What the Fork to Do

All my life I've never really paid attention to food labels, my fat intake, how many calories I was eating per meal and so on. In What the Fork Are You Eating by Stefanie Sacks, there are specific, helpful sections of the book to really keep me on track on what I should be eating daily. In chapter 15, Sacks talks about introducing healthy eating ideas to your family. One way that particularly stood out to me was the "Chopped" competition. This is one way to introduce healthy foods in a fun way. She said that after participating in this competition, her son, "Hunter, [her] picky child who prefers food from a box, ate fish and mushrooms for the very first time! Everyone was on board that evening" that her family tried the "Chopped" competition (Sacks 214).

Chopped is where you give the people you want to help try healthier foods four ingredients to make their own meal. Sacks gave her kids and husband potatoes, onions, fish and mushrooms to make a dinner with. They were more creative and actually created meals like soups and grilled their fish (Sacks 214). I gave my sister and stepdad the task of making an afterschool snack instead, with the ingredients of an apple, a banana, yogurt and mixed nuts.

Ruby decided to mix mashed banana and vanilla yogurt together and topped it with chopped nuts to make a dip for her apple slices. While Monty decided to bake his apple, and roll both the apple and banana in crushed nuts and also used yogurt as a dip.

Bananas are something Ruby would never eat by choice, but with the snack she made, she actually enjoyed them. She said herself that this snack afterschool would be great rather than going to the pantry to have chips. This introduced both Monty and Ruby to a healthier decision as a snack and hopefully they will use this information later when deciding what to eat.


Would you be willing to make a meal with healthier foods you don't usually eat?

Sacks, Stefanie. What the Fork Are You Eating?: An Action Plan for Your Pantry and Plate. New York: Penguin Group, 2014. Print.