It’s been several weeks since my Daily Beast article on the perils of organic kid products. Thanks to everyone who read and commented. I’ve enjoyed the dialogue and have made quite a few new friends who share my frustration at the quality of foods being marketed for our little ones.
While the piece summarizes my views on an organic industry that preys on overtired, easily alarmed parents, it doesn’t address some major takeaways from my research and interviews. Strolling the aisles of Whole Foods and speaking with my sources, I was struck repeatedly by the following thoughts…
Parents wouldn’t eat these foods. What Whole Foods shopping, health-conscious adults would eat a diet of frozen, canned, puffed and preserved foods? Even if they did, would they consider their diets balanced?
Babies and children may have fewer teeth and slightly different dietary needs, but they are not a different species. Grocery stores now have entire sections devoted to food for children (just as they do for our pets!) – special cereals, yogurts, drinks, nutrition bars, crackers, frozen meals and pastas to name just a few . It is a niche fabricated for profit’s, rather than nutrition’s, sake.
As Jill Gusman put it – “a child can eat anything an adult eats – sometimes in a simpler format.”
Organic is (almost) beside the point. A lot of readers were hung up on a portion of the article that discussed organic labeling (for those who are still confused - here it is straight from the horse’s mouth). While I believe that many of today’s kid products are misleading with respect to how many ingredients are organic, even those processed foods that are 95-100% organic will always be inferior to fresh, whole foods.
When forced to buy some prepackaged snack, will I select an organic brand? Sure – but it’s still a last resort.
Snack time, all the time. Nina Planck pointed out a trend I observed constantly in the city – kids riding around in their strollers eating puffed vegetable products or pureed food in a squishy pouch. “I even saw one mom spooning food into her child’s mouth as he rode on the swings,” said Planck.
Why? These foods are mess-free and keep on-the-go kids (and their parents) happy. The problem comes when dinner, or any meal served at a table, comes around. Not only are kids uninterested in the food being served, they fail to appreciate the ritual of sitting with others, enjoying food with their eyes and noses as well as their mouths.
Snacks can have their place, but it isn’t on wheels. Take ten minutes to sit and enjoy a nutritious snack with your child – everyone wins in the long run.
Trust your instincts: healthy eating doesn’t require an advanced degree. Fear and condescension are extremely effective for luring in parent consumers – don’t take the bait. Nutrition is a vast body of knowledge, and cooking well does require a bit of practice, but most parents already know the basics. Cooking simple recipes with fresh, whole food and a variety of ingredients (think colors) will already guarantee a more balanced diet than the prepackaged organics sold for kids.
It’s not about perfection. Everyone I spoke with agree on this point – a food utopia is not the goal.
But here’s how this argument often goes – “I don’t want to be one of THOSE parents that forbids fun foods. If I say no, he’ll only go overboard down the road.”
Agreed – when we demonize foods, whether for ourselves or our kids, rebellion is guaranteed. But, as Planck put so well, there are treats (high quality but indulgent foods – think bacon, honey, homemade baked goods) and there is junk (processed products with unrecognizable ingredients).
Find a place for treats, do your best to avoid junk, and help your kids to understand the difference. “Because I said so” teaches kids that junk foods are forbidden fruit – a real conversation about health and balance is the key.
