ENGL 111-A
Essay 5 – Persuasion
You Are What You Eat Did you know that there are twenty-one ingredients in that box of macaroni and cheese you are feeding your children? What is sodium tripolyphosphate? Can you pronounce it? Think about it, do you really know what you are feeding your children every day? Unfortunately, most of us do not. We all want to feed our families wholesome, nutritious meals, but in today’s busy world it seems almost impossible. Our grocery stores shelves are filled with food that is full of chemicals, pesticides, and refined sugars, but do not have much nutritional value. As a society we have got to start making smarter food choices. Obesity and diabetes have become an epidemic in this country due to the lack of proper nutrition. As working mothers, we have to get food on the table fast. Often, we have very little money to do it with so we buy what we can afford. This often means we end up feeding our family packaged and processed foods. Our children and our families are seeing the consequences of this in their health and weight. We need to stop thinking that it is too hard and too expensive to eat well, and get creative and persistent with teaching our children health eating habits while they are young. One half of school age children who are currently obese will still be obese when they become adults. (Serdula M. K.) Today, one out of every three Americans is considered to be obese. (mayoclinic.com) Obesity is quickly becoming a serious health problem leading to diabetes and heart disease. Poor nutrition is a big factor in this epidemic. Thirty percent of toddlers do not eat a single vegetable on any given day. (Gerber.com)This is a trend that we have got to stop. There is no better place to start than with our children. What we teach them now will stay with them for the rest of their lives. We have got to make eating healthy a fun, family experience. As parents we have got to start finding ways to get our children to eat healthier. We have to get creative and be willing to do the work. Getting our children to eat healthier when they are used to eating chicken nuggets and French fries is not easy, but it can be done. The number one thing we have to do is to be a good example for them. We have to practice what we preach. I would like for you to take a second and think about what you had for lunch yesterday. Why did you choose what you ate? Was it fast or easy to get? Was it the same thing you normally eat? Did it taste good? Was it a good price? Was it nutritious? When we stop to think about why we choose what we eat the answer is not always a good one. Nutrition is typically on the bottom of the list when we choose food for ourselves and our families.
Being the mother of a child with severe food allergies has led me to read every food label in my pantry. My daughter is allergic to milk, soy, and gluten (wheat, barley, and rye) so therefore, packaged foods are virtually out. At first, I was absolutely overwhelmed with thinking about how I was going to be able to feed my child. My daughter is only 16 months old and wants to eat what everyone else is having. I do not have the time to be a short order cook and make everyone a different meal, so I decided that my whole family was going to start eating healthier. I have also found that steaming some vegetables is not any harder or take any longer than cooking a TV dinner in the microwave. My oldest child balked at first, but eventually he saw that his sister was feeling better and so was he. This seemed to make it okay. We eat cantaloupe and watermelon sorbet instead of ice cream and everyone is happy. It is not always easy, but I am persistent and always willing to try new things. One way I get my children to enjoy healthy eating is to get them involved in the kitchen. Most children love to be in the kitchen helping. I often find that they are more willing to eat something if they had a part in putting it together. My kids help measure, wash produce, pour, stir, and I even let them use a plastic knife to help cut things up. No matter what age your child is there is usually at least one step in most meal preparation that they can help with. Meal preparation should not be made into a chore where you are stuck in the kitchen all by yourself being a slave to the stove. Get the family in there with you and make it a fun family event. The busy schedule of a family means that there is probably at least one night a week where there is just not enough time to cook. Between work and baseball practice we often just grab fast food on the run. This is naturally going to happen some times. As mothers, we can only do so much. The great thing is that most fast food restaurants are offering more and more healthy alternatives to cheeseburgers and fries. We have to let our kids know that these options are available. You might be surprised that your kids will go after the mandarin oranges or the apples instead of the fries. For the busy mom on the go, another great strategy is using your freezer. Most of our freezers are packed with frozen dinners that are full of sodium and too many calories. I personally make my own frozen meals, so I know what is in them. Whenever I have time to cook a casserole or other large meal I always make a double batch and freeze the extra. This makes for an extra quick meal on those nights when we are short on time.
Sometimes, getting our children to eat vegetables can be like taking them to the dentist. They do not want anything to do with something green on their plates. Did you know that there is actually a scientific reason for this? Children are born with over 10,000 taste buds and the average adult only has about 3,000. (factoidz.com). This means that, to a child, the flavor of vegetables and other foods will be much stronger than what an adult would taste. Over time they will lose a lot of their taste buds and will be able to eat stronger tasting foods, and will eventually be able to enjoy them as adults.
My favorite trick to get my kids to eat more vegetables is to hide them in everything that I cook. If you cut up the pieces small enough or use a cheese grater they are usually undetectable. I even have one cookbook, Deceptively Delicious by Jessica Seinfeld, which uses vegetable purees in all of the recipes. This is a great way to sneak extra vitamins and minerals into your child’s diet. They will never even know that chocolate chip cookie has broccoli in it or the brownies are full of carrots and spinach! Another strategy for eating well is to buy locally grown foods. No matter where you live there is usually a farmers market nearby. Farmers markets boast produce that is picked at the peak of freshness, so it is way more flavorful than anything you will find in a supermarket. Often times, the prices are very competitive and you can find anything from honey to zucchini. Another benefit of a farmers market is the amount of fossil fuels that are saved by not shipping produce across the country. This savings is often passed on to you, the consumer. Besides, going to a farmers market is a great excuse to get out of the house and get the kids some fresh air. This is a great Saturday morning outing. If you are really brave you could try growing your family’s favorite produce yourself. This does not require you to grow a huge garden in your backyard. I myself grow vegetables and herbs in containers on my back porch. This is my first year to try the upside down tomato plant and to my surprise I have tons of tomatoes growing. I have fresh tomatoes at my fingertips every day during the summer months. Digging in the dirt is so much fun for kids and seeds are relatively inexpensive. You will have to make an initial investment in supplies such as pots and watering cans, but you will be able to reuse them for years to come. There is nothing like watching your child check on their plants every day and learning how to care for them. It is great to see the excitement in their eyes the first time they get to pull a carrot out of the dirt, wash it off with a garden hose, and take that first bite. All kids love to snack. We have to have healthy snacks on hand to curb those cravings. Apples and bananas are great quick snacks that can be eaten anywhere. I usually spend an hour on Sunday cutting up fruit and putting it in containers for snacking during the week. For other types of snacks, such as pretzels or nuts, instead of letting them have the whole container I always portion them out into small snack size baggies. This keeps them from eating five portions when they are sitting in front of the TV. Come on, you know you’ve done it before. It is difficult to provide healthy food for your family when a head of broccoli costs more than a cheeseburger. Packaged and processed foods are typically cheaper than fresh produce. Why is this? Well, most packaged and processed foods contain soy and corn ingredients. Our government subsidizes corn and soy crops so that they can remain affordable to the American people and profitable to the American farmer. Only 1% of the corn grown in this country is grown for sweet corn (corn on the cob), the rest is field corn used for livestock feed and to be processed into ingredients, such as high-fructose corn syrup, corn oil, etc. It is much more expensive to grow broccoli, carrots, and other vegetables, so obviously they are going to cost you more to purchase at the store. This has become a huge obstacle for families to be able to afford healthy foods. It is hard for a mom to decide whether to buy the vegetables or the frozen pizza when she still needs to buy her children shoes and clothes. When you are on a very limited budget there are a lot of hard choices to make. We have to keep our children’s health an upmost priority. If you buy produce on sale, and when it is in season, it can be very cost effective. I personally believe that it is cheaper to buy the healthy food than to have to pay for medicine, because your child is not living a healthy lifestyle.
Our kids are not always at home, and we do not always know what they are eating at school or daycare. If we only see our kids for one meal a day we have to take this as our opportunity to feed them well. If we can get our kids eating better at least one meal a day we are doing our job and giving our children a great gift. There are many creative ways that we can get our kids to start eating better. We just have to stay positive and keep working at it. If one thing does not work, try something else. Don’t give up. They will grow up healthy and have the tools to make their own decisions on what to eat. All that hard work will have been worth it.

Bibliography factoidz.com. 12 July 2010 <http://factoidz.com/biological-reasons-for-why-children-hate-vegetables/>.
Gerber.com. <July>. mayoclinic.com. 12 July 2010 <www.mayoclinic.com/obesity>.
Serdula M. K., Ivery D., Coates R. J., Freedman D. S., Williamson D. F. and Byers T. "Do Obese Children Become Obese Adults?" Preventitive Medicine March 1993: 167-177.