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A survey of 1,400 workers indicated long commutes and late
office hours were the norm in today’s frantic society.
Many of those questioned indicated they did not get home in
time to cook an evening meal and one in 10 did not do a weekly
food shop. How can you be a friend in the kitchen when you
never go in the kitchen and rely on a diet of takeaways and
fast food?
We spend £30 billion on eating out in 2005! That is
a huge amount of money so it doesn’t come cheap but
there may be other concerns too. A study by doctors in Winsconsin
looked at the diet of 600 school children aged between 7-14
years. They found that one in 5 pupils who ate out 4 times
a week at restaurants or fast food outlets were more likely
to have higher blood pressure, unhealthy cholesterol levels
and metabolic changes that predispose to diabetes later in
life, than those pupils who regularly ate at home. So it is
worth making the effort in the kitchen for those family meals
for good health.
According to a snap shot of the nations shopping basket in
the Guardian newspaper (May 26th) wholemeal bread looks like
it’s in fashion and we are eating more fresh fruit and
vegetables, yogurt and drinking more semi skimmed milk. Consumption
of white bread, alcohol and ice-cream is down by more than
8% and decreasing. However when one ‘friend in the kitchen’
went to buy a loaf of white bread in the supermarket recently,
a total stranger muttered “don’t buy that muck!”
But is it so bad? It certainly makes the best summer puddings!
The obesity estimates are very cautious but extremely
worrying.
Dr Tim Lobstein, International Obesity Task Force
We know that less then 6% of parents
of overweight children in the UK are aware that their child
is overweight.
International Journal of Obesity 2005 29:353-355
...take no baths, sleep on a hard bed
and walk round naked.
Hippocrates views on how to stay slim
Parents have the key to the family
car but children have the key to the family food budget –
75% of spontaneous food purchases can be traced to a nagging
child.
James McNeal
One fifth of fish and chip shops
across Scotland still sell deep fried Mars Bars.
Anonymous
Five characteristics of slim people:
they eat breakfast, they eat healthily, they drink in moderation
and they sleep well and take regular exercise.
Slimming magazine
It astounded me that in a place
of such poverty, the love put into children’s meals was
greater than in London – and resulted in a more nutritionally
balanced lunch.
Jamie Oliver has a school lunch in Soweto
If a woman is the same weight
as her male partner she still needs to eat 25% less than he
does, otherwise she will put on weight.
Sainsbury Magazine August 2005
The risk of obesity in a pre school
child increases by 6% for every hour of television he or she
watches every day. If there is a TV in the child’s bedroom,
the risk of being obese is increased by 31%.
B.A. Dennison et al, Pediatrics 2002
An excellent survey of a 1000 readers of Good Food magazine
last year presented some interesting views:
60% would buy more organic food
if they could afford it
23% trust the supermarkets to source top-quality food
73% think food labels are confusing
87% would pay more for better quality food
89% think there is too much packaging on food
45% hate supermarkets but still use them
87% would like to see more fair-trade products |
This gives us all plenty to think and talk about and the
top supermarket gripes are:
Changes to food/aisle layout
Running out of basic foods
They stop stocking your favourite food item
Long queues at the check out
Trolleys with dodgy wheels
Picking the wrong queue at the check out |
Are these the same for you? Or do you have other gripes when
you buy your food? Email
to Friends in the kitchen
According to the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and
Development Health data 2005, these are the longest life spans:
| Japan
Spain
Frances
Australia
Iceland
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85.3 years
83.7 years
82.9 years
82.8 years
82.5 years
|
Canada
Finland
New Zealand
UK
USA |
82.1 years
81.8 years
81.1 years
80.7 years
79.9 years |
Could this be related to diet? In other words, lots of soy
sauce, miso soup, tofu, noodles in Japanese cookery. Alternatively
a taste of Mediterranean flavours with colourful fruits, vegetables
and olive oil. There are two publications out at the moment
on why Japanese women don’t get fat, why French women
don’t get fat….there has not been one on Spanish
women… yet! But it looks like some people have noticed
who is living a longer life.
The new pack by Tear Fund – “Glorious Food”
is great. The pack by this Christian charity is for use in
churches or schools, to raise awareness and monies for the
Quechua people in Bolivia. Their basic diet of potatoes and
wheat, mixed with poverty has been a fertile ground for malnutrition
and Tear Fund’s supported project, Yanapanakuna, hopes
to change that by among other things building humble greenhouses
and teaching women new recipes using fresh produce. The Yanapanakuna
team consists of a cook, the pastor, the doctor and the agronomist.
The cook, called Gaby, invites all the women of the village
to cookery classes, explaining the value of fruit and vegetables
as well as sharing why it is important to clean cooking utensils.
What is the difference between Bolivia and the UK?
In Bolivia over 25% of all children under 5 years of age suffer
from stunted growth, 20% of indigenous children die before
their first birthday. There are no statistics for obesity
and for the first time ever the Government recently provided
a breakfast of milk and biscuits for the children in the village
of San Luis.
The pack has loads of ideas, OHP sheets, Power Point Presentation,
Delia Smith's recipe of Shepherds pie with cheese crusted
leeks, fund raising ideas – it really is great! The
pack costs £9.95 and has loads of ideas.
For more information go to HYPERLINK www.tearfund.org
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