Everyday Systems

How to get your family/friends to eat healthy food.

I love this food writer!

KCCC wrote: How to get your family/friends to eat healthy food.

I love this food writer!

It's true. Brian Wansink did a study on this at a kids' summer camp. When they gave the food more appealing names, the kids ate more of it, and said they liked it better, even though the food itself was not changed.

Geographic names are not mentioned in the article, but they're a good way to make food sound more appealing. How many times have you seen "Southwestern chicken," or something with a similar name, on a restaurant menu or frozen food box? How often do you see "polenta" in those contexts, and how often do you see "cornmeal mush"? The food marketing types know this stuff, and they know it makes a difference what you call a dish.

I kinda loved that there was a related article entitled, "I love you Mom, but you suck at cooking vegetables."

http://summertomato.com/i-love-you-mom- ... egetables/

Nice! I also like The Sneaky Chef. If you still can't get them to eat it, hide it in their food. http://www.thesneakychef.com/

Who Me? wrote:I kinda loved that there was a related article entitled, "I love you Mom, but you suck at cooking vegetables."

http://summertomato.com/i-love-you-mom- ... egetables/

Huh. I didn't know my sister had a food blog. The cooking she describes is so similar to what I suffered through as a kid, she must be my sister.

Don't tell mom.

When I was about five, I said i didn't like tapioca pudding. Yet, for some reason I started calling it Chicken ala King, and then I would eat it. Didn't matter that it had no chicken in it or that I had never tasted Chicken ala King! go figure.

What about tapioca "bubble teas?"



I still think that the "pearls" are too much like fish eyeballs...

(I do like tapioca pudding, for what it's worth.)

What are the dark "spots" at the bottom of the glasses?

oolala53 wrote:What are the dark "spots" at the bottom of the glasses?

Embryonic tadpoles.

No, really.

oolala53 wrote:No, really.

Blueberries or grapes, perhaps?

Those dark globules *claim* to be pearls of tapioca.

But Solid and I know better, don't we?

In some boba drinks the pearls are tapioca; in others they're gelatin or bean paste or various such things.

Like, you know, embryonic tadpoles.

Healthy and tasty should be, and can be, synonymous. Salt, Fat and Sugar: Why Eating Tasty Food Can Solve America's Food Problem.

I think the best way to make food tasty is to learn to cook it properly. It's not that difficult.

The blobs are tapioca pearls. They look weird, but they're great! They have a mildly sweet taste and pleasantly squishy texture (sort of like jell-o...but not really). When you get boba or bubble tea--that's what they call the drink with the pearls at the bottom--it's usually accompanied with an extra wide straw so you can slurp up the pearls as you drink. Yes, it sounds weird--but its REALLY good!

And in case you're wondering about tapioca, it's just a starchy root, sort of like a potato.

oolala53 wrote:When I was about five, I said i didn't like tapioca pudding. Yet, for some reason I started calling it Chicken ala King, and then I would eat it. Didn't matter that it had no chicken in it or that I had never tasted Chicken ala King! go figure.

How funny I have never liked tapioca pudding either, those little "things" in it just make me kind gag.

wosnes wrote:Healthy and tasty should be, and can be, synonymous. Salt, Fat and Sugar: Why Eating Tasty Food Can Solve America's Food Problem.

I think the best way to make food tasty is to learn to cook it properly. It's not that difficult.

Know that the reason that corporate chefs (at chain restaurants and the makers of processed foods) don't do this is money, pure and simple. Putting more salt, fat, or sugar into food is often a cheaper way than cooking it properly to make it taste better. Or perhaps it allows it to be cooked by someone with less skill (who therefore doesn't get paid as much). You don't need to worry about profit margins when you cook for yourself or your family or friends.

Another reason for foods to have a lot of salt, fat, or sugar is prestige. If those ingredients are expensive, you can show off how rich you are by making food with a lot of them. Again, that's something you don't need to do.

A third reason might be a reaction to previous scarcity of fat, salt, or sugar, such as during wartime. I wonder if the popularity of processed foods and desserts in the US in the late twentieth century isn't a reaction to rationing during WWII. Most of us have seen firsthand the tendency to go crazy eating something if we are allowed to have it, or to have it in unlimited quantities, after a time of not being allowed to have it.

Nicest of the Damned wrote:

wosnes wrote:Healthy and tasty should be, and can be, synonymous. Salt, Fat and Sugar: Why Eating Tasty Food Can Solve America's Food Problem.

I think the best way to make food tasty is to learn to cook it properly. It's not that difficult.

Know that the reason that corporate chefs (at chain restaurants and the makers of processed foods) don't do this is money, pure and simple. Putting more salt, fat, or sugar into food is often a cheaper way than cooking it properly to make it taste better. Or perhaps it allows it to be cooked by someone with less skill (who therefore doesn't get paid as much). You don't need to worry about profit margins when you cook for yourself or your family or friends.

Another reason for foods to have a lot of salt, fat, or sugar is prestige. If those ingredients are expensive, you can show off how rich you are by making food with a lot of them. Again, that's something you don't need to do.

A third reason might be a reaction to previous scarcity of fat, salt, or sugar, such as during wartime. I wonder if the popularity of processed foods and desserts in the US in the late twentieth century isn't a reaction to rationing during WWII. Most of us have seen firsthand the tendency to go crazy eating something if we are allowed to have it, or to have it in unlimited quantities, after a time of not being allowed to have it.

The high use of processed foods came well after WWII. I have some recipes of my mother's from the post-WWII era, and while they use processed foods, it's nothing like now.

Also, the article I linked to was more about not being afraid to use salt, fat, and sugar in home cooking -- not the use of these things in manufactured foods.