No More Childish Games

Dun dun dun dun dundundundun dun dun dun dun daaa daaa. Too bad I don’t have an audio feature on this thing because you’d know this exact tune. It’s what streamed through my head as I intensely watched my toaster today. Nothing’s scarier than zoning out in your kitchen, yet to have fulfilled the morning caffeine ritual, only to be jolted to life by the jack-in-the-box-toaster-popping situation. Am I alone here?

It got me thinking about everything from easy bake ovens to kids’ nutrition. As a little girl my parents bought me toys such as baby dolls and Fischer Price Kitchen Sets. It was a teaching method I suppose. It’s like the child version of the mandated high school class called Consumer Education. I was in love with the kitchen set. 

As I got older, unbeknown to my mother, I dragged strainers and pans out to our backyard sandbox to host my very own fabulous cooking show to the imaginary audience. (I wish the [applause] audio was working for me back then...too) 

And a little older, I started helping my mom peel potatoes and make banana bread. AKA licking the beaters.

I distinctly remember the day when my best friend’s mom walked into her house only to witness two 4^th graders making pancakes in her kitchen, unsupervised. I had no idea what the “F” word was before that day. And I didn’t understand the need for that word. I mean, what’s so wrong with using the stove unattended. Clearly, I felt like it was commonplace.

The presence of food developed into my interest in food. My Interest in food developed into my awareness of nutrition- instilled by the mere presence of food and food preparation. During my nutrition educations, I was amazed to discover that 4^th graders in inner-city St. Louis schools believed food came from McDonalds or the grocery store. They had no concept of tomato plants or licking beaters, for that matter. 

I am, of course, pro females in the work place. Clearly. But I am also pro-getting back to basics. With women in the workforce begins a new era of convenience foods and with convenience foods comes diabetes and heart disease. Many concerned moms (and dads!) do express difficulty feeding their children home cooked meals. The answer is presence. Forcing a child to eat vegetables is threatening. The child will resist. However, placing healthy foods on the table or on the child’s plate without forcing them to eat these foods promotes presence = awareness. Eventually, after enough encounters, the child will try the food. 

Parents often hide healthy foods in unhealthy foods to “trick” their children into adequate nutrition. Although this is good for nutrition, it confirms the child’s belief that “healthy foods are icky foods." These blank slates are not afraid of the vegetables until you reward them with candy and hide cauliflower in their mashed potatoes. Exposure is key.

Junk food ads are like the manufacturers and marketers way of dietary exposure. The U.N. health agency plans to discuss clamping down on junk food marketing to children when they meet in New York in September. Maybe it was my upbringing or maybe it was my upbringing in Chicago, where Jack-and-the-Boxes are nonexistent, but when I’m scared of the toaster pop I don’t think of the fast food chain. Just the terrifying toy-and that, my friends, is why I stuck with the Fischer Price Kitchen Set.