When you blog about kids and food, people ask you questions. Especially this time of year, when sweets flow like lava and the sugar high carries you from trick-or-treats to Easter baskets. What do you do about the candy?

So here it is. The post about the candy.

Americans spend more than $2 billion a year on Halloween candy. Two. Billion.

Our Halloween night strategy is pretty simple. After trick-or-treating, costume silliness, and the obligatory ritual of dumping the haul and comparing it with friends, we divide and conquer. Anything with trans fats, high-fructose corn syrup, artificial colors or gelatin (it’s a veg thing) gets tossed. Right in the garbage. (Though last year we kept a bunch to use for decorating gingerbread houses, and that was fun.)

What’s left goes in a candy jar. Tess gets a few pieces that night, but then the jar is stored out of sight. After that, if she asks for something from the jar, we decide case by case. If she’s had other junk that day or it’s close to bedtime, no go. Otherwise we let her pick a piece. But we might dip into that thing once every month or two. It’s out of sight, so she just forgets about it.

When Tess was in preschool, and we visited just a few neighbors’ houses, we’d let her pick a piece, dump the rest and call it a night. Now she helps me sort and toss. We talk about why the ingredients are bad, how they affect our bodies, and how there are better (and tastier) alternatives anyway. We do the same with birthday-party goody bags. She’s first and foremost a chocolate girl, so we’re fortunate that most of the candy doesn’t even appeal to her. Except for Smarties, which I give a pass for food dye because they’re so pastel I figure it can’t be that much. And she eats, what, like a roll a year?

Orange you glad they make this?

But if your kids are more likely to balk at the loss of a Tootsie Pop, you can always have alternative treats on hand for trades. YummyEarth makes great-tasting lollipops. Or swap gummy candies for Annie’s fruit snacks. It’s all still sugar-sugar-sugar, but at least you avoid the other nasties.

I’ve been hearing a lot lately about Great Pumpkins and Halloween Fairies and Switch Witches and other magical creatures who come in the night and swap candy for toys. I’d rather have Tess involved in the process than avoid the conversation by letting some nighttime sprite do the deed. But I suppose the swap fairy could be fun if your kid understands why the candy goes poof. The more that children understand the reasons behind food choices, the smarter the decisions they’ll make on their own. That sounds pretty self-help cheeseball, I know, but it actually works.

So what if Tess wants to eat something we’ve put in the toss pile? We let her. Because the surest way to get a kid to appreciate real food is to let her taste the opposite. Usually a bite or two is all it takes. Which may be why I have a budding chocolate snob on my hands. Drugstore chocolate is no match for the good dark stuff.

Sticky and icky

And what do trick-or-treaters find at our door? (No, not toothbrushes. Though a dentist in my neighborhood did that when I was a kid. Bad idea.) For years we’ve done small tubs of Play-Doh, temporary tattoos, bouncy balls, pencils and notepads, that sort of thing. Last year we gave out the YummyEarth lollipops, too, if only to tip the balance in the treat bags. I know others who do mini raisin boxes, or small bags of nuts, crackers or pretzels (though you still have to label-read for crazy ingredients). Our local food co-op sells bulk ginger chews and mini fair-trade chocolate bars (also available here). And a reader, Karen, alerted me to an organization called Green Halloween that has a terrific list of treat alternatives. Love (love!) the nature items. Or you could get really radical and give away junk-food carrots. (See my previous post on that here.)

Now. Wait. Listen. Someone, somewhere, is saying some variation of this: “Sheesh. It’s Halloween. It’s one day a year. Lighten up and let the kids have their candy, already!”

But, see, that’s the problem. It’s not just one day a year. It’s Halloween night and class parties and community events and then the winter holidays and Valentine’s Day and Easter and birthday parties and swimming class and soccer games and the bank and the shoe store and restaurants with kid menus and the grandparents’ house and anyplace else kids set foot, including, of course, school. The sugar culture is so strong, the highly processed foodstuffs so epidemic, that we no longer have the luxury of viewing these things in isolation. It’s not just a few Halloween treats or one blue cupcake. It’s a crushing pile of chemical-laden pseudo food. And at some point we just have to make it stop.

So yes, I say boo.

What do you think? Do you have a sweets strategy? Treat tales? Tell me how you plan to handle all that candy on All Hallows Eve.

This post originally appeared on Spoonfed last Halloween, and we had quite a discussion about the candy onslaught, non-food alternatives and the ethics of throwing candy away. Then I followed up with this post about the days after the big night. (Hint: Limiting candy does not ruin childhood.) And in December, we used the Halloween stash to decorate (non-edible) gingerbread houses. Tootsie Rolls make great logs.

Spoonfed is on Facebook. You’ll find links to blog posts, news and commentary on raising food-literate kids, questions and comments from readers, voices, viewpoints, the works. Stop by, like the page, chime in, spread the word. (Thanks.)

This post is linked into Fight Back Fridays.

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PBS is showing the movie “Food Inc.” tonight. So I’m pulling out a review I wrote when the movie debuted. Have you seen the film? Planning to watch tonight? Maybe recording it to watch later with your kids? (See more about kid viewing below.)

You’ll never look at food the same way again. I promise. So watch (check your local listings here), then come tell me what you thought.

Food fight

Real food. Whether we grow it or just eat it, here’s my definition: Something that grows in the ground or grazes on it, then is harvested with care and left in as natural a state as possible until it’s consumed. By us. Hopefully with appreciation for where it came from.

I think about this subject a lot. Like all the time, obsessively. And I talk about it, too, which gets mixed reactions. Some friends share my passion. Others wish I would shut up already. The teachers at my daughter’s preschool graciously indulged our practice of supplying our own snacks every day. But the counselors at her summer camp gave blank stares when I suggested that blue ice pops were not real food.

So it’s no surprise that my husband and I found ourselves at a screening of the documentary “Food Inc.,” which showed at the Little Theatre in May as part of the Rochester High Falls International Film Festival. The movie, which has just been released nationwide, argues for a simpler, more transparent and democratic food system — instead of the overly mechanized and subsidized, oligarchic system that has taken its toll on our collective health and the health of the planet.

Thanks to industrialized agriculture, “the way we eat has changed more in the last 50 years than in the previous 10,000,” the food writer Michael Pollan says in the film.

Predictably, there are dark themes: the death of a 2-year-old boy who ate an E. coli-tainted hamburger; farmers intimidated into debt and out of business; chickens bred for breasts so large that the birds can’t stand; a family forced to choose cheap fast food over fresh produce because otherwise they couldn’t afford the father’s (diabetes-related) medicine; and a “hamburger filler” factory where animal parts are sanitized with ammonia and smooshed like fruit roll-ups.

But as people in the audience covered their eyes and cringed, I wanted to shout out for everyone to sit up, look straight ahead and face down the food on their plates. Then, maybe, hopefully, take a deep breath and next time make a different choice.

I’ve been encouraged by the growth of the local-foods movement in western New York, by the rise of so many new farmers’ markets and CSAs (community-supported farms). And by the new crop of idealistic — yet in no way naïve — farmers and producers who’ve embraced our agrarian roots and brought us closer again to food the way it was meant to be eaten.

But if enough of us vote with our forks, even Big Food will play along. With momentum and some loud voices, food policy could shift away from subsidies for monoculture crops like corn and soybeans and toward the development of diverse, sustainable agriculture, making healthy food the norm, no matter your address or paycheck.

Until then? Plant a garden or at least some tomatoes, visit a market, join a CSA, buy pastured meat and dairy, make some jam. And when it hits local theaters, see “Food Inc.” Popcorn optional.

For a little extra inspiration, check out this “Food Inc.” discussion guide from the Center for Ecoliteracy. It’s aimed at high school students, but, as I wrote in a previous post, there’s a case to be made for showing the film even to younger kids. Or at least for talking with them about the issues it raises. We haven’t shown our 7-year-old the movie yet, but we plan to soon. 

Need help deciding whether to let your children watch? Check out these kid-centric reviews from Common Sense Media and Parent Previews.

This post originally appeared on Spoonfed in April 2010, when PBS showed the film in honor of Earth Day.

Spoonfed is on Facebook. You’ll find links to blog posts, news and commentary on raising food-literate kids, questions and comments from readers, voices, viewpoints, the works. Stop by, like the page, chime in, spread the word. (Thanks.)

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Let’s set aside my love affair with real maple syrup* and concentrate instead on the fact that Pinnacle Foods, which makes Mrs. Butterworth’s, is trying to turn its bottles into toys by having kids download “up to 60 playful accessories” for its new “spring collection.” From the press release:

“Mrs. Butterworth’s syrup debuts three newly outfitted limited-edition bottles in select stores, each featuring a unique spring look that unlocks a different downloadable cut-out accessory collection online, encouraging family fun at the breakfast table. … From dress-up to game day to a beach party, Mrs. Butterworth’s has accessories for every occasion.”

Corn Syrup Couture for the whole family!

Things kicked off with a “Family Breakfast Ball” Sunday in Atlanta, which generated a ton of publicity and the predictable gushing among bloggers quick to sell their souls for free samples. Sigh.

*For the record, real maple syrup does not contain: high-fructose corn syrup, corn syrup, water, salt, cellulose gum, molasses, potassium sorbate (preservative), sodium hexametaphosphate, natural and artifical flavor (caramel color, corn syrup), artificial flavor, citric acid, caramel color, mono and diglycerides.

This post is linked into Real Food Wednesdays.

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In a different mood, I might appreciate the irony of such a blatant food-dye holiday falling two weeks before the FDA is set to examine the connection between artificial food colors and children’s behavior. A holiday where people don’t just buy synthetically altered food, but deliberately tint it bright green themselves (a nifty American spin that no doubt would stump St. Patrick).

Shamrocks on her head,
not in her cereal bowl

Yet last week’s crush of screaming green food came right after we’d returned from a trip to Washington, D.C. There, neon colors filled kids’ cereal bowls at the hotel breakfast buffet. School buses of field-trippers chowed pseudo-food at museum McDonald’s. And stroller-pushing parents handed Coke bottles to thirsty kids. It was everyday insanity amplified by the temporary crazy of St. Patrick’s Day. So I wasn’t feeling the fun. In fact I was rethinking green’s status as my favorite color.

But I’ve been trying to remind myself that nature had the color first. That nature owns that color. And that St. Paddy’s celebrations can be just as fun without the petrochemical fix. Last Thursday, Tess and her classmates had a visit from the requisite leprechaun, who toppled books, cut a pair of tiny boots from green felt and left glitter in his wake. But all the kids found in their leprechaun traps were Irish pins and plastic shamrocks. No candy. No dyed-green food. No party, even. Did the kids care? Not a whit.

Now, with the FDA hearings upon us (March 30-31), I’m choosing to believe that we can reclaim green for the natural color it is. I’m under no illusions. Bureaucracy is slow. Artificial colors are rampant. And change needs more than two days of talks. But, in the last couple of months, there’s been a buzz about food dyes that I haven’t seen before. (Including this recent study showing that food, not drugs, may be more effective in treating ADHD.) So, hey, I’m looking on the bright side.

But let’s make sure the FDA has plenty of information: Check out this petition from the makers of the movie “Fresh.” Add your signature and/or comment, and the filmmakers will overnight the petition on March 22 to be received by the FDA on March 23. [Update on March 22: "Fresh" organizers say they'll also provide the FDA with an electronic link for comments received between March 23 and March 30, so there's still time to weigh in.] Whether you have a personal story to share, or just want artificial colors out of our food supply, it takes just a minute to lend your voice. I’ve added my name and a link to Spoonfed discussions on the issue:

Dyeing to know: Easter egg science lesson (April 2, 2010)
Food-dye research. Artificial colors in the United States vs. overseas. And using natural egg dyes as a lesson in fake vs. real.

Color me annoyed (April 9, 2010)
Green popsicles and blue ice cream underscore the prevalence of food dyes in school and summer camp.

The color of trouble (January 22, 2011)
A comprehensive overview of food dyes and the problems they cause, with a bonus farewell to neon birthday cake. (And, incidentally, the most-shared Spoonfed post ever.) An excerpt:

“Artificial colors are the charlatans of food additives: enticing, seemingly harmless… then wham. Linked to long-term health problems, these petroleum-derived chemicals often have immediate and devastating effects on children’s behavior and ability to learn. And unlike when we were kids (and our parents were kids), artificial colors are in everything, from food to toothpaste to medicine, even things that are white or look natural (check your pickles and “blueberries” ). Since 1955, that’s added up to a five-fold increase in dye consumption.”

Any St. Paddy’s tales to share? Vacation observations? Other insights while we ponder the crazy stuff that passes for food?

This post is linked into Real Food Wednesdays and Fight Back Fridays.

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All week I’ve been seeing stories about Walmart-style food reform and food manufacturers’ self-serving nutrition labels, about fake meat, fake blueberries and fake maple syrup. Stories about all the ways the food industry tricks us, and all the ways people get mad about the food industry tricking us. 

So here’s a thought: Let’s stop playing the game. Ignore the labels. Don’t look at numbers. Don’t believe the box or the commercial or the nice kid at the counter. Just… read the ingredients. 

Numbers, schmumbers

When we talk to our children about food, we don’t say, “Here, sweetie, eat these 270 calories and 6 grams of protein with 16% of your daily fiber requirement.” No, it’s just, “Here, try this granola.” Or this apple or egg salad or cookie. We talk about the food, the taste, the fact that the granola has cashews and locally grown oats and real maple syrup. Or that the eggs came from a farmer at the market. The apple, too. And that the cookie is so damn good because it’s made from real food, not industrial oils or refined sugars. (I’m talking to you, Girl Scouts.)  

When we cook together, we measure and chop and make a mess. (And I, at least, try to keep my Type A in check.) We don’t calculate daily nutrient values or worry whether recipes conform to the archaic and lobbyist-driven USDA food pyramid. We don’t confuse “food” for food, or accept that a box o’ fortified nutrients is a substitute for the real thing.   

The food industry, though, wants us to do exactly that. It wants us to think in terms of nutritionism, which puts the focus on percentages and components instead of straight-up ingredients. If the package touts calcium or Vitamin C or nothing-short-of-a-miracle health claims, we’re supposed to forget the ingredients list the size of a brick (and about as healthful, too). Or be so confused that we pick the prettiest box and call it a day. 

And it works. Lots of smart, thinking people don’t read ingredients. Which is how food manufacturers get away with healthy-labeling claims like the outrageous “Better for You” program that greenlights more than 200 barely edibles including Chocolate Lucky Charms and Kid Cuisine Carnival Corn Dog. And which is why food marketing to children has become so egregious. (Remember the McEducation nutrition workshops?) If we didn’t buy into it, they wouldn’t do it.  

So let’s not. Sure, it’s tedious to read ingredients. Ingredient-speak can seem indecipherable, and restaurant ingredients aren’t obvious unless you ask or check websites. But it’s not rocket science. If you could conceivably use an ingredient in your own kitchen — and it came from nature, not a lab — then, for the most part, you’re good.  

Once you do start reading, brace for epiphanies of epic proportions. No joke. We’re talking eye-opening, life-changing stuff. (Like the insane prevalence of artificial colors, which we’ve been discussing here.) 

Two resources that help break it down bite-size: 

“Food Rules,” Michael Pollan’s condensed version of “In Defense of Food,” is a short, clear guide to making wise food choices. Pollan lists 64 “rules” (don’t eat breakfast cereals that change the color of the milk… sweeten and salt your food yourself… avoid food products containing ingredients that a third-grader cannot pronounce). But there’s nothing absolute or militant here. It’s all about using good sense. 

Fooducate’s free iPhone app scans UPC codes to assess products with an algorithm that favors real ingredients, actual (vs. fortified) nutrients and minimal processing. I just downloaded the app and haven’t tried it yet, but it looks promising. 

Another round of labeling madness hits Monday, when the USDA is set to release updated dietary guidelines, but I won’t be batting an eye. It doesn’t matter whether we’re talking about the food pyramid or front-of-package labels or the “nutrition facts” panel. If there’s a number attached to it, ignore it. Read the words, understand the ingredients, eat real food. You with me? 

Update on February 1: Jenna Pepper over at Food with Kid Appeal has a good assessment today of why the new USDA dietary guidelines once again miss the big picture. (Scroll down to the section titled “My reaction to the USDA dietary guidelines.”) Jenna explains why “reducing factory food is a better dietary guideline than reducing calorie consumption.” (Sing it!) That includes factory-made low-fat milk, because, as she correctly points out: “Last time I checked, milk coming out of a cow contains fat; it takes a factory to remove it and add it back in in varying percentages.”   

This post is linked into Real Food Wednesdays and Fight Back Fridays.

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When you blog about kids and food, people ask you questions. Especially this time of year, when sweets flow like lava and the sugar high carries you from trick-or-treats to Easter baskets. What do you do about the candy?

So here it is. The post about the candy.

Americans spend more than $2 billion a year on Halloween candy. Two. Billion.

Our Halloween night strategy is pretty simple. After trick-or-treating, costume silliness, and the obligatory ritual of dumping the haul and comparing it with friends, we divide and conquer. Anything with trans fats, high-fructose corn syrup, artificial colors or gelatin (it’s a veg thing) gets tossed. Right in the garbage. (Though last year we kept a bunch to use for decorating gingerbread houses, and that was fun.)

What’s left goes in a candy jar. Tess gets a few pieces that night, but then the jar is stored out of sight. After that, if she asks for something from the jar, we decide case by case. If she’s had other junk that day or it’s close to bedtime, no go. Otherwise we let her pick a piece. But we might dip into that thing once every month or two. It’s out of sight, so she just forgets about it.

When Tess was in preschool, and we visited just a few neighbors’ houses, we’d let her pick a piece, dump the rest and call it a night. Now she helps me sort and toss. We talk about why the ingredients are bad, how they affect our bodies, and how there are better (and tastier) alternatives anyway. We do the same with birthday-party goody bags. She’s first and foremost a chocolate girl, so we’re fortunate that most of the candy doesn’t even appeal to her. Except for Smarties, which I give a pass for food dye because they’re so pastel I figure it can’t be that much. And she eats, what, like a roll a year?

Orange you glad they make this?

But if your kids are more likely to balk at the loss of a Tootsie Pop, you can always have alternative treats on hand for trades. YummyEarth makes great-tasting lollipops. Or swap gummy candies for Annie’s fruit snacks. It’s all still sugar-sugar-sugar, but at least you avoid the other nasties.

I’ve been hearing a lot lately about Great Pumpkins and Halloween Fairies and Switch Witches and other magical creatures who come in the night and swap candy for toys. I’d rather have Tess involved in the process than avoid the conversation by letting some nighttime sprite do the deed. But I suppose the swap fairy could be fun if your kid understands why the candy goes poof. The more that children understand the reasons behind food choices, the smarter the decisions they’ll make on their own. That sounds pretty self-help cheeseball, I know, but it actually works.

So what if Tess wants to eat something we’ve put in the toss pile? We let her. Because the surest way to get a kid to appreciate real food is to let her taste the opposite. Usually a bite or two is all it takes. Which may be why I have a budding chocolate snob on my hands. Drugstore chocolate is no match for the good dark stuff.

Sticky and icky

And what do trick-or-treaters find at our door? (No, not toothbrushes. Though a dentist in my neighborhood did that when I was a kid. Bad idea.) For years we’ve done small tubs of Play-Doh, temporary tattoos, bouncy balls, pencils and notepads, that sort of thing. Last year we gave out the YummyEarth lollipops, too, if only to tip the balance in the treat bags. I know others who do mini raisin boxes, or small bags of nuts, crackers or pretzels (though you still have to label-read for crazy ingredients). Our local food co-op sells bulk ginger chews and mini fair-trade chocolate bars (also available here). And a reader, Karen, alerted me to an organization called Green Halloween that has a terrific list of treat alternatives. Love (love!) the nature items. Or you could get really radical and give away junk-food carrots. (See my previous post on that here.)

Now. Wait. Listen. Someone, somewhere, is saying some variation of this: “Sheesh. It’s Halloween. It’s one day a year. Lighten up and let the kids have their candy, already!

But, see, that’s the problem. It’s not just one day a year. It’s Halloween night and class parties and community events and then the winter holidays and Valentine’s Day and Easter and birthday parties and swimming class and soccer games and the bank and the shoe store and restaurants with kid menus and the grandparents’ house and anyplace else kids set foot, including, of course, school. The sugar culture is so strong, the highly processed foodstuffs so epidemic, that we no longer have the luxury of viewing these things in isolation. It’s not just a few Halloween treats or one blue cupcake. It’s a crushing pile of chemical-laden pseudo food. And at some point we just have to make it stop.

So yes, I say boo.

What do you think? Do you have a sweets strategy? Treat tales? Tell me how you plan to handle all that candy on All Hallows Eve.

In other Halloween news: Chipotle, the restaurant chain that tries to give fast food a good name, is sponsoring a hilarious costume contest, with proceeds benefiting Jamie Oliver’s Food Revolution. Dress as your favorite ”horrifying processed food product,” go to any Chipotle after 6 p.m. on Halloween and get a meal for two bucks. Then submit a picture of yourself (in costume, in a Chipotle) and enter to win some serious cash. Love this. Not sure I’ll do it. But I love it.

This post is linked into Real Food Wednesdays, Fight Back Fridays and Vegetarian Foodie Fridays.

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I realize that state-fair food is a category unto itself, a passionately defended paean to Americana and summertime. And to criticize it could cause a distracting uproar. Some might even offer me their fried-fave-on-a-stick with instructions to make it disappear right up my behind.     

Dumpling to go

So I’ll just say that we did not partake of the many fried delicacies during our trek to the New York State Fair. But that doesn’t mean we didn’t eat food-on-a-stick. Witness the tasty organic dumplings we ate on forks on the way. And you think I’m no fun.   

But there was another side to fair food that caught me by surprise. Sure, I knew there would be buildings full of cows, pigs, chickens and other farm animals. And I knew that many of those animals — despite the wholesome, gee-whiz facade — had come from or were destined for the industrial food machine that spits out the giant corn dogs being sold steps away. And yes, I went anyway. We’d never been. I write about food and agriculture. I wanted to see it for myself.   

What I wasn’t prepared for was the propaganda with a capital “P.” Big old greasy shtick-on-a-stick. And most of it aimed at kids.   

The most blatant was in the quaint, barn-themed “education center” sponsored by New York Agriculture in the Classroom, under the title “Dairy Fact or Myth.”   

Ponder these two “facts”:   

“Only happy, healthy cows give milk.”   

TRUE. “In order to produce high quality milk, farmers must provide their cows with a clean, dry and comfortable place to live, and plenty of food and water.”   

The whole truth: Even stressed-out, crammed-tight, poorly fed cows give milk. In fact, it’s the foundation of our country’s dairy industry. I wish it were true that only happy cows gave milk, because then we’d have a nation of pastured, sunlight-soaking bovines. But right now? Not so.

Happy cow. Grass. Fresh air. But, oops, it's a statue!

On a related note, a nearby chart cheerfully detailed cows’ ability to “serve as food recyclers by eating the leftovers of the food manufacturing process that would otherwise go to waste.” I suppose they get points for honesty. Many cows do indeed eat food waste. But that doesn’t mean they should. Or that it’s good for them. Or us.   

“Even very large farms are family owned and operated.”   

TRUE. “According to the USDA, 99% of all U.S. dairy farms are family owned and operated.”   

The whole truth: Just because a farm is owned by a family doesn’t mean the practices are sustainable. It doesn’t mean the animals are treated well. But this is what the dairy lobby wants us to think when it promotes the idea of the “family farm.” And since the vast majority of milk in the U.S. is bought and packaged by a few big corporations, most dairy farmers have to play by corporate rules or lose business. When you look at it like that, family ownership doesn’t really matter much, does it?   

(For another example of how Big Ag co-opts the “family farm,” check out the farmer image campaign announced during this year’s Illinois State Fair. Behind the campaign: Illinois Beef Association, Illinois Corn Marketing Board, Illinois Pork Producers Association and Illinois Soybean Association. One big happy family.)   

Not a live birth, but still a star attraction

So, OK, I find the whole ag-education claim behind state fairs dubious, anyway. If you want your kids to see farm animals, well, visit an actual farm. Or a farm-animal sanctuary. It makes me sad to see animals cooped up and gawked at. It’s why we don’t do circuses or animal acts, and why, though I’ve come to terms with zoos because of their conservation work, I don’t really enjoy them. And thank god the New York State Fair doesn’t have live birthing exhibits like the one in Minnesota co-sponsored by one of the largest industrial pig farms in the country. Or like the one in California where a panicked pregnant cow was shot to death this summer.   

But here’s the thing: When a group like New York Agriculture in the Classroom (NYAITC) presents information, kids and parents assume it’s true. And why wouldn’t they? The program does a lot of neat things. It gives grants for school gardens, provides classroom resources and sponsors a student art contest to promote local agriculture. (I wrote about our experience with that contest here). But the fact is it’s funded not only by Cornell University and the New York State agriculture and education departments, but also by the New York Farm Bureau, which is an agribusiness lobbying group. And that makes things messy.   

Here’s another example: NYAITC posted a question on its Facebook page, asking for chicken-themed books to share with second-graders for an ag-literacy week highlighting the poultry industry. I asked if picture books would work. The reply: “as long as the (books) portray a realistic and positive look at all sides of the poultry industry.”   

Smart chickie

I responded with a recommendation for “Louise, The Adventures of a Chicken,” by Kate DiCamillo and Harry Bliss (which I wrote about here). I explained the relevant plot point — how Louise rallies her fellow chickens to break free of a cage — and added something like: “I’m not sure what you mean by a realistic and positive look at all sides, since what’s ‘realistic’ isn’t always ‘positive,’ but second-graders certainly would benefit from learning that chickens should be raised outside, not in cages.”   

I say “something like” because I can’t remember the exact words. And I can’t check the page, because my comment was deleted.   

When I e-mailed someone from the group to find out why, she told me NYAITC censors its page “to be sure we aren’t distributing propaganda” or presenting “extremist” data as “agricultural reality.” Later, when I asked how she could deny that inhumane and unsanitary conditions are indeed agricultural reality, I got the end-run: “Quality agriculture exists on all scales and we protect them at AITC by trying to make sure all farms are represented fairly.”   

Fair enough. Just because a farm is big doesn’t mean it’s bad. But, really, when is it ever good to pack chickens in so tight that they can’t act like chickens?   

Never. The answer is never.   

Now back to the fair. Lest you think it was one big downer, let me say there were some up notes, too, like displays on farming techniques through history, a New York produce stand and two on-site restaurants serving local food. The New York honey and maple industries were well-represented. And on the non-food front, our 6-year-old loved the exhibits on tree and water conservation, and the woodworking and fiber-arts demonstrations.   

And, finally, there was “Dairyville 2010,” the 800-pound butter sculpture showing a small dairy farm on one side and, on the other, a town powered by the farm’s cow manure. At least that was a nod to sustainability. And after the fair, the butter was to be converted to biofuel for a nearby college’s buses. Good stuff.  

Propaganda? Not so much.

But the best thing of all? Turns out that state-fair butter sculptures were created by the dairy industry as propaganda to combat competition from margarine makers. Which is some delicious irony now that we know butter rules and margarine drools (as my daughter said this week in her new first-grade slang).   

Now it’s just a matter of time before all this sustainable-agriculture “propaganda” shows itself for the truth it is.  

The NYS Fair is over for this year, but plenty of other fairs are under way or still to come. Did you go to a state fair this year? In years past? Any thoughts on kiddie propaganda and all that unfair food?  

This post is linked into Real Food Wednesdays, Fight Back Fridays, Vegetarian Foodie Fridays and Wholesome Whole Foods.

Copyright protected by Digiprove © 2010 Christina Le Beau

Have you heard about the new ad campaign that’s branding baby carrots as junk food? Not an alternative to junk food. But junk food’s cheeky, farm-fresh cousin. There will be crinkly, snacky-type bags, some sold in vending machines, all labeled with the hipster directive to “Eat ‘em like junk food.”

In a world of food gone crazy, this is one of the dumbest things I’ve ever seen.

All they need is orange dust

Something like 50 carrot growers are teaming up to spend $25 million to persuade parents and kids that eating carrots is good not because carrots are nutritional powerhouses and tasty, too, but because they’re orange and doodle-shaped like Cheetos. (Haven’t we been down this road with cartoon characters?)

Here’s Bolthouse Farms CEO Jeff Dunn (a former Coca-Cola executive) in yesterday’s USA Today story: “It’s not an anti-junk-food campaign. It takes a page out of junk food’s playbook and applies it to baby carrots.”

Because, of course, junk food is such a good role model.

But the best bit belongs to advertising psychologist Carol Moog, who, according to the story, “says kids may be disappointed to find all the flashy ads are really just for carrots. She says they need to make carrots more fun — like, perhaps, putting an orange (but natural) dusting on carrots that mimics Cheetos.”

Moment of silence, please, as I ponder the ridiculousness of that statement.

So. What do you think? Harmless fun? Or hell in a handbasket?

Some trivia: Did you know that “baby” carrots are, in fact, whole carrots chopped and whittled to nubs? Fascinating backstory here. 

This post is linked into Real Food Wednesdays, Fight Back Fridays, Vegetarian Foodie Fridays and Wholesome Whole Foods.

Copyright protected by Digiprove © 2010 Christina Le Beau