I was excited when I first saw the trailer to the new network television series about healthy school lunch programs, Jamie Oliver’s Food Revolution. “Yes!” I thought, as I’m an advocate for healthy school lunches. “Now Americans can see how much of a positive difference can be made by changing school lunches!” But after watching the first episode, I was kind of disappointed.

The Reality Is, It’s Reality TV.

Here we have a witty Brit going into a town in West Virginia in the middle of the school year to try to change things over night. It’s hard enough for anyone to go to small-town American and instigate change, let alone be a foreigner and do it over night. Next, trying to change anything while in mid-stream is much more challenging than starting from the beginning. It’s common sense. I’m thinking that the network wanted some drama and figured there would be some nice dramatic resistance to film (and there is). And finally, giving grade-school children a choice between the junk food they know and like and healthy food is a set-up for failure. No matter how delicious and nutritious the healthy food choice, kids will pick pizza over it. Be real.

Junk Food Shouldn’t Be An Option

The USDA considers french fries as a vegetable choice in school lunch programs. It's wrong.

The bottom line is this: children should not even have junk food as a choice. We are the adults. We are responsible for what they eat and should be making that decision. The “powers that be,” whether the school or the government, should make a healthy school lunch program available for our children. If you provide them with only fresh nutritious food, they will eat it. Give them green beans that are bright green, not grey. Give them fresh ripe fruit; not some syrupy, overcooked, cubed, mystery fruit  that comes in a cup. Give them brightly colored lightly cooked or fresh vegetables. Give them real unprocessed food — and they will eat it — eventually. If they don’t like it at first, they will grow to like it within a few weeks. I guarantee it.

Good Intentions, But Wrong Execution

Don’t get me wrong. I think Jamie Oliver has good intentions and really wants to make a difference.  And because of all the publicity, I think he will (hey, I’m talking about him, right?). But I think the network got in the way of something that could have been really great. The good thing is, even if this experiment doesn’t go as well as it could (I know it doesn’t because I know of the outcome.), at least the masses can get a good look at the crud that is being served in the majority of the schools and maybe start being proactive in making a change themselves, either at their local school or even at their own dinner table. French fries should not count as a vegetable.

Make A Difference: The Child Nutrition Bill

The Child Nutrition Bill is up for a vote with the Senate in mid-to-late April. Many organizations are petitioning. For more information see the Time for Lunch campaign at www.slowfoodusa.org, Chef Ann Cooper’s Lunch Box “One More Dollar A Day For Healthy School Food” campaign to our elected officials, or sign Jamie Oliver’s petition to save cooking skills and improve school food.

BTW, The Revolution Began Over A Decade Ago

There have already been successful changes to school lunch programs in certain areas of the country. One such place is in Wisconsin at the Appleton School District, which started back in 1997. Chef Ann Cooper, a.k.a. The Renegade Lunch Lady, has made some great strides in improving school lunches in several schools as well. Two Angry Moms is another group that is making a change. I guess the food revolution is just “new” to the masses. And bringing it to the masses is where Jamie Oliver succeeds.

Here are some natural preventative methods to help boost your immunity against the flu, without the risks of getting a vaccine.

1.) Get out in the sunshine. The body synthesizes vitamin D when direct sunlight hits the skin (it doesn’t work through glass). Having optimal vitamin D levels affects the body’s immune system. You only need about 10 minutes a day (without any sunscreen), so take a quick outdoor lunch break. Having the sun shine on only your hands and face is sufficient.  If you can’t get out in the sun, full-spectrum UV lights or supplemental vitamin D are other options.

2.) Avoid Refined Sugar. Sugar drops down your white blood cell (WBC’c) count. WBC’s are your “fighting” cells (microphages) that literally consume viruses and bacteria in order to keep you from getting sick.

3.) Take Vitamin C. Vitamin C does the opposite of sugar. It boosts your WBC count. Do not drink pasteurized juice in order to get your vitamin C since the sugar is detrimental, as explained above. 1000 mg a day is good. However, if you are sick or are getting sick, you need more.

4.) Eat Plenty of Fresh Fruit and Vegetables. Especially Dark Green Veggies.  They are full of vitamin C, antioxidants, bio-flavinoids, essential minerals and other nutrients to help maintain healthy cell function. They are also very alkalizing when metabolized, which fights inflammation, cancer and calcium depletion.

5.) Exercise. Exercise increases circulation, detoxification, metabolism, and elimination. In short, the “good” stuff is circulated throughout your body more efficiently (such as nutrients, immunity builders and oxygen), and the “bad” stuff gets out of your body quicker (cell waste, toxins). NOTE: If you are just starting to exercise, DO NOT OVERDUE IT, as it will have the opposite effect on your immune system due to too much physical stress. Ease into it. Trust me. I’m one of those that ends up sick because I lost myself in my music and worked out too hard on my first day back to the gym. But I rarely get sick if I’m exercising regularly.

6.) Get Plenty of Good Sleep. When we sleep, we recharge and repair our bodies. We assimilate nutrients (use the foods we eat for cell function, replication, and repair) and our immune system fights off any invaders that can potentially make us sick. If you constantly suffer from sleep deprivation, you will most likely get sick, among other things.

7.) Eat Garlic. Now you don’t have to go out and munch whole raw cloves of garlic, but eat foods with garlic in it. Garlic has natural anti-viral and anti-bacterial properties. Some ways to get garlic is to sprinkle some garlic powder on your food to season it, use fresh garlic in salad dressings or in salsa, roast garlic cloves, or just add garlic to whatever you are cooking, whether it’s sauteing, baking, or stir frying, or using it in your sauce or cooking it with whatever you are making. There are many delicious ways to use garlic. If you are one of those rare people that don’t like garlic, you can also buy odor free supplements.

8.) Drink Plenty of Water and Don’t “Dry Out.” Keep hydrated. If you are in a dry heated environment, you are losing more moisture than normal and you need to drink extra water. If your nasal passages are dry, you are more susceptible to germs invading because your mucus membranes are not working to their full potential. Drinking water, using a humidifier, and as a quick fix, using saline nasal spray, will help. Don’t let your skin dry out either. Water helps circulate nutrients and flush out toxins.

9.) Wash Your Hands and Don’t Touch Your Face. Most germs are passed via direct contact. For example: Someone coughs into their hand, opens the door, then you touch the same door handle, then rub your eye. Bam! Enter the germs. Eyes and nasal passages are the most common entry places for germs.

10.) Avoid Crowded Enclosed Places, If Possible. A la subways, elevators, airplanes, etc. This may not be possible, but if you can, make a concerted effort to avoid these places during flu season. Besides the obvious risk of close contact, you also have to deal with recirculated air.

11.) Keep Your Stress Levels Down. Stress knocks down your immunities. Eliminate the stress that you have control over to eliminate. From there, you just need to deal with the remaining stress. Relax. Go for a walk or some other form of exercise. Breathe. Stretch. Plan ahead. Don’t worry about things that you have no control over. ‘Cause guess what? If you get sick, that’s even MORE stress, and you don’t need that.

Flu Season. Holiday Season… one and the same?

No, I’m not “Bah Humbugging,” but I started  thinking about everything that changes in the Fall: school starts, the weather gets cooler, the days get shorter, and we start a three month season of holidays that involves eating too much sugar, traveling, being in close quarters with people and recirculated dry air, and stress (shopping malls, airports, dealing with family, missing family, financial worries). Do you think it is coincidence that flu season coincides with our holiday season?

“Huh?” You may ask, “what does that mean? It sounds like a contradiction.” Simply put, if you are going to eat something that is deemed “bad” for you (I’ll leave you to decide who is doing the deeming), at least make sure you are eating real, high quality ingredients, free of anything artificial. If possible, use whole foods, rather than processed ingredients.

Let’s take lasagna as an example meal — meat lasagna. The reason I specify meat lasagna is that I want to acknowledge that it is different from a veggie lasagna. I could say substitute a veggie lasagna as a healthier lasagna choice. But honestly, it’s different. A veggie lasagna does not taste like a meat lasagna. I’m not speaking of a vegetarian or vegan version of a meat lasagna. I’m speaking of a lasagna made with vegetables, such as spinach, mushrooms and other veggies. So back to what I was saying…

Use High Quality Ingredients

Make your own sauce, or at least buy an organic sauce. In fact, use all organic ingredients if you can. Stay away from canned tomato products, as the liner has BPA that leaches into the sauce. Instead, use jarred tomato products. Use grass-fed beef, which is high in essential fatty acids (omega-3’s) and free from hormones and antibiotics. Use high quality cheese. If you don’t use organic ingredients, at least make sure you are not consuming anything artificial or may contain herbicides, pesticides, hormones, antibiotics or genetically modified ingredients.

The same goes with any “once-in-awhile” food choice that is not exactly the healthiest.

Remember, food is to be enjoyed, but not over-consumed. If you are, for the most part, healthy and not suffering from a major disease, it’s OK to indulge once-in-awhile. It’s good for a sense of well-being. Since you may not eat this “bad” food very often, make it really good. I always say, if it doesn’t taste really good, then it is not worth it (“it” could be my stomach space, or extra calories, sugar, fat, etc.). Another example is popcorn. Pop it on the stove in high quality oil and put real butter and sea salt on it. Don’t eat that microwave garbage that’s over-salted and contains artificial stuff that your body doesn’t know what to do with. You’ll be amazed at how much better it tastes! If you want a dessert, don’t eat cake made with gmo high frutose corn syrup, transfat and artificial crap. Make your own cake with real, whole ingredients. Or, have an organic blueberry pie, or a hot-fudge sundae made with organic vanilla bean ice cream, organic hot fudge, and organic whipped cream.

We’re all human and we want to indulge. So at least do it right.

Go Do It

Now go give yourself a treat and be “bad.” Indulge without guilt. You deserve it. Just do it right with REAL, whole, good tasting, ingredients. And as I said earlier in so many words, eat good “bad” stuff.