Food Day!!

Today is Food Day!


I encourage you to stop by a local farmer's market or at a grocery store and visit the produce section and share with your children, co-workers, friends, and family members - "real food" to celebrate this very important day in history. It is advocated by one of my favorite people, Michael Pollan. You may know him through the documentary that came out a year or two ago called, Food Inc. The non profit organization that created this event is Center for Science in the Public Interest.

More information about this event is here: http://foodday.org/participate/.

I am personally into wellness so I do my best to stay abreast of the latest nutrition news like the My Plate and what ingredients to avoid. At my program where I service limited income children (ages 5-13), we did a craft over the summer focusing on My Plate and read info on the "5 a Day" campaign. I learned that most of my LINC Cares children do not eat any fruit or veggies at all during the course of one day. It is sad but I can be a ray of light in this realm and bring goodness to their eyes and tummies. Buying fruit is cost effective and don't be discouraged if children don't want to eat it, they will! It takes on average of 5 introductions of a food before children will try it. I provide a healthy snack daily. I choose foods free of artificial ingredients - colors and sugars and no hydrogenated oils. I serve fresh produce at least once a week. Since these children do not eat much produce, I won't offer a back up snack on days because I choose to not "give up" and I will encourage them to eat something healthy. Two of the children would not eat anything but oranges but now after 2 months of fresh fruit on Wednesdays, they will eat pineapple and plums.

Today we will be partaking in the Food Day event that I created called, "Fruit Kabobs" from a recipe I found online. I purchased the ingredients for this event for $7 to feed 10 children. I bought granola (no preservatives), apples, pineapples, bananas, lemon juice and a tub of blueberry yogurt (no artificial colors, preservatives or processed sugar like high fructose corn syrup). The granola can be used for more than this occasion. We probably will do kabobs again until we run out. I purchased 2 cups worth.

Here's the recipe on the kabobs: http://www.kinderart.com/kitchen/kabob.shtml

On average I spend $5 a week on produce for 10 people. I buy everything from Henry's (now called Sprouts). They have fantastic sales on Wednesdays. Call your local stores for more information.

If at any time down the road, you desire some help in the nutrition/wellness realm, I invite you to correspond with me. I'd love to share what I've learned and have done with the children at LINC cares and for my own family.