You say you want a Revolution...

I've spent the last couple of hours catching up on Jamie Oliver's Food Revolution. I've been hearing so many incredible and positive things about the show. I admit I was skeptical since it is a Ryan Seacrest production and I'm not his biggest fan, but he hasn't made an appearance yet, so I'm cool with it.

I don't even know how to put into words what I feel about this show. I think that it's incredible and something that should have been done before there was a problem of obesity and heart disease in America. Jamie, a celebrity chef from England, has left his family for months at a time to try to revolutionize the way Americans eat. He started in Huntington Beach, West Virginia, aka, the most unhealthy town in America. Which when you think about it, means the most unhealthy in the world! His main focus is the school system first. These kids walked in to school one morning to be fed pizza. It was breakfast pizza but all that means is throwing some scrambled eggs made from a powder on it. For lunch, they had chicken nuggets. When Jamie asked the cooks to read what the ingredients said, they couldn't pronounce the words, but one lady said, "Chicken breast, see it's fine." They used "potato pearls" in place of actual mashed potatoes for the kids. And get this, even though a potato is mainly considered a starch in most places, here in America we consider french fries to be a vegetable. Really? Greasy, salty, over-processed french fries are veggies? Not for my kids.

Another thing Jamie is trying to do is transform the lives of a family who all seem to be overweight. He and the mom dumped all of the food that this family eats in a week on the table and even though the mom said she knew it was bad for her family, the deep fat fryer was the most used appliance in their kitchen. Oh, except for the freezer FULL of Totino's pizzas. She then looked at the table and starting crying when she was told that this was shorting her kids lifespans by 10-15 years. Jamie made them a beautiful, healthy and what seemed incredibly appetizing meal and then gave her the recipes and the ingredients for a week's worth of food. He then left. He came back a week later to find that most of the grocery items were unused even though she said that she'd made the meals. The next day, Jamie took the family to the hospital. The mother and father are overweight. They have a 4 year-old little girl who is the biggest 4 year-old I've ever seen. The 12 year-old is also obese. The doctor tested the 12 year old for diabetes due to some warning signs he saw. He isn't diabetic but I really hope that they fact that they are leading their son down that path makes those parents change their habits.

I think that the most incredible thing is the chicken nugget demonstration...it was so gross. He brought a group of kids into a kitchen he set up in this town to do a demo for them. He cut up a chicken and pointed out all the good cuts. He then cut up the rest of the chicken (bones, sinew, skin) and put it in a processor. He added some flour and cornmeal and voila! he had himself a chicken nugget patty. He fried them up and then asked the kids if they would still eat it. Every single one of them raised their hands. I was disgusted and appalled. When asked if it was healthy they said no. When asked why they would eat it then they said, 'because I'm hungry." Are we really teaching our kids it's okay to east crap because it's convenient over eating healthy foods? If we are, we're really telling them that it's okay to choose conveinance over life.

There are other things in the show that just set me off. Such as children from about age 4-10 never eating with forks and knives because they are constantly fed finger foods. What in the world?!? Also, a group of first graders didn't know what a potato was! What are we teaching these kids? The people of Huntington Beach need a wake up call as well. Some of the people are just plain hateful to Jamie. This is a man who left his own family to help your family because he cares about this issue so much. Half the people in this town hate him for it. I guess no one really wants their flaws pointed out, but maybe Americans have to have this pointed out to them. Jamie had to point it out to England and guess what...they have dramatically changed the way they feed their children at school and at home.

I know this was kind of a long rant based on a TV show, sorry. People question my desire to home school my kids until right before middle school. Now, maybe this sheds some light on one of the many reasons.

Please, go watch the show. Even if you don't agree with me or with Jamie Oliver, just watch one episode and give it a chance. It's produced by ABC and is on Friday at 9:00 I think. But it's also online at abc.com or hulu.com.