Food revolution

The other night I watched the new Jamie Oliver TV show on ABC, “Food Revolution” (Friday nights) about food in school and I thought I would give you my two cents on that theme.

First of all, when I was a kid we were going to school barefoot in the snow up hill both ways… no really, when I was a kid life seemed way simpler than today. We did what most kids did at our school, we used to brown bag it every day. Our parents were way more aware of what we were eating, because they bought the ingredients and they made the sandwich the night before. Yes, sometimes it was peanut butter and jam with an apple but that’s just the way it was when I was young, a very long time ago. Now I know that peanut butter is now considered evil food by most school districts and certainly prohibited in all schools in the Okanagan. But it’s no excuse. I never even saw a tortilla wrap until I was a grown up. Today kids have way more options and yet they often end up eating crappy lunches or not enough of a lunch or none at all.

If we parents rely on a school board of directors or the government to decide what’s good for our kids, we can hardly complain since we did elect them and/or at the very least could have elected them if we took interest in voting for those type of things.

The other thing I keep thinking is this: I am a parent of a daughter and it is up to me to teach her about life … the birds and the bees, tying her shoes right, not to beat up on other kids, and yes, what is good for her body is also my responsibility. Since when can we blame schools for what our children eat? If my kid does not learn how to write or count properly I will be the first one to blame the school. When it comes to food it is the parent’s job to show their kids what they should eat – “by example” being the best way to show them. My daughter did go to A&W when she was young and may still go with her friends today, but restaurant or prepared food was not our main source of meals. We actually cooked from scratch 95% of the time and we still do.

If your kids learn to eat a piece of fruit at home when they get hungry, they are less likely to ask for chips at school. I would like to see all fried food, fast food or anything like removed from all schools. Without that option available every day, kids don’t think about having it on other occasions.

Lastly, I just want to say that a child that is fed good food and enough of it will see their grades go up a few points. How do you perform at work when you get hungry? Is your concentration better or worse?

The problem is not the actual chicken nuggets although it’s not the best food in the world, the problem is how often they end up eating chicken nuggets and similar type meals because we are so focused on getting to soccer or ballet practice that we forget that eating is more important then anything else... even fun things.

You are what you eat - and for all the parents out there, your kids will become what you feed them. Do you really want to be the proud parent of a chicken nugget?

Chef Martin

This article is written by or on behalf of an outsourced columnist and does not necessarily reflect the views of Castanet.