Food marketers as well as parents  have known for years that a popular cartoon character can influence a child's desire for junk food  but even I  was surprised  to learn the addition of the lovable Shrek could get kids to eat more onions - a lot more onions!

According to today's Wall Street Journal since the Vidalia Onion Committee teamed up with Dreamworks Animation and added Shrek to its  marketing campaign demand for these sweet onions went up 30% to 35% one  produce manager in Mobile, Alabama reports selling vidalia onions 3 times last years weekly volume http://online.wsj.com/article/SB20001424052748704123604575323433042544568.html

The Vidalia onion campaign uses a cartoon character to sell good food but the rest of marketing messages are not  so positive. In a recent study  published June 21 in the journal Pediatrics Christina Roberto and colleagues from Yale University  studied  how popular licensed cartoon characters appearing on food packaging impact young children's taste and snack preferences.   Forty 4- to 6-year-old children tasted 3 pairs of identical foods (graham crackers, gummy fruit snacks, and carrots) presented in packages either with or without a popular cartoon character. Children tasted both food items in each pair and indicated whether the 2 foods tasted the same or one tasted better. Guess what? The kids preferred the foods with the popular cartoon characters on the packaging. This clearly demonstrates  branding food packages with cartoon characters influences young children's taste preferences and snack selection. Unfortunately besides the Shrek tie- in most foods promoted to kids are energy-dense and nutrient poor- AKA - Junk Food.  Those who market inferior foods to kids  are taking unfair advantage of children's innate sense of trust . Using licensed characters to advertise junk food to children should be restricted.

• Preheat oven to 350 F. Bring a pot of water to a boil, large enough to hold the potatoes. Cook the potatoes until tender when pierced with a fork about ten to fifteen minutes.
 

While the potatoes cook, lightly oil a 9x 9 inch oven proof pan. Pour the frozen crumbles into the pan and mix with the catsup until well combined. Top with frozen vegetables.

Once the potatoes are cooked, mash with the milk and butter and season with salt and pepper. Spread the mashed potatoes evenly over the vegetables. Cover the pan with aluminum foil, bake twenty minutes, remove cover and finish baking ten more minutes or until potatoes crisp and turn light brown. Serve warm with a tossed salad of crisp greens on the side.

 

Of course tomatoes are delicious when served cold in a salad but they are also wonderful baked whole and  topped with a few breadcrumbs. I  serve cooked tomatoes as a side vegetable to fish, chicken or a roast . Allow one whole tomato per person and plan on one tablespoon of seasoned breadcrumbs mixed with a little olive oil for each tomato. 

Cut the top off the tomato, making a small well and fill with the prepared breadcrumbs.

Bake in a preheated oven set at 350 degrees for 25- 30 minutes

 Serve warm from the oven.

1. Buy fruits and vegetables in season
2. Grow your own
3. Don’t waste leftovers. Add vegetables (cooked or raw) to broth to make a vegetable soup
4. Use leftover fruits to make a smoothie just blend with yogurt and a little juice
5. Cut fruit and vegetables at home instead of buying them pre-cut.
6. Canned fruits and vegetables last a long time chose vegetables with no salt added and fruit that is canned in 100% fruit juice
7. Frozen fruits and vegetables last a long time too keep a supply on hand
8. Chose store brand canned or frozen fruit and vegetables over name brand.
9. Avoid buying single servings the convenience will cost a lot more
10. Buy frozen fruits and vegetables in large bags, not indivdual servings

Most of us love pasta but  almost everyone tells me they eat more than they should when they make it. Here is an idea for making your next pasta meal even better - mix it with Spaghetti Squash!

The calories will be lower and the nutrition greater.

Spaghetti Squash is a large vegetable resembling a melon or a gourd. Once cooked and sliced open it reveals a mass of delicious "spaghetti-like" strands. One cup of cooked spaghetti squash contains only 45 calories and it  is a good source of fiber and potassium but carries no fat and very little sodium. It is even easy to to cook.

To Cook: Poke the skin with a fork, cook in the microwave on high for 7-8 minutes or until it feels soft. Let rest for five minutes. Then slice in half , scoop out seeds.

 Take a fork and scrape spaghetti strands into a bowl.

You can serve spaghetti squash as a replacement for pasta but I like to mix it half and half as in the picture below on the left. The picture on the right is what it looks like before mixing.

If you don't have time to make a spaghetti squash another nice way to improve pasta is by combining it with an equal amount of french style green beans. The green beans are found in the freezer case and can be prepared following the packaged instructions. For each one cup of pasta add one cup of cooked green beans and the calories are cut almost in half.

Below are three plates of pasta  at the top left is 2 cups of pasta mixed with spaghetti squash at 242 calories,  44 grams carbohydrate*. On the top right 1 cup of spaghetti is mixed with 1 cup cooked green beans and the calories are 232, with 42 gram carbohydrate* . The dish at the bottom contains 2 cups of cooked spaghetti and 394 calories and 74 grams carbohydrate*.

* Knowing  the carbohydrate in pasta is  important for anyone who has pre-diabetes or diabetes because it is the carbohydrate content in a meal that can raise blood sugar.

 All three of these combinations will be delicious but the two on the top will help you lose weight and because the vegetables contain potassium, fiber and small amounts of other nutrients such as vitamin C and A they can help lower blood pressure, cholesterol and even blood sugar,

Peas and corn are Americans most favorite vegetable but everyone I talk to apologizes for liking them so much. Yes they have more calories than some vegetables, but peas have fewer calories than an equal amount of carrots. Both carrots and peas contain about 70 calories in one cup cooked. Corn has double the caloric content or 178 calories in one cup of kernels but with those calories comes 5 gram of protein, 8 grams of fiber and over 400 mg of potassium. Corn is definitely not an "empty calorie" food. One of my favorite ways to eat corn as a replacement for rice, I serve Chile over cooked corn instead of rice and I use corn in casseroles and soup as a rice replacement. Fresh peas will soon be coming into season and there is no reason to apologize for eating this delicious vegetable. In fact peas are an easy, delicious and fun food to grow from seed with your children. We corn lovers will have to wait a little longer but once it is here fresh corn on the cob cannot be beat- but do go light on the butter that is where the real calories can add up.

It is a cold winter day- perfect for a soup or stew filled with a generous portion of delicious vegetables served with steamed broccoli on the side to fit For the Love of Food principles- half the plate filled with vegetables.

 Buy a whole chicken and ask the butcher behind the meat counter to cut it into 8 pieces, 10 pieces if the breasts are big enough. Make sure the butcher gives you the giblets (the heart and liver in the little bag) along with the back bone and freeze it for a soup to be used at another time.

Hoilday time is the perfect time to share For the Love of Food recipes with your friends and family. I just added two great appetizers you can prepare for your next gathering. Both the Red Pepper Pesto Spread and Chick Pea Nuts are delicious and  can be made ahead. When friends ask where you got the recipe please send them to this project and ask them to pass it on to their friends too.

When I recommend families eat more fruit and vegetables, cost is an often cited obstacle. Here is how I save money:

If you love mashed potatoes please try the Whipped potato and carrot recipe I just added to Vegetable Sides. I am testing recipes for an upcoming class at Stonewall Kitchen and have been experimenting with adding vegetables to potatoes to make them better. By replacing half the potatoes with an equal amount of carrots I shaved off almost 160 calories and added 7 grams of fiber to a recipe that makes about four servings. Trust me the result is delicious – no compromise on flavor. Just in time for the holidays too!

More than 10,000 participants enrolled in a  1999 study for the purpose of assessing whether food choices impact the risk of depression and guess what they found? Those eating more fruit, vegetables, nuts whole grains and fish had a much lower risk. Those eating the most meat products and whole fat dairy had the greatest risk of depression. The researchers conclude that eating a “Mediterranean- type diet” can play a protective role in preventing depressive disorders.

http://archpsyc.ama-assn.org/cgi/content/abstract/66/10/1090