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• Kid Food Is Mostly Crap, and It's a Little Shocking

  I doubt most parents would assume a box of waffles with a picture of SpongeBob on the front was necessarily health food. But what if the box also had a label saying, "high in essential nutrients for growing kids"? Even if you don't consciously think about it, you might soften in your approach to the waffles. Well, I've got news for you: That food is most likely crap. Researchers in Canada analyzed more than 360 products marketed to children. They did NOT include junk food, so there's nowhere to run to, nowhere to hide on this study. Instead they covered what is sometimes packaged as "fun food", products with cartoon characters and so on pimping the contents, such as prepackaged dinners. And guess what?    Read More... Posted Jul 23 2008, 03:02 PM by Kelly Mills with | with 4 comment(s) Filed under: food, research study, nutrition, parents, dads, sports, cartoons, obesity, moms, marketing, childhood, activity, characters, junk, grocery

• Family Dinners Good For Parents, Too

  Research has shown that family dinners do wonderful things for kids. No one is 100 percent certain why gathering at a table with regularity is beneficial but it is still good to know. Now there is evidence that encouraging parents to have family meals for the sake of their offspring is also good for the parents, too.   Read More... Posted Jul 14 2008, 02:00 PM by Adrienne Martini with | with no comments Filed under: kids, food, eating, Slate, emily bazelon, family dinner

• What Can You Feed Your Family For $10?

  Like worms on the sidewalk after a summer rain, stories about feeding families for $X litter magazines during recessions. It's one of the few things we can count on in this world: death, taxes and stunt stories that in no way mirror how shoppers actually behave.   Read More... Posted Jul 09 2008, 02:30 PM by Adrienne Martini with | with 1 comment(s) Filed under: food, time, cheap eats, colicchio, Gourmet, stunt story, $10, joel stein

• High Fructose Corn Syrup Is the Same As Honey?

  Some of my best friends are honest PR professionals. I know such critters exist. But honest PR professionals must not work for the high fructose corn syrup industry. How do I know this?   Read More... Posted Jul 06 2008, 03:00 PM by Adrienne Martini with | with 5 comment(s) Filed under: food, FDA, honey, maple syrup, high fructose corn syrup, PR

• Seven Ideas to Reduce Spending on Food

  With food budgets getting tighter and tighter, it's time to start rethinking how we eat. One good way to start that process is to remember what it was like to be a poor college student. If you never had the thrill of long weeks spent eating ramen noodles and debating Nietzsche, convinced that you could solve every problem in the world with your big brain, imagine that you're trapped in a 10x12 room with nothing but a hot plate.   Read More... Posted Jul 04 2008, 02:30 PM by Adrienne Martini with | with 3 comment(s) Filed under: food, budget, eggs, beans, Nietzsche

• Greenhouse: Are You a Water Bigfoot?

  You might already know your carbon footprint, but what's your water footprint? Similar in notion to the carbon footprint, the water footprint is a measure of exactly how much water you use, but also how much goes into the things you use and consume daily. For example, it takes almost 2000 gallons of water to yield a pound of beef. Yikes. And that cup of coffee I glugged down this morning takes almost 37 gallons of water  to produce. Interestingly, the biggest impact on our water footprint is not what we use to clean our homes and ourselves, cook, or wash clothes. Read More... Posted Jul 02 2008, 01:03 PM by AmyinMotown with | with 2 comment(s) Filed under: food, coffee, water, greenhouse, meat, vegetarian diet, water conservation, water consumption, water footprint, grains

• Are bananas the new oil?

  Everyone who thought bananas were this wonderful and inexpensive food that we stumbled onto here in the States – you were wrong. Very wrong. At least that's what Dan Koeppel said in the New York Times this week. His OP-ED piece, "Yes, We Will Have No Bananas," is currently the most emailed article at nytimes.com. According to this extremely interesting essay, bananas are more exotic than we realize and shouldn't be so cheap. Fruit stands on the streets of Manhattan typically sell the yummy yellow-skinned fruit at 3 or 4 for a buck, which is a great deal by New York standards. There are various reasons, Koeppel writes, why bananas... Read More... Posted Jun 20 2008, 10:00 AM by Brett Singer with | with 2 comment(s) Filed under: new york city, food, health, business, new york times, NY Times, fruit, banana, NYTimes, Brett Singer, Dan Koeppel, bananas

• Five Baby Gifts She's Not Registered For (But Really, Really Needs)

  I know she's told you that what she really,really needs is a personalized Bugaboo Bee, (and I really, really need one of those, too, in case any of my people are reading) but on the off chance that this "budget" stroller still doesn't quite meet your budget, here's my offical list of must-haves:   Read More... Posted Jun 05 2008, 06:32 PM by Erin White with | with 3 comment(s) Filed under: food, bugaboo bee, bobbi brown, anthropologie, jytte, orla, new yorker, baby gifts

• The 9 Freakiest Baby Outfits

  Um, What?? Read More... Posted May 29 2008, 10:00 AM by Cole Gamble with | with 3 comment(s) Filed under: food, baby, costume, lists, hamburger, digg, lobster, divine caroline, freaky

• Gasp! Childhood Obesity Not Exploding

  Hey, remember how a little while back we were told childhood obesity was a horrific epidemic ravaging the land? And then every thirty seconds or so a study and accompanying news story would appear, saying that juice or distant mothers or text messaging was one of the causes? (Side note: News outlets almost always use one of maybe three pictures of overweight kids for these stories. I do hope those kids are getting royalties or something.) It seemed like you almost couldn't go a week without at least one "such-and-such is contributing to the fattening of our youth" story appearing somewhere. Well, now there's more news in the kid and weight front. Apparently... Read More... Posted May 27 2008, 07:10 PM by Kelly Mills with | with 2 comment(s) Filed under: kids, food, health, research study, racism, nutrition, childhood obesity, diet, overweight, weight, experts, activity, sedentary, poor, disparities, economic

• Ending the Food Fight: Stopping Childhood Obesity

  You pretty much can't turn on the tv with out hearing how fat American kids are today. Every empire must fall. In Rome, Christian was the downfall. In England it was overextension. Apparently the fall of the American Empire will be juvenile diabetes.       A new book tackles the “epidemic” of childhood obesity in our country...  Read More... Posted May 14 2008, 09:01 AM by Cole Gamble with | with 3 comment(s) Filed under: food, fast food, fat, childhood obesity, diet, overweight, Americans, book, juvinile diabetes, dr. david ludwig

• Pregcellent: Weird Cravings Are Up

  You know that yen for a deli roast beef sandwich, extra mayo, with cheddar cheese potato chips inserted inside the sandwich that struck you suddenly while pregnant? Just me? Apparently not, because the BBC reports that pregnancy cravings are up. Three-fourths of women today experience some kind of craving while knocked up, compared with 30 percent just fifty years ago. Oh, and chocolate topped the list, because pregnant women are not stupid. However, the cravings were not just for weird food stuff. In fact...   Read More... Posted Apr 30 2008, 05:02 PM by Kelly Mills with | with 6 comment(s) Filed under: food, pregnancy, research study, nutrition, mothers, moms, chocolate, BBC, pregcellent, expecting, texture, deficiency, cravings

• Group Asks For Ban On Food Additives Linked to Hyperactivity

  Those wacky Europeans. When a bunch of food additives were linked to hyperactivity in children, the UK Food Standards Agency actually asked that the EU ban those additives, and that UK food manufacturers sign a voluntary ban on the chemicals in effect by the end of 2009. Talk about drastic. All because some researchers at the University of Southampton said the number of hyperactive kids could be cut by a third if the additives were banned. But how are Brits going to know something is cherry-flavored if it isn't colored bright red?  The industry Food & Drink Federation spokesperson says... Read More... Posted Apr 11 2008, 05:03 PM by Kelly Mills with | with no comments Filed under: children, food, health, Europe, safety, EU, UK, chemicals, rules, drink, ban, industry, additives, hyperactivity

• Daily Duh: Less junk food leads to weight loss

  In Philadelphia, land of the cheese steak, five elementary schools participated in a program where candy and soda were eliminated from the vending machines, and kids were rewarded with raffle tickets for "making healthy food choices." And guess what?   Read More... Posted Apr 11 2008, 03:00 PM by Brett Singer with | with 2 comment(s) Filed under: food, school, Philadelphia, eating, junk food, diet, studies, snacks, calories, sugar, daily duh

• Crafty: How to Cook a Dinosaur

  No, I don't have a recipe for making dinner from a dino. (Does anyone else picture the rack of ribs that tip Fred Flinstone's car when I mention meals from extinct critters?) But what I do have is a great crafty idea: ask your kids how they'd cook a dinosaur. Read More... Posted Mar 10 2008, 10:00 AM by Adrienne Martini with | with no comments Filed under: food, recipes, crafty, markers, crayons, dinosaurs, clay, pasta, pens

• Pregcellent: Eat This, Not That

  Sometimes I wonder why I get so pissy about stuff when everybody does it, but I do. Take the diet/nutrition book, "Eat This, Not That" now in a pregnancy edition. It's pimped on the Today site right now. So the original, non-pregnancy version of the book was all over Today and msnbc, three times I believe. Hmmm, it's by the editors of Men's Health--could there be a connection between that mag and Today? Yeah, yeah, nothing new, I know. And the book made dubious claims about nutrition as a way to target belly fat. Again, not unheard of for a diet book to make lame and questionable promises. And I noted that some of the caloric amounts for the "bad" food choices were pretty high, like perhaps they had chosen the worst possible offender and generalized. No, that's not unique. So, how does the expecting mom version stack up? Well... Read More... Posted Feb 27 2008, 08:32 AM by Kelly Mills with | with no comments Filed under: food, health, pregnancy, nutrition, fat, diet, calories, pregcellent, msnbc, eat this not that, resources, mens health, today, expectant moms

• Maybe We Should Switch To Sporks

  Much like playing "The Name Game" with someone named "Chuck" ("Chuck chuck, bo buck, banana fana fo fu... oops!"), it is not a good idea to have a two year old say "fork and spoon" in polite company. Why not? (Fork - r = Fok) + (In - n = n) + Spoon = Fokkin' Spoon Say it out loud. But not while Phyllis Schlafly is listening.   Posted Feb 22 2008, 09:15 PM by Brett Singer with | with 7 comment(s) Filed under: food, eating, toddlers, two year olds, stuff kids say, utensils

• Tall Kids Can't Eat As Kids, But I Have Your Revenge Strategy Right Here

  We all know the all-you-can-eat buffet is essentially a no-holds-barred contest between restaurant owners and patrons. As a customer, it is your job to try and get more than your money's worth from the buffet by eating so much that you have to be wheeled out on a guerney, weakly pumping your fist in the air in honor of your victory. Restaurants often try and counter this by slowly refilling the platters in the hopes that you will get full, or giving you wee little plates to pile with food, or serving nasty-ass stuff, or just giving you dirty looks as you make your fifth round with your napkin tucked into your shirt and slightly askew. I know I've hit an all-you-can-eat sushi place so gladiator that I believe they tried to charge me the polar bear entry fee the next time I went.  One restaurant went below the belt in their mission. They... Read More... Posted Jan 28 2008, 06:14 PM by Kelly Mills with | with 3 comment(s) Filed under: food, discrimination, restaurants, eating out, sushi, manners, tall, height, buffet, all you can eat, dining with kids

• Picky Eaters Unite!

  Lucky me, I don’t have a picky eater. Yet. It seems like most kids go through phases when they will only eat white food, or flat food, or exclusively French fries (my nephew would willingly eat little else ages 1-2). It's clearly not hereditary since I don't know how my parents managed to feed me as a kid – I hate tomato sauce, anything with gravy or white sauce, mushrooms, cooked carrots in any form, and mashed potatoes. And I am less picky now than I was as a child. Read More... Posted Jan 15 2008, 04:09 PM by AmyinMotown with | with no comments Filed under: food, picky eaters, preschoolers, gross food

• Babies Like What Mom Eats

  I always suspected that my kids had a preference for whatever weird craving-thing I ate while pregnant with them. In one case it was cupcakes. In another, soft-serve vanilla ice cream and bananas. In another, pineapple. So, not surprisingly, those things are among the stuff my kids like (but what's not to like about cupcakes?). Fortunately, I also ate broccoli and green beans, because some new studies show that babies like (or at least, don't hate) the flavors their mothers ate while pregnant or breastfeeding. Read More... Posted Dec 02 2007, 10:29 AM by Karen Murphy with | with 8 comment(s) Filed under: food, pregnancy, babies, eating, breastfeeding, broccoli, food preferences

• Amazing! Kids Don't Prefer Junk Food After All!

  Hey, you know all those studies saying that kids don't know their asses from a Big Mac and that they'd rather eat said Big mac than a plateful of broccoli? And the conventional "wisdom" that says kids would rather eat fat and that to make healthy school meals for kids would just cost too much so why bother because kids won't eat it? Wrong, wrong, wrong. At least, wrong according to another! new! study!   Read More... Posted Nov 25 2007, 07:04 PM by Karen Murphy with | with 1 comment(s) Filed under: food, minnesota, junk food, healtthy eating, school meals

• Is It Food or Entertainment? Kid's Foods Crossing Borders of Taste

  Oh, what delights have I been missing out on in spurning TV and the cereal aisle at the grocery store? Apparently, a lot of them. Dinosaur eggs that hatch in oatmeal? Gross. Who came up with that one? Fruit snacks that leave a tattoo on the tongue? C'mon, people, weren't you satisfied with Pop Rocks? So how come food manufacturers think kids need to play with their food? Do you buy this stuff?   Read More... Posted Nov 05 2007, 08:02 AM by Karen Murphy with | with 7 comment(s) Filed under: kids, food, fat kids, advertising, artificial colors

• Kitchenista: Babette's Feast

  Ten years ago this month, I visited the eastern portion of France along with neighboring Germany. All my trips to France have been fraught with culinary delight, but neither my high-school French or my culinary acumen prepared me for the proliferation of chalked roadside signs promising the delights of something unknown but assuredly delicious, called "tarte flambee". Even The Ex, who had lived in that area of Alsace for awhile, hadn't a clue. It was maddening. I had to know what it was. I knew I would love it. Whatever it was. Read More... Posted Oct 11 2007, 02:05 PM by Karen Murphy with | with 2 comment(s) Filed under: food, kitchenista, trader joe's, French cuisine, tarte flambee

• Child's Picky Eating is Your Fault! (Kind Of)

  Growing up, my sister was a relatively picky eater, which annoyed me since I tended to eat everything. And lots of it. I loved (and still love) variety in taste, texture, smell, quality, preparation, and ingredients. But as a big pouter who could stubbornly resist a single bite of anything on her plate, my sister and her tastes often dictated the dinner menus. I understand that now that I’m a parent, but, man, I vowed back then to surround myself with only the most adventuresome of palates. Naturally, I married someone whose food preferences make the childhood version of my sister appear ... Read More... Posted Oct 10 2007, 03:38 PM by Madeline Holler with | with 8 comment(s) Filed under: food, picky eaters, new york times, DNA Testing, gene science

• Direct Link Between Food Additives and Hyperactivity Proven

  The link between food additives and hyperactivity has long been suspected, but the study done by Jim Stevenson, professor of psychology at the University of Southampton, U.K., is the first to show a direct link.  While Stevenson and his colleagues are quick to point out that "no one factor is solely responsible for rising rates of ADHD," the British government has wasted no time warning parents of kids showing signs of hyperactivity to cut out foods with artificial colors and preservatives, and honestly, parents all over the world would do well to follow suit.    Read More... Posted Sep 11 2007, 09:05 AM by Alisyn with | with 5 comment(s) Filed under: food, u.s.d.a., hyperactivity in kids, food preservatives, food additives, link between food additives and hyperactivity

• Back-to-School Food Talk from Slashfood

  Today, popular blog Slashfood is going back to school. The Slashfoodies take it a little bit beyond what to pack for lunch. There are breakfast ideas, kid-friendly cookbooks to help turn your child into a student of the culinary arts along with the elementary ones, and thoughts on quick and tasty dinners. Good stuff. Kinda makes me hungry. Posted Sep 06 2007, 02:18 PM by Patti with | with no comments Filed under: food, cooking, school lunches, Slashfood, back to school

• Latest Nutrition Study: It's All Crap

  I love Scientific American, because I'm American, and kinda scientific. Also because they say some smart things. Science-y things. Well, here's a nice perspective piece on the influence of the food industry on nutritional studies. What exactly does it mean? Well, when we post some bit on how milk is like an anti-aging drink or your kids should eat pounds of walnuts or whatever (and I made those up) there's a good chance the study got at least some funding from a company that has a vested interest in the sales of milk, or walnuts, or whatever. And get this: according to a meta-review by Children's Hospital Boston, "Industry-supported studies were four to seven times more likely to favor their sponsors than research paid for by disinterested parties." So what does this mean for you? Read More... Posted Aug 25 2007, 08:30 AM by Kelly Mills with | with 2 comment(s) Filed under: food, research study, nutrition, obesity

• Kids Aren't Eating Free School Breakfasts

  Growing up, I counted myself as lucky that I didn't have to eat in the school cafeteria. The food all looked the same and every school cafeteria I ever went in had the same smell, so I was very happy with my bologna sandwich, fruit cup, and handful of chips. But kids all over aren't so lucky, and many simply don't have anything to eat at home before they go to school. Hell, many just don't have much to eat any time of day. Which is why the free lunch and free breakfast programs were started in schools. Breakfast, especially, is important, because how can a kid think about fractions when he hasn't eaten that day? Read More... Posted Aug 09 2007, 10:05 AM by Karen Murphy with | with 3 comment(s) Filed under: kids, food, free lunch program, school cafeteria, free school breakfasts

• Kids Know McDonald's is Just Better

  All the healthy eating in the world apparently can't undo the power of branding, even to a preschooler. A new study of 3- and 5-year olds showed that kids overwhelmingly preferred the food in the McDonald's wrapper to its identical twin in the generic wrapper. I think I'm going to be sick now. "This study demonstrates simply and elegantly that advertising literally brainwashes young children into a baseless preference for certain food products ... Children, it seems, literally do judge a food by its cover. And they prefer the cover they know."   Read More... Posted Aug 07 2007, 05:05 PM by Karen Murphy with | with 8 comment(s) Filed under: food, mcdonald's, fast food, junk food, preschoolers, studies' food preferences

• Selfish Kids Ruin Good Meals

  If I dipped chicken nuggets in a glorious combination of honey and ranch dressing, or dressed up french fries with Pixie Stix, my kid wouldn't eat it. It's not that she's picky. She's just obstinate. The kid won't eat, and it's driving me mad. Wait a second. That's not entirely true. She recently ate an entire plate of crisped scallops, heirloom tomatoes and haricot-verts. She couldn't get enough. So, in reality, the kid will only eat if we slave over the stove for her. And it's driving me mad.   Read More... Posted Jul 30 2007, 11:06 AM by Mike Adamick (Cry It Out!) with | with 5 comment(s) Filed under: food, foodies