MORE FRUITS AND VEGETABLES, PLEASE...


A Fact: We have been educating children’s palates with juice in a box, flavored milks, hamburgers, hot dogs, nuggets, pizza, bagels, cookies, fruit leather, cheese roll ups, microwave popcorn, pop tarts, tacos, doritos - edible items that are calorie dense and nutrient poor - at school, at home, and everywhere. Can we act surprised now if that’s what they want?


A Bitter Pill to Swallow: Motivated by unexamined convenience, misplaced financial incentives, we are  waking up to a monster of our own creation. We overfeed our children, hardly nourish them, and then pass the blame around. We do not foster a healthy relationship with food.


A Wake Up Call: As accountable citizens, teachers, parents, physicians, politicians, we’ve overlooked the obvious, education is powerful. Imagine an elementary school food lab where children learn whole foods. Did we sleep through the whole junk food education?


A Reality: The notion that childhood obesity looms like an enemy to be fought prevents us from seeing the simple treatment. Identify the conditions breeding the problem and resolve to change them.  Ha, ha. No, really, that is all it takes... well, and hard work... OK, we also need lots of people willing to invest time and energy in a systemic solution. Oh wait, but what do we do with the war against obesity? It’s giving jobs to so many.


Past the Impasse: When children touch, smell, measure, chop, and mix, rice, beans, and kale; bok choy, lentils, dates, oats, quinoa; and firm juicy fruits like persimmon, plums, and pears these foods become familiar.


When children have a chance to season their cooking with cinnamon, ginger, cilantro, lemon, basil, and cloves they develop wholesome memories of touch, taste, and smell.


Children who are surrounded with the aroma of fresh cantaloupe, who stain their fingers with blueberries, who discover slippery white seeds inside okra, develop a discriminating taste rooted in their own experience.


These foods, now familiar to them, become true choices whether in the supermarket, the cafeteria line, or at home. So simple...


The bright reality in one thousand schools:  Please refer to the Food is Elementary curriculum. Created by Antonia Demas PhD in 2001, it is used today in 1000 schools across the USA.


P.S. We need to trade in the unhealthy foods. If we follow the simplistic slogan of “eat more fruits and vegetables” we will continue to get more obese, just do the math.


Ana M. Negrón MD

3/5/2010 revised 7/11