Why some kids in England ate at school but not at home

Nov 12, 2010 by

Why some kids in England ate at school but not at home

An English mom, Donna Lovett of Norwich, recently started her “fussy” son, Connor, on school lunches, sure that he wouldn’t eat a thing. She was surprised to see that he loved the school food. He even got into fish and vegetables, she noted. It’s opened the way to serving foods at home she didn’t think were “possible” before.

A recent report from The Food Trust in England has revealed that four out of five kids who ate school lunches there started trying new foods at school that they would never have eaten at home. Half of those children also asked their parents to make some of the dishes that they’d tried at school.

This study came out to encourage parents to have their kids eat at the school cafeteria, following an earlier study that revealed that many parents were packing unhealthy lunches for their children, “because they worry that they…

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More Dinner Table Lessons from Jamie Oliver’s ‘Food Revolution’

May 6, 2010 by

Behind the times as usual, I finally watched Jamie Oliver’s Food Revolution—all six episodes at once. We can draw out some meaty lessons for parents who want to change their way their kids eat from Oliver’s strategies to change the way America eats, one school at a time and one town at a time.

Oliver’s first attempt at getting elementary school kids eating healthier was the addition of a healthy meal with real chicken (something unfamiliar) alongside the school’s regular fare: pizza. When given the choice, between the new, healthy meal or their usual pizza, of course the kids chose pizza.

As Oliver also found out, if you offer pink milk or chocolate milk alongside plain milk, the girls take the pink and the boys take the chocolate. Nothing terribly shocking there so far. However, he discovered if you boldly, ruthlessly take away the flavored, sugary milk options altogether, the kids…

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Dinner Table Lessons from Jamie Oliver’s Food Revolution

Apr 30, 2010 by

“Have you seen Jamie Oliver’s Food Revolution?” the moms I coach in getting their kids to eat have been asking me. I finally pulled it up on the web and watched every episode all at once this week.

If I were in Oliver’s place, there are a couple of things I would have done differently (and many not as well), but I admire what he’s done. The more this kind of thing is broadcast, the better, I figure. Oliver encourages us to provide kids with better food. He appeals to our emotions about its importance, and shows us how it’s possible and enjoyable to cook and eat better food. We also see kids perfectly able to enjoy real, from-scratch food.

One of the best moments of the show for us parents to see is when Oliver demonstrates the…

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