Four dyes, many colors

We’re moving soon after Easter, so I haven’t exactly been looking forward to making from-scratch egg dyes this year. It’s not hard. It’s not even time-consuming. But when your house is turned upside down and you’re purging most of what you own, well, who needs one more thing to do, you know? So you’ll understand my recent impulse purchase: a natural egg-dyes kit from the Natural Candy Store (where the resident Easter bunny also shops). I haven’t gotten it yet, but, when I do, I’ll report back on how it works.

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*If you don’t have four pots, use a teapot to boil the water for the chlorophyll capsules. That one doesn’t need to simmer, so you can easily pour out two cups of water and mix the green in a separate bowl.

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I’ve posted versions of this piece each year at about this time. But maple sugaring season is so awesome it deserves a repeat.

Maple sugaring, 19th century style

Fake maple syrup bums me out. And not only because it rarely contains real maple. (Most brands are a mix of high-fructose corn syrup, preservatives and artificial flavors.) It’s because maple syrup is perfect just as it is. Naturally sweet, it also retains trace vitamins and minerals, even antioxidants. It’s still sugar, so let’s not go crazy. But for pancakes or baking, or topping oatmeal or yogurt, there’s no equal.

Great lore, too: Legend has it that a Native American woman brewed up the first batch accidentally. Her husband, heading off to hunt one morning, yanked his tomahawk from the tree where he’d thrown it the night before. Sap ran from the cut and into a container at the base of the tree. The woman found the liquid, thought it was water, cooked in it and got a sweet surprise.

Over time the inevitable happened, and someone got the bright idea to make an imitation of the real thing. Real syrup’s high cost and limited availability no doubt influenced the shift, and early fake versions did contain a decent amount of actual maple. But, really, messing with maple syrup is just plain wrong.

I let my daughter taste the imposter in a restaurant once, because I wanted her to understand the difference, and thankfully she wrinkled her nose and went for the good stuff. (Food nerd alert: Yes, I bring my own maple syrup if we’re going out for breakfast. It’s just what I do.)

But even kids who haven’t grown up with real maple syrup can learn to appreciate it. And one way I guarantee you’ll get their interest is at a maple sugaring event.

Sap on tap

We’re fortunate in western New York to have Genesee Country Village & Museum, a living-history museum that also has a nature center. (And terrific summer camps.) So we get syrup with a side of history.

But you can find maple events throughout northeast North America. And now is the time — New York’s Maple Weekends are March 17-18 and 24-25, and most other states and provinces wrap up by late March, too. If you live elsewhere, but your region has maple trees and cooperative weather, ask around. You’ll likely be able to find maple events near you.  

Tools of the trade

But the best part is the sugaring camp set up to show how early settlers collected, transported and cooked down the sap — techniques that haven’t changed a whole lot in the last few centuries. The equipment is better, operations are bigger, but the end result is pretty much the same. So the girls get a small-scale, up-close view of sap boiled down to syrup, boiled further still to maple cream, and further still to maple sugar. Forty gallons of sap to make one gallon of syrup. No wonder real maple syrup is expensive. But so worth it.

Spoonfed is now on Facebook. You’ll find links to blog posts, news and commentary on raising food-literate kids, questions and comments from readers, voices, viewpoints, the works. Stop by, like the page, chime in, spread the word. (Thanks.)

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We have a living-history museum nearby. One of those places with relocated old buildings and re-enactors who take you right back to the 19th century. During one visit, I was in the kitchen of a home churning butter with my daughter and chatting with another visitor, telling her we’d seen a pig-slaughtering pen being built at the village’s teaching farm. The museum, which used to sell its pigs every winter, had decided instead to start butchering them on-site.

I mentioned how, initially, I’d blanched at the idea of a killing pen, imagining a hand-to-hoof struggle and log walls awash in blood. But then the farm interpreter explained the process: how the pen lets individual pigs get comfortable in a small space and lets handlers control the pig’s diet in its final days, until a farmer goes in and quickly kills the pig.

As a vegetarian, I still found the process unsettling, but I could appreciate that it was humane, and that it had its place in teaching about 19th century agriculture. And that’s what I told the woman next to me at the butter churn.

At this point, the interpreter in the kitchen jumped in, telling me that people in the 19th century didn’t have the “luxury” of being vegetarian, and that she regularly has to explain to school groups that early Americans didn’t have the choices we have today. “Kids come through and they say, ‘You shouldn’t eat meat. It’s mean to the animals,’ ” she said. “I tell them, ‘Well, they had to eat animals or their kids would starve.’ ”

Yes, that’s true, I told her, but there’s also a big difference between how early Americans raised (or hunted) and killed their animals, and how most animals are slaughtered today. Perhaps she could mention that from now on as well?

“Oh no,” she said, “you can’t tell that to a kid.”

Hmmm.

We explain it to our vegetarian 8-year-old, and have for years. Surely someone can explain it to an omnivorous 6th grader. Many of these kids watch violent movies. They play violent video games. They engage in mock battle. They know where meat comes from. So tell me again: Why can’t they handle the truth about how most animals are killed for food?

In an era where kids are inundated with factory-farming propaganda from powerful groups like the dairy industry in schools and agribusiness lobbies at state fairs, our best defense is education. If we want to raise food-literate children, if we want them to think critically, to challenge the status quo — to make good choices when we can’t choose for them — we have a responsibility to tell the truth so others don’t co-opt them with fiction.

And how do we do that? For starters, by exposing kids to the kinds of farms and conditions we want to support. Take them to local sustainable farms and involve them in conversations with farmers at local markets. Show them where your meat, milk and eggs come from. Then keep talking. Since Tess was tiny, we’ve talked about the “happy cows” and “happy chickens” that provide our local milk and eggs. The “happy” thing seems trite, I know (really, how do we know they’re happy?), but it’s an effective shorthand for explaining that we get our food from animals who live outside and eat what they’re meant to eat (i.e., grass and bugs).

Of course this works pretty well with milk and eggs. Meat is trickier (since, um, the happiness ends), but even then I think kids are able to appreciate the difference between an animal that lived a good life and was killed humanely, and one that wasn’t. When I wrote about this topic previously, a reader told how she teaches her young son where meat comes from: “I make sure my son knows what animal he’s eating every time I serve meat. (I think, if you do eat meat, serving it on the bone goes a long ways towards bringing home the idea that you’re eating an animal as well.) … We’re teaching them compassion as well as food literacy.”

Picture books can be surprising allies. Some, like Ruby Roth’s “That’s Why We Don’t Eat Animals,” address the issue directly. Roth advocates for vegetarianism (and, I think, does so without judgment), but the book’s strength is how it presents factory farming in an age-appropriate way. Even omnivorous kids get a takeaway.

Then there are books where agriculture themes are secondary, but still effective. One example: In “Louise, the Adventures of a Chicken,” by Kate DiCamillo and Harry Bliss, Louise leaves her farm for adventures abroad. At one point she’s captured and held in a cage with other chickens. She goes all Norma Rae and they break free with a rally cry: “Chickens do not belong in cages. Chickens must roam free.” To this day, it’s a favorite refrain in our house.

And for older kids? Resources abound:

“My Friends at the Farm,” a video from Farm Sanctuary, is billed as the first video “to introduce the realities of factory farming to children as young as 8 years old in an age-appropriate way.” I haven’t seen it yet, but I’ll be getting a copy soon.

Michael Pollan has a young readers edition of “The Omnivore’s Dilemma.” (Click here for an excellent review from then 13-year-old Orren Fox.) And Eric Schlosser has a kids’ version of “Fast Food Nation” called “Chew on This.”

The groundbreaking movie Food Inc. (which I reviewed here) is generally recommended for teens and older, but I know people who’ve shown it to kids as young as 6. Even if your kids are pretty ag savvy, I think it’s a little wonky for that age, and we still haven’t shown it to Tess (though it’s just a matter of time). But only you know whether it’s right for your family. For help deciding, check out these  kid-centric reviews from Common Sense Media and Parent Previews. For high school students, there’s a companion discussion guide from the Center for Ecoliteracy.

In 2010, then 11-year-old Birke Baehr generated epic buzz with this 5-minute TEDx talk, in which he dissects everything that’s wrong with our food system, including factory farming.

“The Meatrix Trilogy” cartoons borrow from “The Matrix” to take on factory-farmed meat, eggs and dairy, and the fast-food industry. It’s animation with some serious ammunition. The Meatrix Interactive 360 is a companion graphic that lets kids roll over images and click for details. The site also includes presentation kits, handouts and other resources for learning more.

Then there’s the now-infamous Chipotle video. When it aired during the Grammys two weeks ago, I loved its back-to-basics farming message. But I questioned (on Spoonfed’s Facebook page) whether the chain should be so self-congratulatory when it’s selectively sustainable. Readers helped me see the bigger picture (thanks, guys), and indeed the commercial has sparked a lot of discussion about factory farming. And that’s a good thing. It’s also entirely kid-friendly. So here you go:

What do you think? How much should we tell children about the dicier side of the food chain? What kinds of conversations have you had with your kids? Any other resources to share?

This post, inspired by another piece I wrote two years ago, is part of Occupy Our Food Supply, a global day of action (today) where advocates on the ground and online are rallying to raise awareness of how industrial agribusiness has co-opted our food system. I’m a twitter abstainer (for now), but if you’re inclined to tweet this post (and thanks if you do), the event’s hashtags are: #F27 and #occupyourfoodsupply.

Spoonfed is on Facebook. You’ll find links to blog posts, news and commentary on raising food-literate kids, questions and comments from readers, voices, viewpoints, the works. Stop by, like the page, chime in, spread the word. (Thanks.)

 This post is linked into Fight Back Fridays.

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It’s been nuts in my house since late summer. That’s when my husband and I decided to act on our long-nagging desire to shake things up by paring things down. Things, literally, as in possessions. (It’s been non-stop Craigslisting, Freecycling and donating around here.) But also things in the greater cosmic sense: stress, expenses, responsibilities.

We’re trading our big old house for a loft in a former warehouse downtown. My husband just started a new job close to the new place. We’re ditching the second car. More being. Less doing. That’s the idea, anyway.

We have several months yet until we move, and plenty more to do. So when Tess wanted an ice-skating party for her 8th birthday, it was a huge relief. We’ve run the gamut on parties — from small home celebrations to a “Little House”-themed bash in a log cabin — but this year, the simpler, the better.

So we rented our city’s outdoor rink. Everyone brought their families. And we celebrated our Winter Solstice girl on a clear, gorgeous late December day. No gifts, no favors, no elaborate party fare. (And I’ve been known to put the “labor” in “elaborate.”) We collected donations for the city’s animal shelter. I made snowflake gingerbread cookies (on sticks! using a variation on this recipe). We had clementines and water and hot cocoa. And everyone had all kinds of fun.

Hot cocoa story: We ordered from our local grocer. They make it on-site, then pour it into those nifty to-go boxes with spouts, the ones that stay hot for a few hours. And because I asked (and paid a few extra bucks), they were happy to sub local organic milk for the milk they usually use. Some people see that as fussy. I see it as simple. Asked. Accepted. Who ever said this stuff has to be stressful? (It doesn’t.) 

On that same note: Before she settled on ice skating, Tess lobbied for a party at a local indoor play center. And so I called and had one of those conversations I often have. Me: “We’d like to bring our own food, please.” Play center staffer: “Do you have a concern about allergies?” Me: “No, we just don’t eat the kind of food you serve.” Staffer: “Outside food is against our policy (followed by an explanation that blamed a non-existent state law).”

Well, that led to a phone call with the owner, and wouldn’t you know it? Easy-peasy. After I explained that we don’t eat the highly processed junk they typically serve (OK, not in those exact words), he offered to get whatever food we wanted and prepare it in their kitchen. I was all set to order fruit and veggie trays when Tess changed her mind. But I like knowing that’s an option for the future.

BTW, all this rightsizing and rethinking is why it’s been so quiet on Spoonfed the last several months. But that’s not part of the simplification. Quite the opposite. I’m hoping these changes free up even more time for blogging and the thinky pieces I like so much. In the meantime, I’ll try to keep things lively over on Facebook (where I get my micro-blogging fix). And look for a new post next month that will help get Spoonfed back on track.

Happy 2012, all.

Spoonfed is on Facebook. You’ll find links to blog posts, news and commentary on raising food-literate kids, questions and comments from readers, voices, viewpoints, the works. Stop by, like the page, chime in, spread the word. (Thanks.)

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This week at school, my daughter’s class celebrated Thanksgiving with a simple feast: harvest veggie soup, cornbread, pumpkin bread, homemade butter. They’ve been studying flight this fall, so before the kids sat down to eat, they marched through the school with handmade balloon creatures, proudly staging their own version of the Macy’s parade.

As I watched these little people so high on their own awesomeness, I realized yet again why I write this blog and why I’m that pain-in-the-ass class mom who directs traffic every time there’s a food event. It’s because we — parents, teachers, caregivers, kid-lovers — have an obligation to those growing bodies and brains. Food is fundamental. It’s life itself. And now — right now, before they’re jaded in palate and spirit — is when our kids are ready to hear what we have to say, able to learn what we have to teach.

I’m thankful for my daughter and how she’s inspired me to think about food beyond our family. And I’m thankful for every other child in this crazy world, grateful for their innocence and joyfulness, and hopeful that we — the grown-ups — will do right by them.

Happy Thanksgiving, all.    

With donation season here, I’d like to point you to a post from last year about donations to food banks: Would you feed your own kid the same food you donate to food pantries? Aside from asking that loaded question, the piece advocates for giving cash instead of food. And there’s a link to a group that tracks which food pantries can accept fresh produce. The reader comments on this piece are exceptionally thoughtful and insightful.

Spoonfed is on Facebook. You’ll find links to blog posts, news and commentary on raising food-literate kids, questions and comments from readers, voices, viewpoints, the works. Stop by, like the page, chime in, spread the word. (Thanks.)

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A certainty.
Like death and taxes.

Girl Scout cookie season starts early where I live. No sooner had school begun than it was time to prep legions of little girls to peddle cookies with ingredients that no kid should be eating, much less selling. (And just in time for Halloween, too. Yay.) Your council might not start until January or later, but that means there’s still time to rethink the cookies (whether you’re buying or selling). I covered the topic at length (exhaustively?) last season, so rather than repeat myself, I’ll recap below.

I feel the same way now that I did then:  I am not anti-Girl Scouts. I am not anti-cookie. I don’t want to deprive kids of their childhoods. But I am against inferior ingredients. And hypocritical organizations. And practices that force children to sell unhealthful products under the guise of “opportunity” and “tradition.”

And I’m not alone. Last season’s posts generated wide-ranging discussions (here and on Fooducate, which reprinted the first post), with thoughtful insights from Girl Scout supporters, parents and troop leaders, many of whom think it’s time to improve the cookies or find new fundraisers altogether.

It’s good news that the Girl Scouts of the USA is finally addressing concerns about palm oil — a troubling ingredient because its production destroys rainforests and wildlife. And it’s great news that two tenacious Girl Scouts guilted the organization into it. Yet I’m not convinced the announcement is all that significant. “Sustainable” palm oil is questionable, and “pledges” aren’t concrete, so it’s hard to know whether this is anything more than greenwashing. 

But even if it’s legit, even if the Girl Scouts’ pledge leads to reducing or even ditching palm oil in the cookies, what about the rest of the ingredients (here and here)?  That’s the change we really need to see.

(And while we’re at it: Maybe Coca-Cola and Exxon Mobil aren’t the best sponsors for the national Girl Scouts convention, this week in Houston. Just a thought.)

Knock-knock, buy a box?

Those who read last year’s posts might recall that this all began because I pondered whether to let my daughter join a troop even if we had no plans to sell the cookies. Turns out that hasn’t been an issue.  Tess has shown zero interest in Scouts, and we already do lots of fun, enriching things through school and on our own. We’ve also had no trouble not buying the cookies, since no one close to us sells them. I did see a door-to-door Girl Scout this year — the first time in forever. But she skipped my house! I’m guessing it was the “For Sale” sign in the front yard. That, or a neighbor told her not to waste her time knocking on our door. Hmmm.

Now, the recap:

Let’s talk Girl Scout cookies (January 7, 2011)
The first post, in which I ask people to look objectively at the cookies, their ingredients and the mixed messages surrounding the sales. And did you know?  While about 70% of cookie proceeds go to the local council, individual girls and troops keep only 10% to 20% of the price of each box. (The comments on this post are illuminating: on Spoonfed, on Fooducate and on Fooducate’s Facebook page.) An excerpt from the post:

“Oh, there’s no way I’d let her sell them. Our food habits are far from perfect (whatever that means). But I’d feel like a hypocrite. Or a drug dealer. Go on, tell me I’m overreacting. But, seriously, I couldn’t in good conscience let my daughter sell something I believe to be patently unhealthy. (Just as I’m not a fan of donating Girl Scout cookies to food pantries.) And not that I’ve personally tasted one lately, but people tell me the cookies aren’t even that good. Maybe that’s because of ingredient changes. Or maybe because when you eat more real food, you lose your taste for crap. But, no matter. No selling.”

It’s not just a cookie (February 19, 2011)
The follow-up, in which I discuss reaction to the first post (for and against) and tackle the moderation myth. An excerpt:

“People too often confuse activism like this for an anti-treats or anti-fun or other extreme agenda. But this isn’t about never eating sweets or taking away people’s cookies or letting food control your life. And this isn’t just about Girl Scout cookies. This is about holding corporations accountable for ingredients that have no business in our food supply.”

No fooling: Girl Scouts are green and the FDA is making us blue (April 1, 2011)
A what-the-what? about the Scouts’ “Go Green” initiatives. Includes a link to a terrific letter by blogger and Girl Scout leader Jennifer McNichols. An excerpt from Jennifer’s letter:

“To me, Girl Scouts of the USA’s stance sends a frightening message to girls, and that message is the one they already receive on every corporate-sponsored kids’ cartoon and in free teaching materials provided by fast food chains: That ‘making a difference’ is all about thinking small, and keeping it that way, and making the easy choices while putting off the hard ones until it’s too late. Picking up litter and encouraging recycling but never asking where all this waste is coming from and what can be done about it. Getting fresh air and exercise but never examining the food we eat or where it comes from. Running ‘Save the Rainforests’ educational campaigns while selling cookies that contribute to their destruction. You — we — were supposed to be part of the solution, not part of the problem.”

Amen then and amen now.

There is a bright spot amid the latest cookie onslaught: The Girl Scouts recently announced a new locavore badge that encourages girls to explore local food sourcing and cooking. Gotta love that.

Still, I’ll give the last word to a commenter on this story, who suggested that the locavore badge requirements are missing a step: “Bake your own damn cookies.”  

Spoonfed is on Facebook. You’ll find links to blog posts, news and commentary on raising food-literate kids, questions and comments from readers, voices, viewpoints, the works. Stop by, like the page, chime in, spread the word. (Thanks.)

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When you blog about kids and food, people ask you questions. Especially this time of year, when sweets flow like lava and the sugar high carries you from trick-or-treats to Easter baskets. What do you do about the candy?

So here it is. The post about the candy.

Americans spend more than $2 billion a year on Halloween candy. Two. Billion.

Our Halloween night strategy is pretty simple. After trick-or-treating, costume silliness, and the obligatory ritual of dumping the haul and comparing it with friends, we divide and conquer. Anything with trans fats, high-fructose corn syrup, artificial colors or gelatin (it’s a veg thing) gets tossed. Right in the garbage. (Though last year we kept a bunch to use for decorating gingerbread houses, and that was fun.)

What’s left goes in a candy jar. Tess gets a few pieces that night, but then the jar is stored out of sight. After that, if she asks for something from the jar, we decide case by case. If she’s had other junk that day or it’s close to bedtime, no go. Otherwise we let her pick a piece. But we might dip into that thing once every month or two. It’s out of sight, so she just forgets about it.

When Tess was in preschool, and we visited just a few neighbors’ houses, we’d let her pick a piece, dump the rest and call it a night. Now she helps me sort and toss. We talk about why the ingredients are bad, how they affect our bodies, and how there are better (and tastier) alternatives anyway. We do the same with birthday-party goody bags. She’s first and foremost a chocolate girl, so we’re fortunate that most of the candy doesn’t even appeal to her. Except for Smarties, which I give a pass for food dye because they’re so pastel I figure it can’t be that much. And she eats, what, like a roll a year?

Orange you glad they make this?

But if your kids are more likely to balk at the loss of a Tootsie Pop, you can always have alternative treats on hand for trades. YummyEarth makes great-tasting lollipops. Or swap gummy candies for Annie’s fruit snacks. It’s all still sugar-sugar-sugar, but at least you avoid the other nasties.

I’ve been hearing a lot lately about Great Pumpkins and Halloween Fairies and Switch Witches and other magical creatures who come in the night and swap candy for toys. I’d rather have Tess involved in the process than avoid the conversation by letting some nighttime sprite do the deed. But I suppose the swap fairy could be fun if your kid understands why the candy goes poof. The more that children understand the reasons behind food choices, the smarter the decisions they’ll make on their own. That sounds pretty self-help cheeseball, I know, but it actually works.

So what if Tess wants to eat something we’ve put in the toss pile? We let her. Because the surest way to get a kid to appreciate real food is to let her taste the opposite. Usually a bite or two is all it takes. Which may be why I have a budding chocolate snob on my hands. Drugstore chocolate is no match for the good dark stuff.

Sticky and icky

And what do trick-or-treaters find at our door? (No, not toothbrushes. Though a dentist in my neighborhood did that when I was a kid. Bad idea.) For years we’ve done small tubs of Play-Doh, temporary tattoos, bouncy balls, pencils and notepads, that sort of thing. Last year we gave out the YummyEarth lollipops, too, if only to tip the balance in the treat bags. I know others who do mini raisin boxes, or small bags of nuts, crackers or pretzels (though you still have to label-read for crazy ingredients). Our local food co-op sells bulk ginger chews and mini fair-trade chocolate bars (also available here). And a reader, Karen, alerted me to an organization called Green Halloween that has a terrific list of treat alternatives. Love (love!) the nature items. Or you could get really radical and give away junk-food carrots. (See my previous post on that here.)

Now. Wait. Listen. Someone, somewhere, is saying some variation of this: “Sheesh. It’s Halloween. It’s one day a year. Lighten up and let the kids have their candy, already!”

But, see, that’s the problem. It’s not just one day a year. It’s Halloween night and class parties and community events and then the winter holidays and Valentine’s Day and Easter and birthday parties and swimming class and soccer games and the bank and the shoe store and restaurants with kid menus and the grandparents’ house and anyplace else kids set foot, including, of course, school. The sugar culture is so strong, the highly processed foodstuffs so epidemic, that we no longer have the luxury of viewing these things in isolation. It’s not just a few Halloween treats or one blue cupcake. It’s a crushing pile of chemical-laden pseudo food. And at some point we just have to make it stop.

So yes, I say boo.

What do you think? Do you have a sweets strategy? Treat tales? Tell me how you plan to handle all that candy on All Hallows Eve.

This post originally appeared on Spoonfed last Halloween, and we had quite a discussion about the candy onslaught, non-food alternatives and the ethics of throwing candy away. Then I followed up with this post about the days after the big night. (Hint: Limiting candy does not ruin childhood.) And in December, we used the Halloween stash to decorate (non-edible) gingerbread houses. Tootsie Rolls make great logs.

Spoonfed is on Facebook. You’ll find links to blog posts, news and commentary on raising food-literate kids, questions and comments from readers, voices, viewpoints, the works. Stop by, like the page, chime in, spread the word. (Thanks.)

This post is linked into Fight Back Fridays.

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Tess just spent a week playing a 19th century farm girl. She’s done camps at this living-history museum every summer since she was 4. (You haven’t seen cute until you’ve seen 4-year-olds dressed like Laura Ingalls.) But the previous camps were a little of this, a little of that, a sampler of life in the 1800s.

Now that she’s 7, Tess got to pick a themed camp, and 19th Century Farm Kids it was, held at the Pioneer Farmstead at Genesee Country Village & Museum, about 30 minutes from where we live in western New York.

Over the week, the kids learned about the animals (sheep, oxen, ducks, geese, chickens, turkeys, cows and pigs), collected eggs and dabbled in cheesemaking. They pulled purslane for salads. And soaked flax to extract the fibers for linen-making. They even picked and tasted hops. (There’s a working 19th century brewery on-site.)

There was barn-cleaning and wood-stacking, work followed by the fun of 19th century games. They shelled corn and sewed corn bags (like bean bags), then made them again after chipmunks raided the barn.

Every day they recorded their experiences in journals, using fountain pens and ink.

I’ve written about GCVM before, in posts on maple sugaring and teaching kids about industrial meat production. The village offers immersion-style history, with costumed role-players sharing the mundane yet fascinating rhythms of early American life. That of course includes the routines and rituals of food and farming. And for kids, especially, it’s a great lesson in agriculture at its most basic. Sure, the kids immerse for only a few hours a day, and they go home in air-conditioned cars to houses with refrigerators and snacks in bags, but it all sinks in, you know?

It’s the reason (along with the “Little House” picture books) that Tess wanted a pioneer party for her 5th birthday, which we  managed to pull off by renting a 1938 log cabin (itself a replica of a 1721 fort) in a nearby park. How authentic? No heat. Only a fireplace. In December. Looking back, it seems a little nuts. But there was sledding and butter-making and running around in bonnets and straw hats. And everyone went home with maple candy and an appreciation for central heat. (Oh: Renting a cabin with no heat in December? Cheap.)

This summer, when we visited Plimoth Plantation in Plymouth, Mass., we found fantastic exhibits and stories about how the Wampanoag and the colonists ate seasonally, in sync with nature. And these museums are everywhere. Check out the Association for Living History, Farm and Agricultural Museums, with members throughout the U.S. and Canada.

My only complaint about farm camp?  Though kids brought their own snacks and lunches (stored in cloth-covered baskets), the camp supplied drinks. Two choices: Water and “lemonade.”  As in: Country Time. As in: artificial colors and other chemical additives that no way, no how existed in the 1800s. (Though, OK, some other poisonous food colorings did.) And, oh, by the way, no actual lemon. Next time, I’d like to see the kids make their own real lemonade. Just like Mrs. Oleson.

Spoonfed is on Facebook. You’ll find links to blog posts, news and commentary on raising food-literate kids, questions and comments from readers, voices, viewpoints, the works. Stop by, like the page, chime in, spread the word. (Thanks.)

This post is linked into Real Food Wednesdays and Fight Back Fridays.

Copyright protected by Digiprove © 2011 Christina Le Beau

On the road this summer, I was struck, as I always am while traveling, by what other kids eat. For all the junk food in everyday life, there’s something astonishing about vacation. Maybe it’s the sheer volume of really bad food. Or the vacation-treat mentality. Or all those wiped-out parents desperate for something, anything, edible. All I know is that it gets to me.

I know better. I know about rampant bad options and insidious marketing. I know it takes time to educate ourselves and steely resolve to reject the status quo. And I personally know lots of people who just years — even months — ago had epiphanies about the state of our food supply and now wonder how they could have been so blind for so long. And I’m still learning, too. Every. Single. Day. So I know that many people are at their own points on their own journeys.

But as much as I believe in the importance of small steps, as much as I preach and practice tact and humor when dealing with tricky situations, as much as we’ve worked hard to raise Tess to be non-judgmental, I still sometimes have to fight the urge to walk up to complete strangers and roar about the Coke-Cheetos-McFried-bits they’re feeding their kids.

The longer I’m a parent, the more I have actual visceral reactions to seeing children eat this way. At a living-history museum last month, I was pleasantly surprised by the cafeteria’s a la carte salads, fruit-and-cheese plates and hummus packs. It was enough that we could cobble together a decent lunch when we decided to stay longer than planned. But still I heard nearly every other parent ask: “Where’s your kids’ menu?” Which of course had the usual substandard fare. Call me melodramatic, but I wanted to scream.

Instead, I did what I always do and mumbled to my husband. Other times it’s my friends who get an earful. And other times, if the opportunity comes up to weigh in, if another parent somehow invites my advice (like that mother at Starbucks who wanted me to tell her 5-year-old that he’d be more satisfied with a juice box and donut than with “just water”… um, no), I am diplomacy personified, because I really do believe that’s more effective. But does that stop me from having crazy thoughts? Hell no.

And let me tell you: I read a lot of food blogs. I track a lot of food news. I talk to a lot of people. And my surreptitious judging seems quaint by comparison. There’s a whole lot of judging when it comes to parenting in general, but food in particular. And the interwebs have made it far too easy for folks comfy in their convictions to sit back and let the snark flow.

So here’s what I propose: Can we all promise to do one thing (each month?) to help increase access to good food and educate others about our food supply? Send someone to a local farm or farmers’ market or natural-foods store. Invite a friend to dinner. Tell someone about your CSA. Volunteer to teach a cooking class at a food pantry, or your church or community center. Get into your kids’ school, plant a garden and come up with ideas for increasing food literacy. Do something, anything.* Less judging, more helping.

Off to pick at the CSA farm

The start of a school year is in many ways like the start of a new year, filled with promise and renewal, beginnings and opportunities. So as the new school year approaches, let’s take the opportunity to make a difference. One way to start: Pass this on. Help other parents make good choices. Be their tipping point. Because we all were there once.

*A reader suggested volunteering to drive low-income folks to affordable grocery stores. That gave me a few more ideas (which I also shared in the comments): Research local CSAs that offer sliding scales or discounts, then pass that info on to food banks and social-service agencies. Donate excess garden produce through AmpleHarvest.org. Check with local food pantries to see if you can volunteer to glean (pick leftover crops) at a local farm.

Spoonfed is on Facebook. You’ll find links to blog posts, news and commentary on raising food-literate kids, questions and comments from readers, voices, viewpoints, the works. Stop by, like the page, chime in, spread the word. (Thanks.)

Copyright protected by Digiprove © 2011 Christina Le Beau