Feeding Our Children

I have been really excited about Jamie Oliver's Food Revolution, even if I haven't watched an episode yet, but that's what hulu and this weekend are for.  Given my excitement, I was super bummed when I read today's AP article on the results of the experiment (pasted below).  Turns out, kids didn't really like the healthy foods and still wanted pizza and chicken nuggets and sugar.  This coincides with research released yesterday from the National Institutes of Health showing that junk food uses the same chemical pathways in our brain as addictive drugs.  Of course, this government research is merely proving what we all learned from Liz Lemon on a recent episode of 30 Rock - once you've had fat and sugar, you want fat and sugar - and you may or may not seek it out in your sleep.

I was fortunate enough to take an interim graduate course on childhood obesity just as it was becoming a hot topic.  Turns out, kids like most of the foods they are exposed to early on.  There are some things that they'll just never like (like me and mushrooms), but the key comes down to early and consistent exposure.  Then you wind up with kids that actually ask for water and carrot sticks.  I babysat some kids like this in college and their excitement for vegetables always left me stunned.  All of this meaning, the key to raising kids (and adults) that like healthy foods is to give healthy foods to them early and often.  Sadly, this is why Jamie's experiment may not have been that successful.  These children were already conditioned to a regular diet of poor choices.

I am a firm believer that all foods fit, but some just fit every now and then.  And using food for reward and punishment becomes a slippery slope when fried foods are the coveted prize.  I'm not saying that I'll never be the parent sitting in the drive-through, multi-tasking and hoping the kid will stop whining.  But hopefully my kids will be as excited about sauteed zucchini as I am instead of being afraid of it.

Survey: Kids Spurn Celeb Chef's Healthy Lunches

By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS

Published: March 30, 2010

Filed at 10:29 a.m. ET

MORGANTOWN, W.Va. (AP) -- A survey shows kids at the West Virginia school featured in ''Jamie Oliver's Food Revolution'' liked their standard pizza and chicken nuggets more than the celebrity chef's fresh, healthy menu items.

And when denied the food they were used to, many stopped buying the school lunch.

The survey at Central City Elementary in Huntington also found children drank less milk after Oliver removed the sugary chocolate and strawberry bottles.

But there is a bright spot in the data from the West Virginia University Health Research Center: More than six in 10 kids said they'd learned to try new foods.

ABC chose to have the show in Huntington after a 2008 Associated Press story dubbed the five-county metropolitan area the nation's unhealthiest.