April 29, 2011
Written By: Travis Brown
SNOW HILL -- After spending more than a month working with local elementary school cafeterias as part of a Team Nutrition Grant program, Chef Paul Suplee called the effort to improve school nutrition a success. He did admit, however, that it was a small step but expressed hope that it would lead to similar efforts in the future.
Suplee, culinary arts instructor for the Worcester County Technical High School, and his students teamed up with cafeteria workers at five local elementary schools to design sets of easy-to-make yet nutritious meals that could then become part of the school’s regular menu. Suplee and his students spent one week cooking and planning with each school. At the end of the five-week period, the schools will share all of the meal ideas that had been generated with their counterparts, resulting in a widely expanded cafeteria menu for all of Worcester County.
“We’re just trying to educate the kids,” said Suplee. “So far we’ve had good results.”
He stressed the fact that the perceived worry over lack of nutrition in schools isn’t as dramatic as many believe and praised the cafeteria employees his team worked with as having done an incredible job, especially since they are always working with limited resources.
In response to that scarcity of funds and resources, Suplee used a portion of the $30,000 Team Nutrition Grant to outfit some of the more underequipped kitchens with new chef’s knives and other small-ware.
“They need to have the tools to do their jobs,” said Suplee of the cafeteria workers.
Read the complete story here.
Showing posts with label child nutrition. Show all posts
Showing posts with label child nutrition. Show all posts
Friday, April 29, 2011
Wednesday, March 9, 2011
Fresh Sprouts at School
When you think about it, farms and schools have the same goal: to plant seeds and nurture growth. At Sunset Beach Elementary School the figurative ideal has gone literal. Seed-planting, plus a healthy dose of support from educators, parents, farms and the community, has sprouted and nurtured students' love of gardening and their taste for locally grown fruits and vegetables.
On the school campus, students tend a garden and an orchard, thanks to donations from the community and support from the Kokua Hawaii Foundation. The 'AINA Kine Student Farmers' Market Club funds a biweekly healthy snack supplied mostly by local farms, and a weekly lunchtime salad bar comes via support of the foundation.
All this focus on local, healthful food began converging at the school in February 2009, when parent Erin Delventhal noticed that fruit from neighborhood trees was "left on the ground half the time."
"I knew they could be put to good use, so I set up a meeting with the principal and Kim Johnson of the Kokua Foundation, who also has kids at the school," she recalls. The school organized a farmers market club for students and asked the community to donate home-grown produce for the first sale. On market day they had a table full of food that generated $180 in one hour.
"When we asked the club what they wanted to do with the money, they said they wanted to provide the students with a healthy snack," Delventhal says. "The first snack was watermelon."
Since then, 15,000 healthy snacks have been served to the student body.
"Working with local farmers, I am usually able to purchase produce that is allowed to ripen naturally," says Delventhal. "Buying local gives the students the best-tasting snacks and, ultimately, influences their food choices. For instance, after serving starfruit from Poamoho Organic Produce in Waialua, we saw students lining up, quarters in hand, ready to purchase starfruit at the student farmers market."
Several months after that first market, the club received a grant from the foundation to plant a garden at the school. It also hosted a community tree drive that led to an orchard of guava, starfruit, kumquat, orange, lemon, lime, tangerine, grapefruit, sapodilla, wax jambu and sweetsop trees. Under the trees, the children planted sweet potato, pumpkin, zinnias,
gardenias, lilikoi and pineapple.
Meanwhile, the school organized a fresh lunchtime salad bar.
Today, produce from the school garden takes its place on the farmers market table alongside donations, and Thursday lunches include a trip to the salad bar. And the students love it.
All this focus on local, healthful food began converging at the school in February 2009, when parent Erin Delventhal noticed that fruit from neighborhood trees was "left on the ground half the time."
"I knew they could be put to good use, so I set up a meeting with the principal and Kim Johnson of the Kokua Foundation, who also has kids at the school," she recalls. The school organized a farmers market club for students and asked the community to donate home-grown produce for the first sale. On market day they had a table full of food that generated $180 in one hour.
"When we asked the club what they wanted to do with the money, they said they wanted to provide the students with a healthy snack," Delventhal says. "The first snack was watermelon."
Since then, 15,000 healthy snacks have been served to the student body.
"Working with local farmers, I am usually able to purchase produce that is allowed to ripen naturally," says Delventhal. "Buying local gives the students the best-tasting snacks and, ultimately, influences their food choices. For instance, after serving starfruit from Poamoho Organic Produce in Waialua, we saw students lining up, quarters in hand, ready to purchase starfruit at the student farmers market."
Several months after that first market, the club received a grant from the foundation to plant a garden at the school. It also hosted a community tree drive that led to an orchard of guava, starfruit, kumquat, orange, lemon, lime, tangerine, grapefruit, sapodilla, wax jambu and sweetsop trees. Under the trees, the children planted sweet potato, pumpkin, zinnias,
gardenias, lilikoi and pineapple.
Meanwhile, the school organized a fresh lunchtime salad bar.
Today, produce from the school garden takes its place on the farmers market table alongside donations, and Thursday lunches include a trip to the salad bar. And the students love it.
Monday, January 17, 2011
For Healing, Meals Made to Order
JULIEN COLLOT, who is 8 and has had leukemia, has been on a low-microbial diet since his two bone-marrow transplants, in 2006 and 2007. When he developed diabetes last year, he had to go low-fat and low-sugar as well.
So Pnina Peled, the executive chef at Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center, makes Julien his beloved shrimp scampi with Promise, a butter substitute, and eggplant Parmesan using egg whites, whole-wheat bread crumbs and soy cheese. When Julien told Ms. Peled about his love of pumpkin spice cake, she presented him one baked with egg whites and applesauce. After he rejected the hospital’s whole-wheat ravioli, she hauled her pasta maker on the subway from Brooklyn to roll out a handmade version.
“She came in on her day off with a stack of cookbooks and sat with us to come up with a menu for him,” Julien’s mother, Jacqueline Collot, said the other day as her son relished whole-wheat spaghetti dressed with sesame oil and topped with green beans minced fine to look like scallions — Ms. Peled’s response to his stated craving for “unspicy spicy noodles.”
“What Pnina offers Julien is a combination of love of food and the freedom that was taken away for so long,” Ms. Collot added. “To see him interested in meals gives us great comfort.”
Ms. Peled, who came to Sloan-Kettering a year ago after working in some of the city’s finest restaurants and winning an episode of the popular Food Network show “Chopped,” is part of a revolution in hospital food.
Bland broths, neon Jell-O and unidentifiable white-meat products are slowly becoming scarce. Instead, hospitals like the University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center in Houston and Cincinnati Children’s Hospital Medical Center have extensive room-service-like menus and give patients the freedom to order meals whenever they are hungry, while the kitchen staff at St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital in Memphis is happy to duplicate recipes provided by parents.
Sloan-Kettering patients, too, order meals from one of 75 room-service menus — kosher, halal, vegan, low-sodium, etc. But Ms. Peled said that when she started, she saw that patients who did not find anything appealing on the menu often would not eat at all, which motivated her to make the food service more flexible.
She has a team of 35 chefs from diverse backgrounds catering to the special requests of patients, particularly the younger ones, who come to the renowned cancer center from around the globe. In recent months, one chef has been serving dal, curries and rotis to a 16-year-old patient from India; another has made yellow rice for a 3-year-old Latino boy who wanted the version like his mother’s; and a third devised a menu of low-microbial foods for an 8-year-old girl from Italy who wanted dishes that reminded her of home, like fish Francese (it has a lemon sauce).
“There’s no substitute for a good diet, and appetizing food can make all the difference,” said Dr. Susan Prockop, a pediatric oncologist at Sloan-Kettering, noting that eating well can speed recovery and keep patients off intravenous nutrition.
Dominique Symonette, the registered dietitian in charge of pediatrics at the hospital, said that cancers, and chemotherapy, often result in mouth sores, nausea, vomiting and difficulty swallowing. Low-sodium, low-sugar and low-microbial diets — which limits raw and fresh food because of the risk of infection — are common for patients with compromised immune systems or those who are taking steroids or other medications long term.
Enter Chef Peled or one of her three sous-chefs, who spend an hour each afternoon meeting with pediatric patients and their parents to discuss food preferences. (Adult patients at Sloan-Kettering can also make personalized requests, but as the mother of a 2-year-old, Ms. Peled, 37, has a soft spot for sick children.)
Veronica McLymont, director of food and nutrition services at the hospital, says the customized approach has not increased costs because when the children get what they want, less food is wasted.
Read the complete story here.
So Pnina Peled, the executive chef at Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center, makes Julien his beloved shrimp scampi with Promise, a butter substitute, and eggplant Parmesan using egg whites, whole-wheat bread crumbs and soy cheese. When Julien told Ms. Peled about his love of pumpkin spice cake, she presented him one baked with egg whites and applesauce. After he rejected the hospital’s whole-wheat ravioli, she hauled her pasta maker on the subway from Brooklyn to roll out a handmade version.
“She came in on her day off with a stack of cookbooks and sat with us to come up with a menu for him,” Julien’s mother, Jacqueline Collot, said the other day as her son relished whole-wheat spaghetti dressed with sesame oil and topped with green beans minced fine to look like scallions — Ms. Peled’s response to his stated craving for “unspicy spicy noodles.”
“What Pnina offers Julien is a combination of love of food and the freedom that was taken away for so long,” Ms. Collot added. “To see him interested in meals gives us great comfort.”
Ms. Peled, who came to Sloan-Kettering a year ago after working in some of the city’s finest restaurants and winning an episode of the popular Food Network show “Chopped,” is part of a revolution in hospital food.
Bland broths, neon Jell-O and unidentifiable white-meat products are slowly becoming scarce. Instead, hospitals like the University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center in Houston and Cincinnati Children’s Hospital Medical Center have extensive room-service-like menus and give patients the freedom to order meals whenever they are hungry, while the kitchen staff at St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital in Memphis is happy to duplicate recipes provided by parents.
Sloan-Kettering patients, too, order meals from one of 75 room-service menus — kosher, halal, vegan, low-sodium, etc. But Ms. Peled said that when she started, she saw that patients who did not find anything appealing on the menu often would not eat at all, which motivated her to make the food service more flexible.
She has a team of 35 chefs from diverse backgrounds catering to the special requests of patients, particularly the younger ones, who come to the renowned cancer center from around the globe. In recent months, one chef has been serving dal, curries and rotis to a 16-year-old patient from India; another has made yellow rice for a 3-year-old Latino boy who wanted the version like his mother’s; and a third devised a menu of low-microbial foods for an 8-year-old girl from Italy who wanted dishes that reminded her of home, like fish Francese (it has a lemon sauce).
“There’s no substitute for a good diet, and appetizing food can make all the difference,” said Dr. Susan Prockop, a pediatric oncologist at Sloan-Kettering, noting that eating well can speed recovery and keep patients off intravenous nutrition.
Dominique Symonette, the registered dietitian in charge of pediatrics at the hospital, said that cancers, and chemotherapy, often result in mouth sores, nausea, vomiting and difficulty swallowing. Low-sodium, low-sugar and low-microbial diets — which limits raw and fresh food because of the risk of infection — are common for patients with compromised immune systems or those who are taking steroids or other medications long term.
Enter Chef Peled or one of her three sous-chefs, who spend an hour each afternoon meeting with pediatric patients and their parents to discuss food preferences. (Adult patients at Sloan-Kettering can also make personalized requests, but as the mother of a 2-year-old, Ms. Peled, 37, has a soft spot for sick children.)
Veronica McLymont, director of food and nutrition services at the hospital, says the customized approach has not increased costs because when the children get what they want, less food is wasted.
Read the complete story here.
Sunday, August 29, 2010
"Lunch ladies" (and Men) Go To Boot Camp. No Chicken Nuggets Allowed.
SANTA MARIA, CALIF. — The people making lunch in this big commercial kitchen are pros; some of them serve thousands of diners a day. But they're not all comfortable using a knife to peel a butternut squash or chop fresh parsley.
They work in school cafeterias, "lunch ladies" who are not all women and who would like to be seen more as lunch teachers contributing to the overall education of the children who eat their food.
They have been trained in food safety but not always in cooking. Too often, they say, their job has been to heat frozen chicken nuggets or packaged burritos, or to distribute canned fruit, sometimes to the children of people growing and picking fresh produce.
So two dozen cafeteria employees from Santa Barbara County schools are spending a week this summer in a culinary boot camp, learning to cook pork roasts and chicken, vegetables and casseroles they can serve in their schools -- food that tastes good, comes in under budget and meets federal requirements.
The boot camp "drill sergeants" -- Cook for America founders Andrea Martin and Kate Adamick -- also discuss politics and child psychology, nutrition and marketing. They teach time management, culinary math, knife skills, the history of school food and menu planning. Get rid of flavored milk and stop serving cinnamon rolls for breakfast, they say.
"I'm totally impressed," says Cathy Kelly, one of the people taking part in the boot camp in a central kitchen of the Santa Maria-Bonita School District.
Kelly, who works in the Lompoc Unified School District, and her colleague Debbie Frank say their secondary schools are cooking food from scratch but the elementary schools need more kitchen equipment. Much of the food comes frozen and is reheated, including pizzas and burritos, Kelly says.
"It's pretty bad when we don't want to eat it," Kelly says. "When our hamburgers come, I can't stand the smell. I would like to serve something I'm proud of."
The boot camp is one of several efforts around the country to get more produce and whole grains and more freshly cooked food onto school lunch trays.
Read the complete story in the Los Angeles Times.
They work in school cafeterias, "lunch ladies" who are not all women and who would like to be seen more as lunch teachers contributing to the overall education of the children who eat their food.
They have been trained in food safety but not always in cooking. Too often, they say, their job has been to heat frozen chicken nuggets or packaged burritos, or to distribute canned fruit, sometimes to the children of people growing and picking fresh produce.
So two dozen cafeteria employees from Santa Barbara County schools are spending a week this summer in a culinary boot camp, learning to cook pork roasts and chicken, vegetables and casseroles they can serve in their schools -- food that tastes good, comes in under budget and meets federal requirements.
The boot camp "drill sergeants" -- Cook for America founders Andrea Martin and Kate Adamick -- also discuss politics and child psychology, nutrition and marketing. They teach time management, culinary math, knife skills, the history of school food and menu planning. Get rid of flavored milk and stop serving cinnamon rolls for breakfast, they say.
"I'm totally impressed," says Cathy Kelly, one of the people taking part in the boot camp in a central kitchen of the Santa Maria-Bonita School District.
Kelly, who works in the Lompoc Unified School District, and her colleague Debbie Frank say their secondary schools are cooking food from scratch but the elementary schools need more kitchen equipment. Much of the food comes frozen and is reheated, including pizzas and burritos, Kelly says.
"It's pretty bad when we don't want to eat it," Kelly says. "When our hamburgers come, I can't stand the smell. I would like to serve something I'm proud of."
The boot camp is one of several efforts around the country to get more produce and whole grains and more freshly cooked food onto school lunch trays.
Read the complete story in the Los Angeles Times.
Monday, August 23, 2010
San Francisco Targets Kids' Meals, Restaurant Industry Reacts
While San Francisco’s proposal to restrict the use of toys and other “incentives” in the sale of restaurant kids’ meals may not see formal hearings until next month, agitation within some foodservice industry quarters is already running high.
San Francisco Supervisor Eric Mar and two colleagues submitted this month a draft ordinance that in many ways mirrors a law in nearby Santa Clara County, restricting marketing through children’s meals that do not meet specified nutritional guidelines.
The Santa Clara measure, believed to be the first of its kind in the nation, as well as the new San Francisco proposal, are each based on the premise that childhood obesity can be reduced by prohibiting restaurants from offering free toys, online gaming time or other incentives along with meals marketed toward children.
While the Santa Clara measure targets thresholds for total calories, calories from fat, trans fats, sodium and sugar, the San Francisco proposal requires that all qualified meals include a half-cup of fruit and three-quarters of a cup of vegetables.
“They’ve taken a bad idea and made it worse,” California Restaurant Association spokesman Daniel Conway said. He noted that the industry serves what customers want, and that many chains have voluntarily increased offerings of fruit slices, low-fat yogurts, grilled foods and bottled waters in recent years in response to such consumer demands.
“This proposal has gotten the attention of the industry,” Conway continued. “We can’t help but speculate that these proposals are largely driven by the desires of individual politicians to have their names in lights. We remain skeptical about the effectiveness of a proposal like this to have any kind of meaningful impact on childhood obesity and it is clear, based on comments on websites and listening to the radio that many adults, and parents in particular, find the approach to be offensive.”
A statement by three San Francisco supervisors said: “This legislation is aimed at promoting healthy eating habits and to address issues related to childhood obesity. Fast-food restaurants target children and youth by offering toys and other incentive items. The Healthy Meal Incentive legislation would encourage restaurants to provide healthier meal options.”
The Santa Clara measure, because it covers just the unincorporated areas of that county, impacts a relatively small number of restaurants — some estimates put the number at a dozen or fewer.
The San Francisco proposal would impact a greater number of restaurants. According to restaurant websites, Burger King, KFC, McDonald’s and Taco Bell, alone, operate about 48 locations in the city. The proposal also may be of greater interest to the restaurant industry because it represents an escalation in the strategy of restricting the use of incentives to sell kids meals that don’t meet sponsors’ nutritional expectations.
The local Golden Gate Restaurant Association said it has concerns about the San Francisco proposal.
“We are opposed to the continuing over regulation of the restaurant industry,” GGRA executive director Kevin Westlye said. He said his group is “currently evaluating the toy ban [proposal] and political landscape before proceeding.”
Proposed restrictions on the use of toys or incentives in the sale of restaurant foods to children may soon arise in other cities and states.
A report in the San Francisco Chronicle stated that Ken Yeager, the Santa Clara County supervisor who proposed that jurisdiction’s kids meal law, has received inquiries about the legislative strategy from officials in Chicago, New York City and Orange County, Calif. An e-mail to Yeager’s office seeking confirmation of such inquiries was not returned by press time.
McDonald’s, perhaps the world’s best known purveyor of kids meals and the operator of at least 19 restaurants within San Francisco, according to its website, declined to comment on the proposed San Francisco law.
The Oak Brook, Ill.-based chain of more than 14,000 U.S. restaurants and another 18,000 in other countries, suggested that trade groups representing the entire industry, such as the CRA, were a more appropriate source of feedback on legislation. Recent changes to McDonald’s menu offerings have included apple slices, 1-percent fat milk and water options.
Comment or not, McDonald’s, and any restaurant peer that offers free toys or other incentives when selling kids meals, will find operations and marketing more complicated in San Francisco if the measure passes.
Friday, August 13, 2010
In Massachusetts, a Prescription for Produce
The farm stand is becoming the new apothecary, dispensing apples — not to mention artichokes, asparagus and arugula — to fill a novel kind of prescription.
Doctors at three health centers in Massachusetts have begun advising patients to eat “prescription produce” from local farmers’ markets, in an effort to fight obesity in children of low-income families. Now they will give coupons amounting to $1 a day for each member of a patient’s family to promote healthy meals.
“A lot of these kids have a very limited range of fruits and vegetables that are acceptable and familiar to them. Potentially, they will try more,” said Dr. Suki Tepperberg, a family physician at Codman Square Health Center in Dorchester, one of the program sites. “The goal is to get them to increase their consumption of fruit and vegetables by one serving a day.”
The effort may also help farmers’ markets compete with fast-food restaurants selling dollar value meals. Farmers’ markets do more than $1 billion in annual sales in the United States, according to the Agriculture Department.
Massachusetts was one of the first states to promote these markets as hubs of preventive health. In the 1980s, for example, the state began issuing coupons for farmers’ markets to low-income women who were pregnant or breast-feeding or for young children at risk for malnourishment. Thirty-six states now have such farmers' market nutrition programs aimed at women and young children.
Thomas M. Menino, the mayor of Boston, said he believed the new children’s program, in which doctors write vegetable "prescriptions" to be filled at farmers’ markets, was the first of its kind. Doctors will track participants to determine how the program affects their eating patterns and to monitor health indicators like weight and body mass index, he said.
“When I go to work in the morning, I see kids standing at the bus stop eating chips and drinking a soda,” Mr. Menino said in a phone interview earlier this week. “I hope this will help them change their eating habits and lead to a healthier lifestyle.”
Read the rest of the story here.
Doctors at three health centers in Massachusetts have begun advising patients to eat “prescription produce” from local farmers’ markets, in an effort to fight obesity in children of low-income families. Now they will give coupons amounting to $1 a day for each member of a patient’s family to promote healthy meals.
“A lot of these kids have a very limited range of fruits and vegetables that are acceptable and familiar to them. Potentially, they will try more,” said Dr. Suki Tepperberg, a family physician at Codman Square Health Center in Dorchester, one of the program sites. “The goal is to get them to increase their consumption of fruit and vegetables by one serving a day.”
The effort may also help farmers’ markets compete with fast-food restaurants selling dollar value meals. Farmers’ markets do more than $1 billion in annual sales in the United States, according to the Agriculture Department.
Massachusetts was one of the first states to promote these markets as hubs of preventive health. In the 1980s, for example, the state began issuing coupons for farmers’ markets to low-income women who were pregnant or breast-feeding or for young children at risk for malnourishment. Thirty-six states now have such farmers' market nutrition programs aimed at women and young children.
Thomas M. Menino, the mayor of Boston, said he believed the new children’s program, in which doctors write vegetable "prescriptions" to be filled at farmers’ markets, was the first of its kind. Doctors will track participants to determine how the program affects their eating patterns and to monitor health indicators like weight and body mass index, he said.
“When I go to work in the morning, I see kids standing at the bus stop eating chips and drinking a soda,” Mr. Menino said in a phone interview earlier this week. “I hope this will help them change their eating habits and lead to a healthier lifestyle.”
Read the rest of the story here.
Thursday, May 28, 2009
Children, Meet Your Vegetables
Baltimore chefs donate their time to program that introduces kids to the joys of healthful eating
By Jacques Kelly
May 26, 2009 - The third-graders at a Catonsville elementary school recently took a break from the usual cafeteria fare of corn dogs and pizza to sample organic, field-grown salad greens mixed with black olives, apple cider vinegar and oil, Maryland strawberries and honey.
And they became chefs for a day, mixing their own salads and making their own dressing.
Their experience last week was a culmination of a three-morning seminar, called "Days of Taste," which teaches children about what's produced on Maryland farms, tells them about non-processed foods and encourages them to grow a little more adventurous at mealtime.
The program is offered at 17 Baltimore city and county schools, and the instructors who donate their time are some of Baltimore's best-known chefs, including John Shields of Gertrude's, Spike Gjerde of Woodberry Kitchen, Galen Sampson and Christian DeLutis of Dogwood restaurant and local chef and baker Ned Atwater.
"You can really see the light bulbs go off when some of the city children have never eaten a fresh, raw vegetable and they taste it in a salad," said Atwater, who has been teaching the classes for nearly a decade.
"Over the years, we've probably been to half the public schools in Baltimore," he said.
Last week, he took his aluminum salad bowls and non-iceberg lettuce to the Westowne Elementary School on Harlem Lane in Catonsville.
"Our program is different because we have real professional chefs and professional farmers," said Riva Kahn, a cell biologist who lives in Timonium and helped develop the program. "It opens the eyes of these kids to different career possibilities. Our angle is to let them discover that healthy food and good food are not mutually exclusive."
While not every plate at Westowne was completely clean at the end of the lesson, most were fairly empty.
"I like olives," said Samuel Cushman, 9, who explained his grandmother likes to put them in salads.
JanayaWilson, who said she likes to cook - and makes her own salad dressing - is not a fan of red peppers. "I've never liked them," she said, leaving an unconsumed section of them of her paper plate.
As part of the experience, the students boarded buses for One Straw Farm in White Hall in northern Baltimore County. They saw lettuce being started in the greenhouse and the growing fields. (Other suppliers include Brad's Produce in Churchville and Calvert's Gift Farm in Sparks.)
"I learned that compost is banana peels and leftover foods," said Kye McMath, who also said he now knows what part of the tongue are associated with sweet and sour.
Atwater led a post-salad discussion on whether the foods tasted salty, sweet, bitter, sour or "umami" - a Japanese word meaning savory.
"We put in things you wouldn't think would go in a salad - like strawberries - and they tasted really good," said Vivian Montgomery-Walsh, a 9-year-old. "Going to the farm was really cool because we learned how a seed turns into veggies and fruit."
The Westowne food and cooking class attracted a number of parents as helpers and faculty members as observers.
"The math and the science are great, then you can ... look at it as a health class," said Westowne's principal, Patricia Vogel.
"Days of Taste" is a project of the American Institute of Wine and Food, a nonprofit educational organization founded by television chef Julia Child, wine maker Robert Mondavi and others.
"It was a program that originated in French schools," said Atwater, who worked with Kahn and food writer Cynthia Glover to tweak the mini-seminar for local school children.
Members of the Baltimore AIWF chapter gave $14,000 for the school events last year.
All the chefs donate their time to teach the students.
Other chefs in the program include Nona Nielson-Parker of Atwater's, Michael Marx of Rub Barbecue, Barry Fleischmann of Innovative Gourmet, Vicky Barkley from The Classic Catering People, John Walsh of Chef's Expressions and Marc Dixon of Bistro Blanc in Glenelg.
"Over the years, I've seen food become more and more processed commercially," Atwater said. "I want to teach kids about a balanced diet and where the food they eat comes from."
By Jacques Kelly
May 26, 2009 - The third-graders at a Catonsville elementary school recently took a break from the usual cafeteria fare of corn dogs and pizza to sample organic, field-grown salad greens mixed with black olives, apple cider vinegar and oil, Maryland strawberries and honey.
And they became chefs for a day, mixing their own salads and making their own dressing.
Their experience last week was a culmination of a three-morning seminar, called "Days of Taste," which teaches children about what's produced on Maryland farms, tells them about non-processed foods and encourages them to grow a little more adventurous at mealtime.
The program is offered at 17 Baltimore city and county schools, and the instructors who donate their time are some of Baltimore's best-known chefs, including John Shields of Gertrude's, Spike Gjerde of Woodberry Kitchen, Galen Sampson and Christian DeLutis of Dogwood restaurant and local chef and baker Ned Atwater.
"You can really see the light bulbs go off when some of the city children have never eaten a fresh, raw vegetable and they taste it in a salad," said Atwater, who has been teaching the classes for nearly a decade.
"Over the years, we've probably been to half the public schools in Baltimore," he said.
Last week, he took his aluminum salad bowls and non-iceberg lettuce to the Westowne Elementary School on Harlem Lane in Catonsville.
"Our program is different because we have real professional chefs and professional farmers," said Riva Kahn, a cell biologist who lives in Timonium and helped develop the program. "It opens the eyes of these kids to different career possibilities. Our angle is to let them discover that healthy food and good food are not mutually exclusive."
While not every plate at Westowne was completely clean at the end of the lesson, most were fairly empty.
"I like olives," said Samuel Cushman, 9, who explained his grandmother likes to put them in salads.
JanayaWilson, who said she likes to cook - and makes her own salad dressing - is not a fan of red peppers. "I've never liked them," she said, leaving an unconsumed section of them of her paper plate.
As part of the experience, the students boarded buses for One Straw Farm in White Hall in northern Baltimore County. They saw lettuce being started in the greenhouse and the growing fields. (Other suppliers include Brad's Produce in Churchville and Calvert's Gift Farm in Sparks.)
"I learned that compost is banana peels and leftover foods," said Kye McMath, who also said he now knows what part of the tongue are associated with sweet and sour.
Atwater led a post-salad discussion on whether the foods tasted salty, sweet, bitter, sour or "umami" - a Japanese word meaning savory.
"We put in things you wouldn't think would go in a salad - like strawberries - and they tasted really good," said Vivian Montgomery-Walsh, a 9-year-old. "Going to the farm was really cool because we learned how a seed turns into veggies and fruit."
The Westowne food and cooking class attracted a number of parents as helpers and faculty members as observers.
"The math and the science are great, then you can ... look at it as a health class," said Westowne's principal, Patricia Vogel.
"Days of Taste" is a project of the American Institute of Wine and Food, a nonprofit educational organization founded by television chef Julia Child, wine maker Robert Mondavi and others.
"It was a program that originated in French schools," said Atwater, who worked with Kahn and food writer Cynthia Glover to tweak the mini-seminar for local school children.
Members of the Baltimore AIWF chapter gave $14,000 for the school events last year.
All the chefs donate their time to teach the students.
Other chefs in the program include Nona Nielson-Parker of Atwater's, Michael Marx of Rub Barbecue, Barry Fleischmann of Innovative Gourmet, Vicky Barkley from The Classic Catering People, John Walsh of Chef's Expressions and Marc Dixon of Bistro Blanc in Glenelg.
"Over the years, I've seen food become more and more processed commercially," Atwater said. "I want to teach kids about a balanced diet and where the food they eat comes from."
Tuesday, March 17, 2009
Alice Waters' Crusade for Better Food
(CBS) When it comes to food, Alice Waters is a legend.
At age 64, she has done more to change how we Americans eat, cook and think about food than anyone since Julia Child. Waters was only 27 years old in 1971 when she opened her French bistro Chez Panisse in Berkeley, Calif., today considered one of the finest restaurants not just in the United States but in the world.
Waters has produced eight cookbooks, but she's more famous as the mother of a movement that preaches about fresh food grown in a way that's good for the environment. The movement, now called "slow food," is a healthy alternative to "fast food." You might think this appeals only to the Prius-driving, latte-sipping upper crust, but Waters' ideas have gone mainstream.
It all started at Waters' culinary temple, Chez Panisse. She still shows up almost every day, as she has for the last 37 years, to oversee the cooking with her exquisite, infallible taste buds. It's not just the cooking that has made her famous: it's the ingredients. She was one of the first to serve antibiotic and hormone free meats and insist on fresh, organic, locally-grown fruits and vegetables.
"You started a revolution in food. How we think about food. How we cook food. But do you think of yourself as a revolutionary?" correspondent Lesley Stahl asked Waters. "I guess I do now, but when I started Chez Panisse I wasn't thinking of a philosophy about organic and sustainable. I just was looking for flavor," Waters replied. It's flavor that comes from serving only seasonal food, one of her hallmarks; say "frozen" and Alice Waters shudders.
Because all her food has to be fresh, she buys only from local ranchers, fishermen and farmers. People who meet Waters are struck by how gentle and dreamy she seems to be, and they wonder how someone like that became so successful. Truth is, Alice Waters is a steamroller, relentlessly going after what she wants.
And now she wants everyone to cook the way she does. And that has put her in the spotlight "People have become aware that way that we've been eating is making us sick," she said. She has become the leader of a movement to change how we eat. And she's getting traction. Now you can go to your neighborhood grocery store - even Wal-Mart - and buy organic. But in the process, she's become a target.
"People say Alice Waters is self-righteous and elitist. And these are words I've heard over and over," Stahl pointed out. "I feel that good food should be a right and not a privilege and it needs to be without pesticides and herbicides. And everybody deserves this food. And that's not elitist," Waters argued.
Read the complete Lesley Stahl interview with Ms. Waters here.
At age 64, she has done more to change how we Americans eat, cook and think about food than anyone since Julia Child. Waters was only 27 years old in 1971 when she opened her French bistro Chez Panisse in Berkeley, Calif., today considered one of the finest restaurants not just in the United States but in the world.
Waters has produced eight cookbooks, but she's more famous as the mother of a movement that preaches about fresh food grown in a way that's good for the environment. The movement, now called "slow food," is a healthy alternative to "fast food." You might think this appeals only to the Prius-driving, latte-sipping upper crust, but Waters' ideas have gone mainstream.
It all started at Waters' culinary temple, Chez Panisse. She still shows up almost every day, as she has for the last 37 years, to oversee the cooking with her exquisite, infallible taste buds. It's not just the cooking that has made her famous: it's the ingredients. She was one of the first to serve antibiotic and hormone free meats and insist on fresh, organic, locally-grown fruits and vegetables.
"You started a revolution in food. How we think about food. How we cook food. But do you think of yourself as a revolutionary?" correspondent Lesley Stahl asked Waters. "I guess I do now, but when I started Chez Panisse I wasn't thinking of a philosophy about organic and sustainable. I just was looking for flavor," Waters replied. It's flavor that comes from serving only seasonal food, one of her hallmarks; say "frozen" and Alice Waters shudders.
Because all her food has to be fresh, she buys only from local ranchers, fishermen and farmers. People who meet Waters are struck by how gentle and dreamy she seems to be, and they wonder how someone like that became so successful. Truth is, Alice Waters is a steamroller, relentlessly going after what she wants.
And now she wants everyone to cook the way she does. And that has put her in the spotlight "People have become aware that way that we've been eating is making us sick," she said. She has become the leader of a movement to change how we eat. And she's getting traction. Now you can go to your neighborhood grocery store - even Wal-Mart - and buy organic. But in the process, she's become a target.
"People say Alice Waters is self-righteous and elitist. And these are words I've heard over and over," Stahl pointed out. "I feel that good food should be a right and not a privilege and it needs to be without pesticides and herbicides. And everybody deserves this food. And that's not elitist," Waters argued.
Read the complete Lesley Stahl interview with Ms. Waters here.
Tuesday, November 18, 2008
Childhood Hunger Grows
WASHINGTON (AP) -- Some 691,000 children went hungry in America sometime in 2007, while close to one in eight Americans struggled to feed themselves adequately even before this year's sharp economic downturn, the Agriculture Department reported Monday.
The department's annual report on food security showed that during 2007 the number of children who suffered a substantial disruption in the amount of food they typically eat was more than 50 percent above the 430,000 in 2006 and the largest figure since 716,000 in 1998.
Overall, the 36.2 million adults and children who struggled with hunger during the year was up slightly from 35.5 million in 2006. That was 12.2 percent of Americans who didn't have the money or assistance to get enough food to maintain active, healthy lives.
Almost a third of those, 11.9 million adults and children, went hungry at some point. That figure has grown by more than 40 percent since 2000. The government says these people suffered a substantial disruption in their food supply at some point and classifies them as having "very low food security." Until the government rewrote its definitions two years ago, this group was described as having "food insecurity with hunger."
The findings should increase pressure to meet President-elect Barack Obama's campaign pledge to expand food aid and end childhood hunger by 2015, said James Weill, president of the Food Research and Action Center, an anti-hunger group.
He predicted the 2008 numbers will show even more hunger because of the sharp economic downturn this year.
"There's every reason to think the increases in the number of hungry people will be very, very large based on the increased demand we're seeing this year at food stamp agencies, emergency kitchens, Women, Infants and Children clinics, really across the entire social service support structure," said James Weill, president of the Food Research and Action Center, an anti-hunger group.
Weill said the figures show that economic growth during the first seven years of the Bush administration didn't reach the poorest and hungriest people. "The people in the deepest poverty are suffering the most," Weill said.
The number of adults and children with "low food security" -- those who avoided substantial food disruptions but still struggled to eat -- fell slightly since 2000, from 24.7 million to 24.3 million. The government said these people have several ways of coping -- eating less varied diets, obtaining food from emergency kitchens or community food charities, or participating in federal aid programs like food stamps, the school lunch program or the Women, Infants and Children program.
Among other findings:
• The families with the highest rates of food insecurity were headed by single mothers (30.2 percent), black households (22.2 percent), Hispanic households (20.1 percent), and households with incomes below the official poverty line (37.7 percent).
• States with families reporting the highest prevalence of food insecurity during 2005-2007 were Mississippi (17.4 percent), New Mexico (15 percent), Texas (14.8 percent) and Arkansas (14.4 percent).
• The highest growth in food insecurity over the last 9 years came in Alaska and Iowa, both of which saw a 3.7 percent increase in families who struggled to eat adequately or had substantial food disruptions.
The department's annual report on food security showed that during 2007 the number of children who suffered a substantial disruption in the amount of food they typically eat was more than 50 percent above the 430,000 in 2006 and the largest figure since 716,000 in 1998.
Overall, the 36.2 million adults and children who struggled with hunger during the year was up slightly from 35.5 million in 2006. That was 12.2 percent of Americans who didn't have the money or assistance to get enough food to maintain active, healthy lives.
Almost a third of those, 11.9 million adults and children, went hungry at some point. That figure has grown by more than 40 percent since 2000. The government says these people suffered a substantial disruption in their food supply at some point and classifies them as having "very low food security." Until the government rewrote its definitions two years ago, this group was described as having "food insecurity with hunger."
The findings should increase pressure to meet President-elect Barack Obama's campaign pledge to expand food aid and end childhood hunger by 2015, said James Weill, president of the Food Research and Action Center, an anti-hunger group.
He predicted the 2008 numbers will show even more hunger because of the sharp economic downturn this year.
"There's every reason to think the increases in the number of hungry people will be very, very large based on the increased demand we're seeing this year at food stamp agencies, emergency kitchens, Women, Infants and Children clinics, really across the entire social service support structure," said James Weill, president of the Food Research and Action Center, an anti-hunger group.
Weill said the figures show that economic growth during the first seven years of the Bush administration didn't reach the poorest and hungriest people. "The people in the deepest poverty are suffering the most," Weill said.
The number of adults and children with "low food security" -- those who avoided substantial food disruptions but still struggled to eat -- fell slightly since 2000, from 24.7 million to 24.3 million. The government said these people have several ways of coping -- eating less varied diets, obtaining food from emergency kitchens or community food charities, or participating in federal aid programs like food stamps, the school lunch program or the Women, Infants and Children program.
Among other findings:
• The families with the highest rates of food insecurity were headed by single mothers (30.2 percent), black households (22.2 percent), Hispanic households (20.1 percent), and households with incomes below the official poverty line (37.7 percent).
• States with families reporting the highest prevalence of food insecurity during 2005-2007 were Mississippi (17.4 percent), New Mexico (15 percent), Texas (14.8 percent) and Arkansas (14.4 percent).
• The highest growth in food insecurity over the last 9 years came in Alaska and Iowa, both of which saw a 3.7 percent increase in families who struggled to eat adequately or had substantial food disruptions.
Sunday, May 4, 2008
Could "Healthy Eating" Lead to Malnutrition?
From The Times
May 2, 2008
Too much healthy eating is as bad for children as too much junk
It is no surprise that children love junk food. Its makers go to great lengths to make sure that their offerings deliver a full-on, unsubtle assault on taste buds, with plenty of salt or sugar to create the sense that it is “tasty”.
But a significant proportion of our nation's children are worryingly chubby and heading for potential obesity problems in later life, it seems that others are suffering from “muesli belt malnutrition”: the overzealous application of “healthy eating” rules imposed on their daily food intake. A recent study warns us that too much fibre and too little fat can lead to vitamin deficiencies and stunts growth in the under-fives.
This means that young children who have wholemeal bread, brown pasta and piles of fruit imposed on them are getting too full too quickly and do not have room for enough foods such as dairy products, meat, eggs and fish, which have vital nutrients for growth and development.
So how do we strike a balance? Children thrive on a good variety of foods, which includes grains and potatoes such as bread, pasta, noodles, rice and all varieties of potatoes; calcium-rich foods such as milk, yoghurt, fish canned with edible bones such as pilchards; protein-rich foods such as eggs, chicken and turkey, red meat and Quorn products; plus a variety of different fruit and vegetables. The million-dollar question is how much should they have of each at various ages.
This to some extent varies with the size and appetite of your child. The World Health Organisation has provided some useful parameters.
Lower-fat milk
You can start giving toddlers semi-skimmed milk from the age of 2. Fully skimmed milk is not suitable as a main drink until they are 5, because it doesn't contain enough calories for a growing child.
Fish
Because oily fish such as mackerel, salmon and sardines contain residues of pollutants such as dioxins and PCBs, the Food Standards Agency advises that you can give boys up to four portions a week, but that girls should have no more than two a week, because the residues can build up in their bodies over the years and can affect reproductive functions in later life. Shark, swordfish and marlin contain relatively high levels of mercury, which may affect a child's developing nervous system, so these should be avoided.
Eggs and nuts
Toddlers should have their eggs well cooked until the white and yolk are solid to avoid salmonella, while nuts for children under 5 should be given only crushed or flaked to reduce the risk of choking.
Wholegrain foods
Definitely do not add bran to children's foods and avoid giving very young children wholemeal pasta and brown rice. Too much fibre can sometimes reduce the amount of minerals, such as calcium and iron, that they can absorb and leave them feeling bloated and too full to finish their meal. By the time they are 5, young children can gradually be weaned on to wholegrain versions of cereals.
What about salt?
There is no need to add salt to the food of children under the age of three. Children in the UK manage to chomp their way through as much as 10-12g of salt daily and yet under the age of 7, children should have no more than 3g of salt each day and those between 7 and 10 no more than 5g. Once over 11, like adults, they should have no more than 6g of salt daily. Current high intakes can damage their developing kidneys and store up potential blood pressure and heart disease problems.
How much sugar?
Our children are getting about 17 per cent of their daily calories from sugar when they should, like adults, be getting no more than 10per cent. This means that four to six-year-olds should eat no more than 40g of sugar a day; seven to ten-year-olds no more than 46g and 11 to 14-year-olds no more than 50g.
If you limit children's consumption of sweets, chocolate and biscuits, along with fizzy drinks and squashes, you will cut their sugar intake. But honey in flapjacks, fruit syrup added to “orange drinks”, glucose syrup in breakfast cereals and dextrose in fromage frais all also count towards sugar intake and also need to be watched.
A good rule of thumb is to look on the nutrition label. Foods and drinks with less than 2g per 100g of sugars (this figure will include all the various forms in which sugar comes) is low in sugar, while any with more than 10g is high.
May 2, 2008
Too much healthy eating is as bad for children as too much junk
It is no surprise that children love junk food. Its makers go to great lengths to make sure that their offerings deliver a full-on, unsubtle assault on taste buds, with plenty of salt or sugar to create the sense that it is “tasty”.
But a significant proportion of our nation's children are worryingly chubby and heading for potential obesity problems in later life, it seems that others are suffering from “muesli belt malnutrition”: the overzealous application of “healthy eating” rules imposed on their daily food intake. A recent study warns us that too much fibre and too little fat can lead to vitamin deficiencies and stunts growth in the under-fives.
This means that young children who have wholemeal bread, brown pasta and piles of fruit imposed on them are getting too full too quickly and do not have room for enough foods such as dairy products, meat, eggs and fish, which have vital nutrients for growth and development.
So how do we strike a balance? Children thrive on a good variety of foods, which includes grains and potatoes such as bread, pasta, noodles, rice and all varieties of potatoes; calcium-rich foods such as milk, yoghurt, fish canned with edible bones such as pilchards; protein-rich foods such as eggs, chicken and turkey, red meat and Quorn products; plus a variety of different fruit and vegetables. The million-dollar question is how much should they have of each at various ages.
This to some extent varies with the size and appetite of your child. The World Health Organisation has provided some useful parameters.
Lower-fat milk
You can start giving toddlers semi-skimmed milk from the age of 2. Fully skimmed milk is not suitable as a main drink until they are 5, because it doesn't contain enough calories for a growing child.
Fish
Because oily fish such as mackerel, salmon and sardines contain residues of pollutants such as dioxins and PCBs, the Food Standards Agency advises that you can give boys up to four portions a week, but that girls should have no more than two a week, because the residues can build up in their bodies over the years and can affect reproductive functions in later life. Shark, swordfish and marlin contain relatively high levels of mercury, which may affect a child's developing nervous system, so these should be avoided.
Eggs and nuts
Toddlers should have their eggs well cooked until the white and yolk are solid to avoid salmonella, while nuts for children under 5 should be given only crushed or flaked to reduce the risk of choking.
Wholegrain foods
Definitely do not add bran to children's foods and avoid giving very young children wholemeal pasta and brown rice. Too much fibre can sometimes reduce the amount of minerals, such as calcium and iron, that they can absorb and leave them feeling bloated and too full to finish their meal. By the time they are 5, young children can gradually be weaned on to wholegrain versions of cereals.
What about salt?
There is no need to add salt to the food of children under the age of three. Children in the UK manage to chomp their way through as much as 10-12g of salt daily and yet under the age of 7, children should have no more than 3g of salt each day and those between 7 and 10 no more than 5g. Once over 11, like adults, they should have no more than 6g of salt daily. Current high intakes can damage their developing kidneys and store up potential blood pressure and heart disease problems.
How much sugar?
Our children are getting about 17 per cent of their daily calories from sugar when they should, like adults, be getting no more than 10per cent. This means that four to six-year-olds should eat no more than 40g of sugar a day; seven to ten-year-olds no more than 46g and 11 to 14-year-olds no more than 50g.
If you limit children's consumption of sweets, chocolate and biscuits, along with fizzy drinks and squashes, you will cut their sugar intake. But honey in flapjacks, fruit syrup added to “orange drinks”, glucose syrup in breakfast cereals and dextrose in fromage frais all also count towards sugar intake and also need to be watched.
A good rule of thumb is to look on the nutrition label. Foods and drinks with less than 2g per 100g of sugars (this figure will include all the various forms in which sugar comes) is low in sugar, while any with more than 10g is high.
Wednesday, January 9, 2008
Renegade Lunch Lady Saving Kids' Lives
(CNN) -- Ann Cooper is on a one-woman whirlwind campaign to change the way kids eat in schools. "We're killing our kids with food," she says.
Half of all the Hispanic and African-American kids born in 2000 and one-third of Caucasian kids will have diabetes in their lifetime, many before they graduate college, Cooper says, citing U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention statistics. "It's all because of what we are feeding them," she says. "It's all preventable."
Cooper, self-proclaimed renegade lunch lady and chef, is actively working against what she describes as entrenched interests -- fast-food companies and junk-food producers -- that she says profit from selling unhealthy foods to schools. They're "basically making money off our children's health and their future," she says. "I'm just so pissed off."
She wasn't always this way. Cooper used to be a big-shot celebrity chef who worked at tony resorts, on cruise ships, for hotel chains and prestigious film festivals. She's won numerous awards and is on boards for executive chefs, women chefs and the Alumni Committee of the Culinary Institute of America.
Despite the accolades, Cooper felt something was missing. She recognized that as a celebrity chef, she was reaching only the top 10 percent of the wealthiest people in the country. So she sought ways to make a difference.
She and her fellow culinary icons "would spend a lot of time trying to give back," she says. "We cooked for Second Harvest, we cooked for donations, we cooked whatever."
But there was also impermanence to food. Whether people ate her food or threw it away, Cooper lamented that it all ended up as sewage or waste.
After writing her first book, "A Woman's Place Is In the Kitchen," on the role of women in food, she started to feel like there was a way to leave something behind. Writing the book led to associations with high-profile women who were trying to make a difference -- Alice Waters from Berkeley, California, and Nora Pouillon of Washington, D.C., who were into organics and sustainability.
Those relationships changed the way she thought about food -- so much so that a few years later came her second book, "Bitter Harvest," about where our food supply comes from and how political concerns often trump healthy diets.
Now Cooper knew she was getting somewhere. When the Ross School in East Hampton, New York, called offering her a position as executive chef of wellness and nutrition, she didn't exactly jump at the chance. But after giving it some thought, she realized it was a way to reach future generations and really leave a lasting impact. "All of a sudden, it felt like, wow, this is something I could really do, and I could really make a difference."
Today, Cooper is director of nutrition services in Berkeley, where she has transformed the school lunch program from 90 percent frozen reheated foods to 90 percent fresh. Berkeley schools used to serve fruit once a week; now it's on the menu every day, and so is the salad bar.
More than that, the healthy food curriculum is carried into the classroom. With a staff of 90 to help, Cooper runs cooking classes, gardening classes and serves food in 17 locations. She has created a "meal wheel" to help kids all over the country understand what should be on their plates daily. With her Web page, Lunch Lessons, Cooper is hoping to make her program a model. "There's only one of me. I can't cover the whole country," she says.
If she had one wish, Cooper says, it would be that "Oprah would take on this issue as a social justice issue and that we would get our presidential candidates to really start to talk about this issue, because I just can't imagine what's more important ... than the next generation. We're just really not taking care of them."
Half of all the Hispanic and African-American kids born in 2000 and one-third of Caucasian kids will have diabetes in their lifetime, many before they graduate college, Cooper says, citing U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention statistics. "It's all because of what we are feeding them," she says. "It's all preventable."
Cooper, self-proclaimed renegade lunch lady and chef, is actively working against what she describes as entrenched interests -- fast-food companies and junk-food producers -- that she says profit from selling unhealthy foods to schools. They're "basically making money off our children's health and their future," she says. "I'm just so pissed off."
She wasn't always this way. Cooper used to be a big-shot celebrity chef who worked at tony resorts, on cruise ships, for hotel chains and prestigious film festivals. She's won numerous awards and is on boards for executive chefs, women chefs and the Alumni Committee of the Culinary Institute of America.
Despite the accolades, Cooper felt something was missing. She recognized that as a celebrity chef, she was reaching only the top 10 percent of the wealthiest people in the country. So she sought ways to make a difference.
She and her fellow culinary icons "would spend a lot of time trying to give back," she says. "We cooked for Second Harvest, we cooked for donations, we cooked whatever."
But there was also impermanence to food. Whether people ate her food or threw it away, Cooper lamented that it all ended up as sewage or waste.
After writing her first book, "A Woman's Place Is In the Kitchen," on the role of women in food, she started to feel like there was a way to leave something behind. Writing the book led to associations with high-profile women who were trying to make a difference -- Alice Waters from Berkeley, California, and Nora Pouillon of Washington, D.C., who were into organics and sustainability.
Those relationships changed the way she thought about food -- so much so that a few years later came her second book, "Bitter Harvest," about where our food supply comes from and how political concerns often trump healthy diets.
Now Cooper knew she was getting somewhere. When the Ross School in East Hampton, New York, called offering her a position as executive chef of wellness and nutrition, she didn't exactly jump at the chance. But after giving it some thought, she realized it was a way to reach future generations and really leave a lasting impact. "All of a sudden, it felt like, wow, this is something I could really do, and I could really make a difference."
Today, Cooper is director of nutrition services in Berkeley, where she has transformed the school lunch program from 90 percent frozen reheated foods to 90 percent fresh. Berkeley schools used to serve fruit once a week; now it's on the menu every day, and so is the salad bar.
More than that, the healthy food curriculum is carried into the classroom. With a staff of 90 to help, Cooper runs cooking classes, gardening classes and serves food in 17 locations. She has created a "meal wheel" to help kids all over the country understand what should be on their plates daily. With her Web page, Lunch Lessons, Cooper is hoping to make her program a model. "There's only one of me. I can't cover the whole country," she says.
If she had one wish, Cooper says, it would be that "Oprah would take on this issue as a social justice issue and that we would get our presidential candidates to really start to talk about this issue, because I just can't imagine what's more important ... than the next generation. We're just really not taking care of them."
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