Don't Tell Us How To Feed Our Kids...

...Educate instead.

According to a story broke by the Carolina Journal, a preschool girl's homemade lunch was deemed nutritionally incomplete according to USDA standards and was supplemented with school-provided food.  Confusion ensued and the girl, supposedly thinking she was not allowed to eat the lunch packed by her mother, ate only the chicken fingers given to her by the school, choosing not to eat the other supplements because she didn't like them.

Here's the story, and a follow-up here.

(Have you read the stories?  Okay.  Good.  Let's move on)

My problem isn't just that schools are required to supplement homemade lunches that, upon inspection, are considered nutritionally incomplete - this in and of itself can cause confusion with young children regarding the food sent to school with them: what's wrong with the food my parents' made for me?  Should I still eat what I brought?  Will I get in trouble if I don't eat my lunch?  I don't like the school food! And my problem isn't just that there is evidently lots of room for error in interpreting the USDA regulation by whomever is inspecting these lunches.  

My problem is that there is a federal agency telling us what and how to feed our children, and has actually found a way to force schools to physically put this regulation into practice.  Now, while I appreciate that schools are required to provide a "balanced meal" to those children that need to buy their lunch from the school cafeteria, that should be the extent of it.  Lunches brought from home should be left alone.

This leads me to what I think is the bigger, more general problem: the government should stop trying to force everyone to eat healthier.  I say, if parents want to feed their kids crappy food - which is not the case in the preschool girl's story, as her mom packed her a healthy lunch - then let the parents do so.  Let them feed their kids food that may eventually lead to diabetes and/or obesity.  Then, let them deal with the consequences of their parenting.

(And before you start going, "Oh, but what about the kids?!", just keep reading)

I think education would have a much better long term effect than the government forcing their will upon the people by, for example, having schools supplement a child's lunch with food the parent doesn't even know their child will be eating.  When the government takes over the parenting responsibilities from the actual parents, the actual parents could possibly a) rebel by acting out, intentionally doing things that are opposite of what the government wants, negatively affecting their children, b) rebel by causing a ruckus, and that's when news stories break, c) become lazy due to additional, outside "parenting", d) not learn anything about improving their parenting skills.  Or none of these things could happen.  Those are just possibilities, and before anyone suggests that offering these theories is a sign of slippery slope on my part, I'll say that these theories, illogical or not, would probably not exist without the premise of government "parenting".

Now, let's talk about the kids.  When the government takes over the parenting responsibilities from the actual parents, the kids a) can get confused about what they're supposed to do, b) can get confused about their parents' actions, c) start questioning their parents' actions, d) they may not learning anything useful.

In the case of the preschooler, A and B did happen.

Since I don't really want to live in a place where government mandate leads to small-time fascist action, and I don't want to live in a place where I'm told what to do on a such a basic level - what to watch, what to listen to, what to read, what to eat, I support the notion of education being the manner in which we learn how to feed our kids.  The government can outline what they think are safe cooking temperatures, what amounts of what foods equals a balanced meal, and can even campaign against diabetes and obesity.  That's all great.  But good parents know their kids and will tailor their food preparation according to how their kids eat in order to get them to eat nutritiously.  Bad parents will not and, so long as their actions don't go so far as to be considered abuse-by-way-of-unhealthy-diet, those parents will have to suffer the consequences.  And yes, I understand that the kids will, too, but there's a way to combat that.  It's called education.

Parents should be the first food educator to their child.  After all, they will feed the child most often.  But since school is a place that children will attend throughout the week, and is a major part of their days, food education should most certainly take place in the classroom.

Is a young student, even in preschool, ever too young to learn about what could happen if they eat too much candy?  Too much McDonald's?  Too many potato chips?  If you eat too much sugar, one day you might rely on giant, scary needles everyday!  If you eat too much fatty foods, you might become so overweight you'll never get to play kickball or on the swings again!  Too many salty foods might stop your heart!  There are tactful, useful, and effective ways to teach young kids at school about food just as they are taught other subjects, and if they are continuously educated - and I'm not talking about a special health-day during a single school year, either - the facts will stick in their brains.  They may not be able to think about it on the level of an adult, but at least the possibility of questioning their snacks and meals at home is very, very present.  And if a kid actually requests to eat an apple at home rather than an Oscar Meyer's Lunchables pack, or drink a glass of juice instead of a soda, what is the likelihood of a parent saying no?  Forcing a kid to eat supplements that are supposedly missing from the homemade lunch they brought to school doesn't educate in this manner.  And lunch isn't necessarily the best time to deliver this lesson, despite the fact that lunch is feeding time.

There are a few different food education programs that exist to teach young school kids about food.  But what I want to see is something that isn't an event, something that doesn't have a clever or fancy title, something that doesn't draw attention to itself because it's special.  Because making basic food knowledge stand out makes the acquisition and practice of that knowledge special instead of normal.  But normal is what we want, right?  When kids - and adults - know that eating too much of one thing can be bad, that eating certain types of food more often than others can be good, that there are consequences to eating just like there are consequences to stealing and fighting with classmates, it has a greater chance of becoming part of their everyday set of useful tools, like math, English, and history.

An ongoing, in-class, food education curriculum that offers basic food knowledge and presents opportunities for kids to try different foods and even prepare different foods themselves will help normalize such knowledge.  If we can help begin to normalize this knowledge in today's youth, then the next generation should benefit from it.

Reading, Writing, and Using Recipes - Part 2: Grab a Pencil

This installment is extremely overdue, but I promise it'll get you thinking.

Last time, I talked about what a recipe is, and I concluded that it is primarily a guide, a set of assembly instructions.  I also concluded that recipes don't really teach the user how to cook, but one could use them as teaching supplemental material and rewriting a recipe can certainly help with this.

For those that already know how to cook and are looking to become more efficient when following a recipe, a rewrite can be a great boon.

Whatever the case, what rewriting a recipe does is help to ensure that you, the cook, know exactly what you're supposed to do, that you understand what to do with the ingredients both in the preparation stage and the cooking stage.

Rewriting does not mean simply copying the recipe verbatim, however.  While this might help you to memorize a recipe, it may not necessarily help you to understand how to execute a recipe.

Let's use a recipe for the Tunisian spice paste, harissa, as an example:

• 1 tbsp whole caraway seeds
• 2 tbsp whole coriander seeds
• 2 tsp whole cardamom seeds
• 1 tsp whole black peppercorns
• 2 oz small dried chiles, such as Chili de Arbol, Thai chilies, etc.
• 1 tbsp salt
• 1 oz garlic cloves, chopped
• 4-6 oz olive oil

Toast caraway, coriander, cardamom, peppercorns in saute pan over med. heat.  Allow them to cool, then grind together.  Toast the chiles over low heat, then add them to the spices and grind together.  Grind the salt and garlic into a paste using a mortar and pestle, add to the spice/chile mix, and grind together.  Drizzle in the oil while still grinding until thick paste is formed.

When I began rewriting recipes, I started by simply writing down the ingredients and then the instructions in my own shorthand.  

Toast caraway, coriander, cardamom, peppercorns in saute pan, med. heat.  Cool.  Grind together.  Toast the chiles, low heat.  Add to spices, grind together.  Grind salt and garlic into a paste, add to spice/chile mix, grind together.  Drizzle in the oil while still grinding until thick paste is formed.

By writing down the ingredients, you can become familiar with what ingredients you'll need to use and what you'll need to buy if you don't have them.  This means you'll also be less likely to forget ingredients while in the middle of cooking.

As for the instructional part, most everyone has seen recipes that have paragraphs written in nice, complete sentences that are, more or less, grammatically correct.  Sometimes there is more than one paragraph, and sometimes the paragraphs have several sentences.  And sometimes those sentences are long, as they often add details like what tools to use and about how long to cook something.

Now, there's nothing wrong with this.  Instructions of this ilk are pleasant to read and rather complete.  The point of these instructions is to let you, the cook, know what you'll be doing with what and when, so the more information the better, right?  But I have found that using these recipes during the actual act of cooking is difficult because finding the next step requires scanning these paragraphs to find where I've left off, meaning I had to quickly weed through what I'd already read.

By writing the recipe in your own shorthand, you can accomplish at least three things.  First, the act of writing will, again, allow you to become familiar with the instructions.  Second, by using your own shorthand, you show that you have an understanding of the original instructions.  Third, you increase the chances of more easily being able to find your place in the instructions while cooking.

All of this is very important because understanding what you're supposed to be doing in order to execute a specific dish will allow you an easier time during cooking.  An easier time during cooking means you'll more easily become familiar with some of the methods and techniques which you'll find used in many, many other recipes.

All of this is, of course, assuming that you, the one doing the rewrite, will be the one to use the recipe.  Your shorthand should reflect just how much detail you'll need to know.  If you know how to execute the risotto method, then there's no need to write out all of the steps to making a risotto if part of your recipe involves a risotto, right?  After all, it would be just more text to wade through.  The same goes for anything you already know how to do, and know how to do it well.  The less text you have to read during cooking, the better.

However, if you're writing for someone else, you may want to be more detailed in your rewrite.  Let's use the risotto example.  If you know how to execute the risotto method, you might write your instructions down for a mushroom risotto as follows:

Add butter and olive oil, med.-med.high heat.  Add mushrooms.  Saute until browned.  Remove half, add onions, sweat.  Add rice, stir to coat.  Risotto method.  After last turn, add remaining mushrooms.  Add salt and Parmesan to taste.

Now, this might be your version of a few different recipes that you've borrowed from in order to produce a mushroom risotto that you really like.  And your friend likes it, too, and wants the recipe.  He or she has never made a risotto before.  They may not know what a "turn" is.  They may not know what to look for during cooking.  So, as you write out the recipe for them, their lack of risotto experience is something to keep in mind, and thusly you give them instructions that perhaps read like this:

Bring chicken stock to a boil in a separate pot, then simmer.  In another pan, add olive oil and butter over med.-med.high heat until butter is melted but not brown.  Add mushrooms.  Saute until browned, tossing occasionally to prevent burning, but not too often to prevent searing.  Remove half, reduce to med. heat, add onions, sweat until translucent.  Add rice, stir to coat.  Add 1/3 of chicken stock, stirring frequently until absorbed.  Repeat with another 1/3 of stock.  Repeat, adding most of the last 1/3.  Check texture, making sure rice is al dente.  Add remaining mushrooms, stir in.  Add salt and Parmesan to taste.

That's a pretty basic example of how to construct a risotto, modified to include sauteed mushrooms.  An attempt was made to keep it simple and easy to understand while providing enough detail to give the inexperienced cook clues to look for so they can, hopefully, reproduce the dish.  Experience will hone the cook's skills but the recipe is a good starting point.

Knowing your audience, whether it's you or someone else, will determine how you write or rewrite your recipes.  Once you've determined how to write something, you can either leave it at that or you can take it one step further and play with the format of your recipe.

But that's a subject for next time.