Everyone knows that fruits and vegetables are by far the healthiest foods to eat. They are full of nutrients and phytonutrients that we need to stay healthy. Even if your child is a picky eater, sometimes you can think of a few foods that they like which are vegetables. My six year old daughter likes: artichokes, pickles, olives and carrots. With the carrots, if I just put a bowl out she will eat them, but if I ask her to eat them she will start crying and protest she doesn’t want to. She doesn’t do well with pressure.
What I learned from Dr. Pescatore, a NYC physician, who practices integrative medicine and does allergy testing, is that the healthiest way to eat is to rotate foods so you aren’t eating the same food everyday. Kids would prefer to eat the same thing day after day, but building a little variety into their diet ensures they are getting different nutrients and not eating the same molecule day after day. It also prevents allergies and intolerances. We try to do this with snacks, fruits, nuts as well as vegetables. Here is our snack rotation:
corn chips
rice cakes
potato chips or potato flyers
Another important thing to know about the food rotating is that it helps build the immune system.
Anonymous - I am a microeconomist (living in Tucson, AZ) trying to upgrade all of the individual food items I purchase for my family. I thought it would be interesting how I evaluated one food item: cranberry juice. The run-of -the mill brands of cranberry juice are sold in 64 oz. bottles and are 25% juice The high quality brands are 100% juice and are sold in 32 oz bottles. So, to do fair price comparisons I converted everything to 64 oz bottle equivilants and 100% juice equivalents. Therefore, the Ocean Spray 64 oz bottle of 25% juice and 75% water (at $2.75/bottle) becomes a 64 oz bottle of 100% juice at $11.00/bottle. The 32 oz. of 100% organic Knudson (at $8.49/bottle) becomes a 64 oz bottle of 100 % juice at $16.98/bottle and so on.
Here are three brands I located:
1) Ocean spray at Wal*Mart supercenter with no artifical flavoring, preservatives or coloring BUT with “natural flavor, fumaric acid and sodium citrate”. $11.00
2)Knudson (at Albertsons and Wild Oats supermarkets) Organic and 100% pure. Nothing added . $16.98
3) L & A (at Basha’s supermarket). 100% pure but not organic. Nothing added. $11.38
So to go from run of the mill to 100 % pure costs only an additional 38 cents, but to go from 100% pure to 100% pure AND ORGANIC costs an additional $5.60. As far as the taste is concerned both the Knudson and L & A brands, when diluted and sweetened with Splenda tasted the same. By the way the 100% juice has to be diluted and sweetened to be drinkable. But as far as the end result is concerned: the flavor of either of these was absolutely incredible compared to the Ocean Spray. So, since I decided that I couldn’t affort the ORGANIC I decided on the 100% pure L & A. Life is a compromise: I would love to go organic, but I can only afford 100% pure. Bill/Tucson