The Perfect Pluot Ain't No Silver Bullet
Alice Waters is full of crap..organic crap I'm sure..but crap still. One of the things that has been rattling around in my brain for the past few weeks is a food piece in the Times Sunday Magazine that ran recently. The author, a frustrated mother calls in Waters to purge her pantry and fridge of "bad, unhealthy" foods. She may also have called her in because she didn't have any other better ideas for a feature but we'll never know.
The author is self-indulgent enough and has time enough apparently, to worry about what her peers would think if they saw the type of foods she has been feeding her two teen boys. To me the lowest rung on the processed food chain is "Bagel Bites". She wasn't buying them Bagel Bites so after I'd realized that it all seemed like whining to me. Anyway, she called in Alice Waters who proceeded to purge her kitchen of all processed foods and then replace them all with exotic organic creations. The boys eat it up for the most part and they live happily ever after. The thing that really cracked me up though was the pluot punchline. Unhappy with the fruit the boys were nibbling, Waters swoops in and presents them with one perfect pluot. All is Zen and off she flies on her organic broomstick or her chauffeur-driven Prius.
A pluot would appeal to my kids, I've no doubt. One pluot for each and then they'd never touch one again. My daughter is a vegetarian and my son is an aristocrat--at least in his mind. She eats Nutella sandwiches on that nasty soft potato bread for lunch each day. My son packs his own lunch and I purposely leave the room when he does. His idea of lunch is a carton of chocolate milk, a bag of Cheetos, some cookies, some crackers and maybe another kind of cookies. Child 1 assures me that he is no different than the boys in her grade. Apparently all boys bring nothing but crunchy, nutritionally worthless carb collections for lunch.
It is not just that my kids won't eat anything normal, it's also that even the foods they like appeal to them for a limited time only. "Oh, we love XXX, the Smiths have XXX, can you buy some?" So I buy some. Usually I go to Costco and buy a large container of the proscribed delicious, wonderful, to die for food item. (In my defense, I have learned NOT to do this.) I get it home and I am a heroine for perhaps two days. Then they eat one or two over a few days and suddenly, whatever they have been pining for, whatever Mrs. Smith buys for her dears becomes repulsive to my children. Fruit rollups, GoGurts, Smurfits--you name it. I've bought it and they've rejected it. I tell them in advance that these things are made from old tire treads and then dyed with food colorings made from beetle dung. I tell them they will not like XXX and I am right. But being right in this case isn't even any fun because it means I have to throw out a case of crap.
I have largely given up on dinner. He likes Trader Joe's macaroni and cheese and toast. Also black beans and brown rice with some chopped up tomato on top. She likes plain pasta and plain rice. She will eat cooked tofu with flavorings from Trader Joe's but I can tell it will be a short infatuation. They have won the dinner battle. I have surrendered for now. But I am stepping up the lunch war armed with Japanese ingenuity. It's Zojirushi to the rescue!
For about two years now, my kids have bitched and moaned about school lunch. They did have a point actually. In its well-meaning crusade to abolish chubby children, there are no seconds. Each kid gets three fish sticks--no more. My tiny children came home snarling or comatose each day. They just weren't getting enough food. That's when I gave in and they began taking lunches each day. But now they want hot lunch that they can bring from home. Why the school doesn't just get a microwave for the kids is beyond me. I'd email the nice man who runs the city's lunch program but why bother? I'm sure there is some very good reason--although I suspect it's mostly because providing a microwave would slow up the lunch lines intolerably.
The war is on now and I've got Zojirushi on my side. I think. These $50 lunch "jars" are made by the Japanese and feature a stainless steel jar with tiny, little containers stored inside. Supposedly they will keep a nutritious protein-rich lunch my midgets require hot or at least warm for 3-4 hours. I'd been hearing about these marvelous magic lunch kits for years and now I am about to enter the lunch battle armed to the teeth. At least that's the hope. If I know my kids, she'll be begging for a ham sandwich in a week and he'll want nothing but apples and bananas for his lunch--for the next two years. And my Zojirushis will wind up in the basement...
The author is self-indulgent enough and has time enough apparently, to worry about what her peers would think if they saw the type of foods she has been feeding her two teen boys. To me the lowest rung on the processed food chain is "Bagel Bites". She wasn't buying them Bagel Bites so after I'd realized that it all seemed like whining to me. Anyway, she called in Alice Waters who proceeded to purge her kitchen of all processed foods and then replace them all with exotic organic creations. The boys eat it up for the most part and they live happily ever after. The thing that really cracked me up though was the pluot punchline. Unhappy with the fruit the boys were nibbling, Waters swoops in and presents them with one perfect pluot. All is Zen and off she flies on her organic broomstick or her chauffeur-driven Prius.
A pluot would appeal to my kids, I've no doubt. One pluot for each and then they'd never touch one again. My daughter is a vegetarian and my son is an aristocrat--at least in his mind. She eats Nutella sandwiches on that nasty soft potato bread for lunch each day. My son packs his own lunch and I purposely leave the room when he does. His idea of lunch is a carton of chocolate milk, a bag of Cheetos, some cookies, some crackers and maybe another kind of cookies. Child 1 assures me that he is no different than the boys in her grade. Apparently all boys bring nothing but crunchy, nutritionally worthless carb collections for lunch.
It is not just that my kids won't eat anything normal, it's also that even the foods they like appeal to them for a limited time only. "Oh, we love XXX, the Smiths have XXX, can you buy some?" So I buy some. Usually I go to Costco and buy a large container of the proscribed delicious, wonderful, to die for food item. (In my defense, I have learned NOT to do this.) I get it home and I am a heroine for perhaps two days. Then they eat one or two over a few days and suddenly, whatever they have been pining for, whatever Mrs. Smith buys for her dears becomes repulsive to my children. Fruit rollups, GoGurts, Smurfits--you name it. I've bought it and they've rejected it. I tell them in advance that these things are made from old tire treads and then dyed with food colorings made from beetle dung. I tell them they will not like XXX and I am right. But being right in this case isn't even any fun because it means I have to throw out a case of crap.
I have largely given up on dinner. He likes Trader Joe's macaroni and cheese and toast. Also black beans and brown rice with some chopped up tomato on top. She likes plain pasta and plain rice. She will eat cooked tofu with flavorings from Trader Joe's but I can tell it will be a short infatuation. They have won the dinner battle. I have surrendered for now. But I am stepping up the lunch war armed with Japanese ingenuity. It's Zojirushi to the rescue!
For about two years now, my kids have bitched and moaned about school lunch. They did have a point actually. In its well-meaning crusade to abolish chubby children, there are no seconds. Each kid gets three fish sticks--no more. My tiny children came home snarling or comatose each day. They just weren't getting enough food. That's when I gave in and they began taking lunches each day. But now they want hot lunch that they can bring from home. Why the school doesn't just get a microwave for the kids is beyond me. I'd email the nice man who runs the city's lunch program but why bother? I'm sure there is some very good reason--although I suspect it's mostly because providing a microwave would slow up the lunch lines intolerably.
The war is on now and I've got Zojirushi on my side. I think. These $50 lunch "jars" are made by the Japanese and feature a stainless steel jar with tiny, little containers stored inside. Supposedly they will keep a nutritious protein-rich lunch my midgets require hot or at least warm for 3-4 hours. I'd been hearing about these marvelous magic lunch kits for years and now I am about to enter the lunch battle armed to the teeth. At least that's the hope. If I know my kids, she'll be begging for a ham sandwich in a week and he'll want nothing but apples and bananas for his lunch--for the next two years. And my Zojirushis will wind up in the basement...
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