Page 8 - Priorities #34 2006-July

Sign of the Times
Priory Dining Hall Serves Fresh, Organic Produce and ‘Homemade’ Meals
sugar.
To Peter Agoston, Chef and Kitchen Manager
for Priory’s Dining Hall, the school cafeteria is a natural place to help Priory kids develop a taste for a healthy lifestyle. By replacing frozen, processed entrees with main courses cooked from scratch,
by baking instead of frying French fries, and by incorporating organic, locally grown produce into such treats as Asian beef stir fry and salad with homemade dressing, Mr. Agoston is introducing the Priory community to a new standard of eating. He sees it as an important part of the Priory’s educational mission to educate children not just in academic matters, but also about nutrition, health, and environmental soundness.
“I had considered introducing some changes years ago, because I believe in this healthier diet and eat it myself. The ability to buy the fresh, local produce and the information about childhood illness came at about the same time, and that gave me the motivation and the capability to do it,” he explained.
There is another reason to make the change now—while Priory students may not be eating the “typical” American diet at home or at school, they haven’t left for college yet. The dreaded “freshman five” of 25 years ago is now the dreaded “freshman 15.”
These lessons don’t end in the lunchroom. Dora Marron, Dean of the Priory Middle School, has expanded the health curriculum, and given greater attention to nutrition. Last year, students (and parents) had a special study unit with a professional nutritionist in addition to the regular health curriculum. The students kept and analyzed logs of what they ate in a day, learning about the categories within the food pyramid and how to recognize a portion size, and designing healthy menus. Eighth grade girls took a special unit in body image that
Peter Agoston, Chef and Kitchen Manager for the Priory’s Dining Hall, thinks the school cafeteria is a natural place to help students develop a taste for a healthy lifestyle.
BFy Jennifer Kelly, Student Intern
or years, the operative word in most schools for planning student meals was “yum.” Most decisions revolved around that yum factor. Today, while treats haven’t entirely
disappeared, school meals and snacks are beginning to reflect the times and the health factor.
Today, there are twice as many overweight American children and three times as many overweight American teenagers as there were just twenty years ago; altogether about a third of young Americans are overweight or at risk of becoming so.
Not surprisingly, these young people may face serious health risks, including type 2 diabetes, high cholesterol, high blood pressure, asthma, and also lower self-esteem, depression, and other social or psychological challenges. More than two thirds of them will carry their extra weight and the associated problems into adulthood, experts anticipate.
There are other factors, but a big part of
the problem apparently can be tied to the poor nutritional habits of the average American kid.
A 1997 study found that the diets of nearly half
of U.S. children didn’t meet *any* of the intake recommendations in the USDA’s Food Pyramid
-- they weren’t eating even an apple or two from the fruit group, or a dozen baby carrots and a sprig of broccoli’s worth from vegetables. They were, however, getting more than enough from the tip
of the pyramid— half of the calories consumed by young Americans that year came from added fat or
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