provided breakfast averaging up to 400 calories, the two school provided meals could actually meet a child’s daily caloric needs comfortably. To be fair to the government, the caloric recommendations they make for school lunches are meant as a safeguard against starvation and malnutrition. The idea is that even if the child doesn’t eat any other meal that day they would still be able to maintain necessary function. This is actually the problem. Most of the children in this country are not starving to death, and after they ingest a whopping 1000 calories between their school provided breakfast and lunch, they then go home and have a snack and dinner, leaving them way above their daily needs, resulting in excess weight gain.

In this past weekend’s New York Times Magazine, the feature article was titled The School-Lunch Test. It was an exceptionally eye opening article that dealt with independent groups throughout the country working with public schools to make their school lunches more nutritious, and to also bring about change in nutritional education to younger children. The key group the article followed was a group led by Dr. Arthur Agatson (otherwise known as the South Beach Diet author) entitled HOPS—Healthier Options for Public Schoolchildren. Dr. Agatson’s staff worked with a public school in the Kissimmee, Florida public school system, where most of the children were from low income families, and qualified for government paid-for lunches. Team HOPS, worked with the government rationed foods that the school district received, they traded tater tots for sweet potatoes, and breaded chicken patties for grilled chicken. The program also subsidized the substitution of whole wheat products for their government provided white bread counterparts, subsidizing the cost difference between low fat and standard issue government cheese, also bringing in more fresh vegetables, and substituted their school breakfast of Lucky Charms and Fruit Loops for Total and Raisin Bran. They also brought in a nutrition educator, partially paid for by the Kellogg institute, to come in to speak with the kids about nutrition, to teach them about it on their terms by incorporating into stories, and bring in exciting facts about different types of fruits and vegetables. The HOPS program even worked with teachers to adjust math and science programs to include nutrition in ways that would not interrupt their class plan or take away from their preparation for statewide tests.

The most surprising part of this article was the reaction by the staff and the families of these children. You would think that most parents would be happy that their children were learning to make smart choices, but most seemed aggravated and angry. Calling the board of education complaining that their children were being put on the South Beach Diet (having read the South Beach Diet book, the school plan and the diet plan have very little in common, but that’s just my opinion), and complaining that their children refuse to eat anything unhealthy any more and won’t eat what they put in front of them (Good for those kids!) I was most surprised by the response by Jean Palmore, the director of food services for the public school system, who in interviews publicly discussed her own dislike for whole grains and sweet potatoes, and she couldn’t even imagine children wanting to eat that. Talk about not having a good example for these children to follow.

And there’s been good news for the school, 23 of the 486 students classified at the beginning of the project are now considered normal or at risk of becoming overweight. Yes that’s only a 4.7% change in the status of overweight children, but that’s a great start. The study found that the control schools within the same district, had a slight increase in children deemed overweight.

The 2006-2007 school year, marks the first that public schools will receive government subsidies to help them create healthy eating, nutritional education and increased physical fitness plans for their children. This is a huge step in the right direction for our national public schools. The fact is that children are taught to eat badly. As adults, we consider children finicky eaters and give them foods that we think will satisfy them with little to no fuss, like chicken fingers, hamburgers, pizza, mozzarella sticks, french fries, and our school lunches reflect that. Schools provide food that they think kids will eat with no fuss, most of the food the government sends to our schools is deep fried processed foods that need only be reheated before serving, instead of fresh foods that need thought and preparation. By teaching our children from a young age that the foods that ‘they eat’ are fried finger foods, we are allowing them to go into adult hood considering those foods to be acceptable parts of a daily diet. Perhaps it is for this reason that the children of today are the first in history to be expected to have a shorter life expectancy than their parents! And that the Center for Disease Control has predicted that 30-40 percent of today’s children will become diabetic in their lifetime. If we don’t do something now to teach out children proper eating habits we will inadvertently kill them.

Arkansas Takes a Step Toward Healthier Children

noreply@blogger.com (Kim) — Thu, 17 Aug 2006 15:48:00 +0000

In 2004 Arkansas became the first state, and remains the only state, in the United States to require mandatory testing of public school students BMI’s and to send the results home their parents. Unlike the adult test which classifies adults as underweight, normal, overweight or obese, the childhood test classifies the children as underweight, normal, overweight or at risk for becoming overweight, and gives their parents a percentage of their peers that they weigh more/less than.

I applaud Arkansas Governor, Mike Huckabee’s, initiative in this matter. Huckabee, has himself, lost 100 lbs, after being diagnosed with diabetes. In reports released today, Arkansas reveals a decrease in childhood obesity rates from 38.1% to 37.5%. Which is an admirable feet. The report also suggests that more physical activity should be introduced to children within the public school system and more healthy food should be made available to the public.

Strangely, I am not a proponent of required weighing of public school children, I think the experience can be traumatic when done improperly, and although I’m sure great steps have been taken within the public school systems to make the procedure as confidential and trauma free as possible, the fact remains that children can be mean, and sometimes so can parents. I’m glad that their efforts to curb obesity have been successful though, and hope they can continue to focus on this ever growing problem. I very much appreciate the states suggestions of increased mandatory physical activity within the school system and making healthier foods more widely available. I actually think that it’s sort of strange that this program has been going on for two years, and these suggestions are just now being made. But, better late than never. In my opinion these suggestions should have been the first step toward improving Arkansas’ health, and perhaps weighing should have come later.

My hope is that Arkansas efforts continue to influence their communities, as children and parents make healthy eating and adequate exercise a priority. Hopefully more states will make the health of it’s citizens the same kind of priority that Arkansas has.

Find out Your BMI
Arkansas Agressive on Childhood Obesity