sprinklefingers

As I’ve mentioned, I’m developing the school lunch program for my kid’s elementary school. At first I thought waking up an hour earlier and going to sleep an hour later (in order to carve time out to work on the project) wouldn’t be a big deal. I’m writing to you now, clutching a cup of strong coffee, to tell you I was wrong. So wrong.

The first thing to slip was the waking up an hour earlier. As it is, I get up at about 4:45am each day. What kind of crazy person am I to think that I could go to bed at 11pm, wake up at 3:45am, squeeze in some exercise and THEN have something sensible (and school food related) come out of my brain? I can’t even think of the words to describe how crazy that is. Other than the word crazy, of course.

But all of this extra work has been really great for me creatively. Having more to do forces me use my time more efficiently. While writing the school food plan I also designed the bakery’s summer menu, developed five new flavors of ice cream (one involves smoked sugar and I love it so much I fear a near narcotic-like addiction coming on,) my French has improved by leaps and bounds AND I’ve had time to read Jonah Lehrer’s Imagine. So, I’m feeling pretty good.

But, really, what’s kept me going is how excited I am to get the school food plan up and running. Right now the detailed plan is with the school board waiting for approval. I’ve asked for a few things that I know will be difficult.

For example, recess before lunch. A great deal of research has been done to support the notion that kids who have had recess before lunch are more focused and deliberate when it comes to eating. This sounds great - until you factor in the fact that scheduling a school day isn’t a piece of cake and flipping recess for lunch for all students could be nearly impossible. But even with those odds I still asked for it. Fingers crossed.

Read up on recess before lunch for yourself here. And here. And here. 

Yes, I’ll keep you posted on this school food adventure. Not to worry…

A must read!
From Mark Bittman’s New York Times blog…

[click on the text to visit the post online.]

Of the two edges of the sword of America’s malnutrition — hunger and obesity — the latter is by far the more prevalent and deadly. In New York City perhaps 2 percent of children have “very low food security,” which might mean vitamin deficiencies, a day without food, a loss of weight, a month of being hungry[2]. Meanwhile, 40 percent of New York’s public school students are overweight or obese, and 2,000 New Yorkers die each year from obesity or overweight-related conditions. All of those deaths are preventable.

No one should belittle even a little hunger, but this why-do-we-even-have-to-talk-about-it comparison of it and obesity is germane because the city’s Health Department recently suspended expansion of the Breakfast in the Classroom (BIC) program, which serves free breakfast in the classrooms of 381 of 1,750 public schools. The program is ostensibly meant to ensure that hungry kids start the day with something to eat.

But the school system already offers every kid, all 1.1 million of them, regardless of income, the opportunity to have free breakfast in the school cafeteria. BIC simply puts that breakfast on every kid’s desk.

The Health Department reined in BIC after finding that roughly 20 percent of all kids might be eating two breakfasts: one before arriving at school and another at their desks, adding on average about 90 unneeded calories to their daily intake. Linda Gibbs, deputy mayor for Health and Human Services, explained that the city wants to make “sure that that no child goes hungry and that every child has access to a healthy breakfast,” but at the same time “wants to be cautious that our good intentions don’t inadvertently exacerbate the obesity issue,” noting the 40 percent figure cited above.

From yesterday’s New York Times:

As obesity rates in children have climbed, so has the incidence of Type 2 diabetes, and a new study adds another worry: the disease progresses more rapidly in children than in adults and is harder to treat…

…Type 2 is thought to be brought on by obesity and inactivity in people who have a genetic predisposition to develop the disease when they gain weight. And they may also have an inborn tendency to put on weight. The pancreas still makes insulin, though not enough, and the body does not use insulin properly — a condition called insulin resistance. High blood pressure and cholesterol often come with the disease. Initial treatments include dietary changes, exercise and oral medicines, but many people eventually need insulin…

…poorly controlled diabetes significantly increases the risk of heart disease, eye problems, nerve damage, amputations and kidney failure. The longer a person has the disease, the greater the risk. So in theory, people who develop diabetes as children may suffer its complications much earlier in life than previous generations who became diabetic as adults.

Deep breath.

That’s awful news. Just awful. Here’s to feeding kids right. Right?

My (hilarious, loving, amazing, quirky, faux French-speaking) kid will be entering kindergarten in the fall. In a stroke of luck (or an act of God, depending upon your point of view,) he lotteried in to a brand new (!) French immersion public charter school here in Portland. 

I told you about it before - and also mentioned that I’d be helping to formulate the school food program. And now, a few weeks later, I’m heading up the entire school food committee. Whoa.

I don’t usually enter in to anything half-assed, and this school food thing is no exception. So I’ve turned to my library of books concerning feeding children and I’m feeling quite inspired. 

The most recent book I’ve read on the subject is French Kids Eat Everything by Karen Le Billion. While it doesn’t exactly apply to formulating a school food program for an American school, it did make a few points that have really stuck with me. The first? French kids don’t eat between meals. Think of the mountains of junk food this eliminates: “granola” bars filled with tablespoons of sugar, goldfish crackers, yogurt in a tube, processed cheese in a plastic tray.

The second point: at French schools the children are only offered water to drink. In fact, vending machines are completely, flat-out banned at all French schools. 

The third point (and this has become a mantra for me): Le Billion suggests saying the following phrase to your kids, you don’t have to like it, but you do have to taste it. This has worked wonders for me. With this simple (and somewhat magical) phrase, I’ve got my kid eating bowls of broccoli and piles of lettuce. He tries a bite knowing it’s just a taste - then he realizes he likes it. It literally works like a charm. 

French Kids Eat Everything basically explains that the idea that you have to feed kids kid food is completely false. Agreed.

And now I’m reading Lunch Wars - a not-so-light hearted look at school food. After reading the first chapter which covered GMO’s and food additives I thought I might cry my eyes out. I avoid any processed food containing ingredients I don’t recognize as real food, so I’ve never really looked at lists of ingredient names and exactly what they are doing to our kids. Reading up on it really opened my eyes and the information gained scares the you-know-what out of me. 

The best piece of information I’ve gained so far - especially where my own food shopping is involved - is how to read PLU labels on produce. I had NO IDEA that you can tell if something has been genetically modified by it’s PLU number. Take a look:

• Organic produce has a 5 digit PLU number that begins with the number 9.
• Conventional produce has a 4 digit PLU number that begins with the number 4.
• Genetically modified (GMO) produce has a 5 digit PLU number that begins with the number 8.

I find this information so useful that I took a snapshot of it on my cell phone and saved it to my home screen. Now while shopping, if I need a refresher, I can pull up the information in an instant.

I know I’ve only scratched the surface of school food - but I’m happy to have you readers along for the journey. And if anyone out there has something they’d like to add to the conversation, I’d be happy to hear it! Got something to say about school food?

lately i’ve been spending some time meeting with purveyors of delicious foods. part of the fun of creating a new menu for work is that i have been able to explore various tasty treats - with the hopes of using them to concoct new baked goods. one of my favorite test foods of late? smoked cheese. 

now, don’t get me wrong, we eat a lot of smoked cheese at home - i love it with grits and a poached egg - but there’s something different about someone just showing up at your workplace with an enormous slab of mozzarella that they have custom-smoked for you. i honestly never knew that working with someone who owns a smokehouse could be so delicious. 

now, more details on my smokehouse relationship are coming soon (and really, the question is at this point: what CAN’T go in the smokehouse?) - but for the moment, i have a recipe to share:

whole wheat noodles with roasted vegetable sauce and smoked mozzarella

you can get your own smoked mozzarella at any good specialty foods store. can’t find it? mozzarella that hasn’t been smoked will make a fine substitute. 

you need:

• 4 medium squash - perhaps 2 zucchini and 2 yellow squash, cut into chunky half moons
• 2 pints of cherry (or other small variety) tomatoes, left whole
• 2 large cloves garlic, smashed and peeled
• salt 
• pepper
• italian seasoning or other dried herbs
• olive oil
• balsamic vinegar
• 12 oz whole wheat spaghetti noodles
• reserved pasta cooking water
• 8 oz smoked mozzarella, grated or shaved
• good handful parmesean-reggiano cheese, freshly grated

make the sauce:

1. preheat the oven to 425.
2. combine the squash, tomatoes, garlic, a hefty pinch of salt & pepper, a dash or two of dried herbs and a few good glugs of olive oil in a bowl. swish around to completely coat the vegetables in the olive oil. 
3. turn the vegetables out onto a sheet tray and slide into the oven. roast for 20-25 minutes or until the tomatoes have burst, everything is soft and the liquids from the vegetables are starting to make their own ‘sauce.’
4. meanwhile, cook the noodles in salted water. follow the package instructions, but before draining the noodles, reserve about 1 cup of the water. 
5. add the drained noodles back to the pot you cooked them in. to the noodles add the roasted vegetables and whatever ‘sauce’ they’ve created, a glug or two more of olive oil, and a few splashes of balsamic vinegar. stir
6. next, add the cheeses to the pot with the noodles and vegetables. splash in about 1/4 cup of the pasta water and stir. if the cheeses and vegetables still look a bit thick, stir in a bit more of the pasta water until it is a bit thinner.
7. taste your pasta - add salt & pepper or a bit more vinegar if you wish.
8. to serve: place a mound of noodles in a dish and top with the roasted vegetables that you fish out of the mixture. the noodles will be coated with the ‘sauce’ you’ve created out of the roasted vegetables and the melty cheeses combined with the pasta water. top each mound of pasta with shaved parm or shaved smoked mozzarella. i also like mine with another good splash of balsamic, but that’s just me. 

here’s to people who do awesome things with food!

it seems like time is just slipping through my fingertips these days. i get to work and it’s already time to leave. i spend precious minutes commuting. i get home with 30 minutes to get dinner on the table. it’s like a game that’s not very fun and is neverending. sigh.

because of my lack of time i’ve been trying to figure out ways to cook meals faster with less dishes to wash (because if there are fewer dishes i can get to the laundry faster. and if i get to the laundry faster i can get to my bed faster.)

so far, this is my favorite:

tofu & vegetables with noodles and peanut sauce
serves 4

you need:

• 15 oz firm tofu
• seasonings for tofu: salt, pepper, curry powder - anything you like
• canola oil for drizzling
• fresh green beans, enough for 4 people, trimmed
• 2 zucchini - cut into half moons
• 1 bunch green onions - white parts and 1” green parts thinly sliced
• 2 carrots

• 1 lb whole wheat spaghetti

• peanut sauce
• lime

make dinner:

1. preheat oven to 425.
2. on one large sheet tray place the trimmed green beans, the zucchini half moons and the sliced green onions. sprinkle with salt and pepper and drizzle with canola oil. give them a quick mix with your hands and then scoot them to one side of the sheet tray.
3. on the other side of the sheet tray place a small cooling rack.
4. next, cut the tofu into manageable cubes then place the cubes in a bowl. season how you’d like then drizzle with oil. mix with your hands then place the cubes of seasoned tofu on the cooling rack you’ve placed on the sheet tray.
5. slide the entire tray into the oven and let roast 18 minutes or so - stirring the bean mixture often and watching so that nothing is burning.
6. while the beans & tofu are cooking, shred your carrots: using a vegetable peeler, start at the top of the carrot and pull the peeler all the way down - creating a carrot ribbon. set your carrot ribbons aside.
7. prepare your peanut sauce. i always advocate homemade peanut sauce over bottled - it’s going to be way more delicious - but i understand if you just had to grab a bottle to make things easier on yourself. (although if you make the sauce ahead and store it in your fridge you’ll always have delicious peanut sauce on hand!)
8. boil your spaghetti noodles to your desired doneness. when they’ve finished cooking, reserve a few tablespoons of cooking water and then drain the noodles. mix the drained noodles with the pasta water and a bit of peanut sauce. set aside.
9. when the vegetables and tofu have finished cooking (the tofu will be slightly dry and the vegetables will have some browning in places,) remove the veggies from the sheet tray and put them in a mixing bowl. add the carrots and stir gently. leave the tofu where it is until you’re assembling your dishes.
10. to serve: mound some noodles in a bowl, top with the vegetable mixture and a few pieces of tofu. drizzle peanut sauce all over the top and squeeze on a bit of lime juice.

my kid and my husband ate this. without me forcing them. honest.

The received wisdom is that the middle classes eat well and can cook. Poorer people are more likely to be overweight and live on ready meals. But is it really true?

a fascinating look from the guardian at how four families living in the same neighborhood shop for and prepare (or not) food.

Food for children – young children at least – is generally uncorrupted by notions of class. They do not look at a friend’s lunchbox and see that the chocolate bar and salty crisps could mean more than the food itself. They just think their friend is lucky to be given such treats. Food to a child is simple and if you’re lucky, it turns into a simple – and healthy – pleasure. When I think about the four families, there is one trait which is the same in each. In every family, there was at least one child who wanted to be allowed to cook regularly. For Ralf and Jessamy, it was 10-year-old Jonah. For Nichola, it was Lenise, 11. For Spenta, her son Yazard, 11, and for Reggie and Andrew, 11-year-old Megan. In every case, the parents were willing in spirit, but all expressed the sensation of a sinking heart at the idea of a chaotic kitchen that needed to be cleared up afterwards. Can it be a coincidence that all these children are around the same age? Could it be true, as Sheila Dillon told me, that our national wellbeing ultimately lies in educating and encouraging the children, rather than berating their parents? Hold on to that thought as your child spreads flour over your kitchen floor. I know I am going to.

i cannot wait until it’s my turn to bring the preschool snack. cannot wait. cannot wait!

thanks to my little friend ebay, i’m now in possession of these:



this is going to be so much (delicious) fun!
how do i know?
it says right on the package that these cookie cutters will transform my kitchen into a 3-ring circus. i can only imagine what they’ll do for preschool snack time!