Q: How do you convey to a child that you are not serving the food he wants right now because it is not healthy (ideally without becoming the meany he would think I was)? In this example, he wanted waffles (with lots of syrup) or pancakes or doughnuts. The child is already extremely obese. He is sensitive to his weight, so I sure wouldn't want to point out the connection about eating this and becoming even fatter, also to not make him feel bad about himself. I know when I want some dessert (that's what I call waffles and doughnuts), I wouldn't stop or even care now because of some consequences later. How do I get him to eat healthy without ruining our relationship or his self-esteem?

A: You're not going to like me for this answer. Keep Reading…

Golly gee, it's happened to me! My son, E, age 7, has turned into a pasta-craving picky eater. Fruits are fine, but bread products are preferred. Vegetables look to him like 4-inch hypodermic needles poised to pierce his skin. And everywhere we go, he notices the desserts. Life has become a never-ending negotiation about how much of this he has to eat before he gets some of that.

I tell you this not to brag (yeah, right), but so you will think, "Ha! Howie goes telling everyone else how to feed their kids and here he can't even do it right in his own home. What a fraud!"

No, wait. That's not right either. Keep Reading…

Q: How exactly do I make a breakfast smoothie that includes green leafy veggies. Do I put them straight into the blender with the other ingredients or juice them first? 

Keep Reading…

Andrea Beaman is one of the most sensible and kind voices out there on the topic of feeding and treating yourself right. What other health and nutrition guru would admit to smoking the occasional cigarette (but only after a couple of drinks!), and explain it in a way that shows us how to quit all our unhealthy addictions?

Andrea was FitFam's guest on the December Member Call. Listen online (60 min) or download the mp3 below to discover:

• several healthy holiday treats
• whether short fasts during the holiday season will make things better or worse
• the mindset shift that allows anyone to "find the time" to prepare healthy food every day
• three convenience foods that can turn anyone into a healthy short-order cook on a moment's notice
• how to quit smoking by not quitting smoking
• the secret to breaking food addictions without struggling or feeling deprived

Kathleen Melanson, Director of the University of Rhode Island's Energy Metabolism Laboratory, is conducting a series of brilliant and simple experiments about the connection between how fast we eat and how many calories we consume.

One experiment even got press in USA Today: 30 college-age women were asked to eat a meal of pasta and sauce with grated cheese, and a glass of water on two different occasions. One time they were asked to eat quickly, and were given a large spoon and bowl, and the other time they were asked to eat as slowly as possible, with a small spoon and bowl, and instructed to place their spoon down between bites.

The results: Keep Reading…

Q: My kids visit me (the dad) pretty much every weekend, and I'm committed to feeding them nutritious food and teaching them about being healthy. But their mom, who's responsible for them during the week, lets them eat whatever they want. I don't want their visits with me to turn into "food fights" – any advice on how to handle this situation? Keep Reading…

Q: Is it better to eat several small meals throughout the day ("grazing"), or two or three larger ones, assuming I'm getting the same number of calories either way?

A: Let's say you run a business, and one of the things you need to do is check and respond to email. If you're like almost everyone I know, you get lots and lots of emails. More than you want. More than you know what to do with. And more than you can effectively respond to with 100% accuracy and attention.

You can't just stop doing email. If you didn't communicate effectively with folks, you'd be out of business. But you can't just do email either. You do the minimum to keep you functioning, and then spend the rest of your time doing more strategic work.

Keep Reading…

Q: How do I get a kid to change from being used to eating junk food to healthy food?  Sugar and fat just make foods so much yummier and I imagine there's some major withdrawal from being used to sweet and fat foods.

A: Sugar and fat make foods yummy not because God hates us and wants us to look bad in bathing suits and spandex, but because these substances are chock full of easily digested calories. For most of history, living beings faced two big problems: getting a date on Saturday night, and getting enough food to stay alive during the famine. In those days, it made sense to load up on the calories you found in a big slab of animal fat or  hanging from an extremely ripe fruit tree, because who knew if that was the last food you'd see in a week.

Keep Reading…

I recently pointed out in a forum, "… oil of any kind is so concentrated with calories and so devoid of nutrients that it has little place in a healthful diet." Someone took issue with that statement, reminding readers that fats are essential to life.

Quite so, but there's a difference between fats and oils. Oils are highly processed foods, especially these days with the chemical methods of extraction and the need to preserve them to keep them from going rancid, and add nothing but empty, fiber-less calories to your diet.

So how do you get by without oil? Here are some strategies:  Keep Reading…

Students in England's state schools are up in arms over the government ban on junk food lunches, according to an article in today's New York Times:

Five months after the celebrity chef Jamie Oliver succeeded in cajoling, threatening and shaming the British government into banning junk food from its school cafeterias, many schools are learning that you can lead a child to a healthy lunch, but you can’t make him eat.

The fancy new menu at the Rawmarsh School here?

“It’s rubbish,” said Andreas Petrou, an 11th grader… “We didn’t get a choice,” he said of the school food. “They just told us we were having it.”

Goodness! What is this evil and draconian menu foisted upon the helpless children of the Empire?

The government’s regulations, which took effect in September, have banished from school cafeterias the cheap, instantly gratifying meals that children love by default: the hamburgers, the French fries, the breaded, deep-fried processed meat, the sugary drinks.

Now schools have to provide at least two portions of fresh fruit and vegetables a day for each child, serve fish at least once a week, remove salt from lunchroom tables, limit fried foods to two servings a week and cut out candy, soda and potato chips altogether.

Why is this so objectionable? Two reasons:  Keep Reading…