Good Day Google+ - Food Revolution Day

Hey there, everyone. We're finally here. I'm a little foggy here. My bandwidth's having some issues. Actually stealing it from a neighbor because I have no connectivity here in Orlando. It's a beautiful sunny day, but I don't know what's wrong with my usually great bandwidth. We're here for a wonderful cause, and it's Food Revolution Day. I almost forgot what day it was. It's Food Revolution Day. I've been having such a wonderful, strange day that we're here. We wanted to come on, and we wanted to see everyone. The comment tracker's not working. It's just a whole, as Mia would say, a hot mess. We're going to persevere here and talk about food revolution and getting kids interested in eating food. I'm going to run down my list of guests right now, and then we're going to get started. If you have questions, I will monitor the Hangout window and see what we can find. Let's start. To my right, on my screen anyway, I have Nasim Beltran and his wife Elizabeth. So how you guys doing today?

Great, great. We're doing really good over here in Italy.

Ah, wonderful. And then next to them I have Maggie Unzueta. How you doing, Maggie?

I'm great. I'm hot in San Diego.

How's it been in San Diego with the fires? You guys alright?

I'm okay because I'm on Coronado Island and it's fine, but the rest of San Diego is— and it's gonna break today, thank goodness. But we've had a lot of problems recently.

Okay, good. Well, I'm glad to hear that. At least you're safe on the island. And of course, Giselle from EcoRicoTV. How you doing?

Hola, mis queridos amigos. Well, you know, I'm in Los Angeles, and as you can see, I look like the whatever of the opera because this window is getting blasted with insane 100-degree sun. And this one, not so much, but the blinds are all closed and there are no lights on, and it's like— climate change, climate change.

You are too pretty to be the Phantom of the Opera. You're the one he carries off.

You're very kind.

Thank you.

So, and then in her little bonnet here outside, Aslan. How you doing, Lynn?

I'm very good, thank you. Just waiting for you.

Oh, now you're going all Elton John on us.

Very good. Excited to be here. Looking forward to it.

I'm excited to have you because it's an important day today. We're here to talk about the food revolution, Jamie Oliver. I didn't even try to invite him in. It's been such a hot mess. We're just going to go with what we have today and hope for the best. So, Lynn, since I have you there, let's talk about what you do to encourage your children to eat and how you, what you do. Talk to us.

Me? Yeah. Yeah, well, you know, I don't do anything special. The kids have always been in the kitchen with me, so we don't separate. I've noticed that a lot of people talk about kids cooking and all that. With me, there's no difference between kids cooking adult cooking because the kids cook what I cook. So we don't do anything different to get them cooking. They're there and, "Oh, Mummy, can I do this?" Sure, by all means. Whatever their favorite food may be, you know, whether it's chopping up salad, chopping up carrots, or making green Thai curry because that's what they love to eat, they go right ahead and do it. And to me, that's been the secret to it, really. Just having them in the kitchen when you're cooking, right? Gisele, I'm sure you'll agree with that.

Yeah, I'm sitting here making comments on the comment tracker because we had so many people just waiting, waiting, waiting for this fabulous event. You know, here's one thing that I do do, OK? Because there's always a reason why people like Aslan and I and Maggie, our kids eat everything. So here's a little thing. I have one rule in this house. The rule is that if you come to our home, you have to try everything that gets put in front of you. Whether you want to or not, you have to try it. Whether you're an adult or a child, everybody and all of their issues have to come in, and they have to be open to trying it once. If you do, if you don't like it, whatever, I don't care. You leave it, but at least you've given it an effort. By that, you've kind of expanded your horizons in the food place because we eat everything in this home as well. So that really helps because any kid that walks through the door and is the world's pickiest eater has to try everything one time. And they start coming to my house and they're like, "Ooh, can we have some manchego cheese? Ooh, can we have some shrimp with mojito? Ooh, can we have—" And so it really helps their palate. And one of the things that's very interesting about kids is that babies have an incredibly sensitive palate. People don't get it. What happens is they go, "Oh, she tried whatever. She'll never like it." No, no, no, no, no. You just have to let them try it once, and then a little while later you let them try it again because their palate is constantly adjusting to sweet, sour, bitter, salty. For instance, the other night we go to dinner to this tapas restaurant, and lo and behold, my daughter orders this hamachi with piquillo peppers, mussels in a saffron cream sauce, and fried Brussels sprouts with a homemade ricotta. Now, my kid's 9, okay? Wow. And I'm sitting here going, okay, baby, are you sure you want this? Because she notoriously will try a Brussels sprout because I make them and they're fabulous. And you can watch that video, Caramelized Brussels Sprouts, and watch them. And then you can watch my health tip about why they're so good for you. Those cruciferous greenies are really important to eat. You have to figure out how to get kids to eat that type of food. She finally ordered this fried Brussels sprouts because she just wanted to. We were all like, "Oh, they're going to be delicious." She tried them and loved them. I had her try mussels in a basic white wine sauce, and she was like, "Really good." Then she orders it in a saffron cream sauce. She ate the whole thing. I got one. And it was just like a revelation to me because I can see that she's not only intellectually and emotionally is she developing, but her taste and her palate is changing. So you just have to kind of keep in there. I mean, that's the best advice I can give you is really understand how people change and how palates change and just don't give up. Keep trying new things. And adding new flavors and creating rules that are fun for kids because they all come in and they're like, well, we know Gisele's gonna make us try something, you know. So they do.

I think that goes with adults too, though. I think with evolving tastes and stuff, it's exactly the same with adults. What you eat now you might not have eaten 10 years ago, but that's because you've matured. Your tastes have matured, especially for those of us who cook. You know, we cook certain things differently now than perhaps we did 5, 10 years ago because we've discovered perhaps something better, a new way to cook, a tastier way to cook, a healthier way to cook. So that goes the same with adults too.

Yeah, totally agree.

Maggie, so what do you do for your little one to get him to eat?

Well, I just want to chime in with kind of what Gisele just said. I am— okay, so I'm a very picky eater. Isn't that funny? So I think, well, you know, I can't be a picky eater and not let my son not be a picky eater, but I do have that role that Gisele does with myself and with him, especially when I'm at a restaurant and reviewing a restaurant. I will try it. I will try it once. If I like it, don't like it, it's a different story. But I have that rule with him. And I was raised with— I wasn't raised with, you know, I wasn't raised with mac and cheese. I was raised with arroz con pollo and, you know, salsa verde. You know, that was the food I was raised with. We didn't have chicken fingers back then. And one of the things that I do, I posted some pictures on the comments there. You know, I try to make it fun for him. I try to make it fun for him and for me because we're so picky. So in here I have some orange slices and some lemon slices, you know, something to just make it a little different and fun. He loves this. Oh, and this is in a little wine glass. So, and I break these probably more than he does.

Well, that's good to know. So, uh, does he ever go—

sorry, Chef. Go ahead. I love interrupting people. Sorry, Maggie. Does he ever go to restaurant reviews with you? Do you take him?

Yes, yes, yes, yes. Oh, cool. Yeah, I've taken him a couple of times with me. In fact, they invited us One of the restaurants had a new kids menu, and they know that I'm picky as I am, so they invited him and they invited me, and the two of us just sat there and ate together. But I do see his palate changing, and I do understand that, you know, obviously he has a sensitive palate and he's just a kid and it's still developing and all of that. But yeah, he has been to— he's come along a couple of reviews with me, but he can't He can't sit through the entire thing. I would like him to. It would be fun. Hopefully.

Hopefully with time. Hopefully with time. Yeah. Excellent. What a great experience, huh, for him? Oh yeah. You should get him to do the next review and post it on D+.

Well, you know how— okay, so, you know, I'll do development, so I'll be creating a recipe or whatever, and I'll ask his opinion, and he'll tell me. He's so honest. He'll tell me, this is too salty, or this isn't good, or he'll be like, this is gross. What are you giving me? I'm like, hmm, I wonder why he thinks this. But yeah, honesty. Kids are so honest. You know, it's funny.

Someone posted on the comment tracker, do you have a kids board, a kid-friendly board on Pinterest? And I was like, no. Every restaurant that I have in my show— and if you guys watch it, you'll know, because Adriana's in the show on IkoRiko TV. Everything is tested through her, and she's been doing this since she was 4. I'm not talking like cookies. I'm talking pumpkin crème brûlée. I'm talking caramelized Brussels sprouts, as I have said. I'm talking fish and chickens and whatever it is, I test on my kid. She has grown up learning and understanding. The other night when we were eating mussels, for instance, it was a lesson in food safety because I said, okay, this one— she said, "Mommy, this one's closed." I said, "Well, you can't eat that. If you do, this is what's going to happen." She got a little nervous. "Well, this one's only a little bit open." It was a really interesting time to learn for her as well. It's kind of a science experiment, which is what I try to do with so much of food because food is so much about science. When they grow up in the kitchen— somebody posted here, "A sharp knife is a safe knife." It's who? Let me find it. And it is very true. And so— oh, there it is. Renee Bode, hey, honey. Julia Child said, a sharp knife is a safe knife. Freaks my husband out. My kids have been with me even in the front pack. Gisele, we have the same rule. And knife safety and knife skills are super, super important. And what I did with my child was I got her the little plastic knives when she was really little so that she could just start understanding how to hold the utensil, what to do with her fingers and her hands, how to be really safe. And I think the earlier you start with that, with food testing, with just allowing them to be around you while you're doing things, is the absolute best policy in the kitchen. And I'll say another thing. My parents— I'm from Puerto Rico, if you don't know already that I'm a Boricua, la Boricua. And in our culture, if you go to a party It's babies and it's 80-year-olds. So it's not like you have parties just for adults and just for kids. There are some, but like with the Italians, you know, Nazim, I'm sure, you know, and Elisabetta, um, the whole family's there. And so food is a huge family activity. And, um, introducing that whole kind of cultural element into your life is, I think, critically important just for social skills. My parents never ate anything that they wouldn't give us. If my parents ate lobster, we ate lobster. If they ate steak, we ate steak. It was never like, "Oh, the kids are going to eat this and the adults are going to eat that," which I think internalizes this kind of separation of what you're allowed to eat and not to eat. I would just really encourage everybody to make sure that whatever you're eating, you're also sharing with your children. It will it will create more sophisticated eaters as they get older.

Yeah, you know, with my son, I bought him when he was just maybe 3, I bought him a little apron. I love aprons. I have a collection of aprons, so I thought, oh, this is so cute, let's give him an apron. So I got him a little apron, and he would sit there, I mean, chair up to the kitchen counter cooking with me. I'm like, okay, smell this, and he was 3, able to identify cumin and oregano and all these different spices. Now he's 6. So he's too big to help me in the kitchen. He's in the next room. He's going to be like, what are you talking about? But no, no, no. He does help me in the kitchen sometimes, but I really have to drag him into it. So I have to invite his Legos, and I have to invite his— he has all his other toys, you know, and I make it a party. So I go, okay, let's cook, let's get the music going, and here's your apron. Legos are like helping us stir.

Yeah, of course, of course.

I wanted to go into the whole baking thing.

I'm listening to all these stories, and we were just talking off mic, our daughter was a totally different ballgame. I mean, when she was about 3, when she was really young, we had to— Betty, I remember she had to put on the floor of the kitchen table newspapers all over around her seat because she just would grab everything and just go wham, wham, wham, all over the walls, you know, and it's like, okay. And she was a picky eater.

She was smaller than 3. Yeah, she is a picky eater.

She still is. She still is. And she always is criticizing you.

Let me tell you, it doesn't work all the time. I've been sharing, I've been keeping her in the kitchen, I've been cooking with her, I've been doing everything, but it's still very difficult.

Well, do you start with like— Elizabeth, is she really kind of basics about fruits and things like that? Because what I found is that the more my daughter will experiment with basic things like vegetables and fruits, the more apt she is, of course, to start experimenting with things that are a little a little bit more complex. So my daughter will go to school with fresh fennel, mangoes, and raspberries, which I think are just normal. But most kids are like, what is that? This week she had mangu, which is a Dominican mashed plantain dish. Figueres. With cheese in it. No, no, no, no, no, no. Mangu is—

It's boiled plantains that you mash. It's a breakfast dish.

Well, it can be. We have it for dinner and lunch and whenever. It's a breakfast dish if you fry your eggs and put it on top, but it's not just for breakfast. Like, we did it with sautéed chicken breast with grilled onions. But mangu, you serve with a sauce of onions, garlic, vinegar. That you put on top and then you fry eggs and you put it on top. And that's the breakfast that Maggie's talking about. But you can eat it at all times of the day. It's a vegetable, effectively.

We've got a question from the audience. Alexandra Ricky Gonzalez says, so what do you do when your kids are at school? Have you tried anything with school lunches, or do you stick to sack lunches?

Can I tell you, I am absolutely disgusted with school lunches. School lunches. My son was last— was it last year? It was last year that they had this big lunch for the parents and the students to come in and, you know, sit down in the big courtyard to eat with them. And you could bring in food from home or wherever. And I said, what do you want to eat? He never had a school lunch. So he said, can we eat a school lunch? And I thought, well, how bad could it be? Gross. Absolutely disgusting. I even wrote this. I took pictures of it, and I wrote a whole blog post on it. And I thought, how could this possibly be? And my son does not go to a school in a bad area either. I mean, we're talking about a very affluent area. And this bean burrito, it was not— oh, by the way, I asked his teacher, what do you recommend to eat? And she said, oh, try the bean burrito. So I thought, who can mess up a bean burrito? It was so gross. You should see. I mean, it looked like someone had had the runs. I mean, the yellowy cheese. I'm going to throw up. Oh, and the fruit there was caught there in syrup. And I thought, this isn't a fruit. This is not even dessert. I wouldn't even feed this to my dog. This was gross. So I wrote this whole thing.

Anyway, so school lunches for him. School lunches are so critical in helping teach kids. And we're fortunate that my daughter is at a school that is part of the Edible Schoolyard Program of the Shea Hanees Foundation. So we have a garden, and today we had morning sing, and we had a whole garden set up, and we were selling herbs and all the fruits and vegetables that the kids grow in their own garden. And our school lunch program is organic when possible, super healthy vegetarian choices. But my daughter still chooses to take her lunch to school every day, so I make her lunch every single day. She will take everything from mangú, which was leftover and asked for it, with fresh vegetables or chicken or salmon or whatever we've done the night before. The school lunch program, which is what we're really talking a lot about today, has to be changed. I can't stress enough that parents should be actively talking to their administration about the school lunches. There's another question here that I wanted to address. Cindy Kirschner said, what do you think about kids' menus in restaurants? Seems like most are, quote, junk food to me. My daughter has almost never, never eaten off a kids' menu in a restaurant, and when she has, it's like this. Oh, you guys have chicken tenders. Well, instead, can we substitute a grilled chicken breast with some steamed broccoli, please? Do you want french fries, baby, or would you like broccoli? How about both, Mommy? Okay, both. You know what I mean? So be active about changing whatever's on there, and if it's not, then get a side of chicken breast and a side of broccoli and have them eat it.

That's a good point. I was just going to bring something about Italy in the sense that we are very fortunate here because Zoe went through— now she's 19— and she went through the public school system here, and here they are very adamant about no soda drinks in school. You don't have that whole system that we saw in the States. And I would say about 8 years ago, there was a McDonald's that was trying to get their hands doing the whole catering for schools in Italy, in Milan, inside the schools. And all the PTA, the mothers, everybody just went up in arms, and that stopped that at the bud.

Wow, that must have been a losing battle for McDonald's to begin with. McDonald's in Italian schools? Really? Yeah. Bizarre, that's really bizarre. So what are school lunches like? Do you know anything about non-public schools? What are school lunches like there?

How was the school lunch at the public school?

It was decent, but lately they gave, I mean the last few years they gave the commission to the people that did the lunches. To a private organization, and I think that they used to have the kitchen inside the school, but of course it became too expensive for the government to run those kitchens, so they gave it to somebody outside. And the quality, I guess, went a little bit down because it's pre-prepared food and it comes in school. Okay. Few hours after it has been cooked. So being Italian, a little bit picky about food.

Do all schools where you guys come from, do all schools have school lunches, or do you guys have the option of packed lunches from home?

Well, I think that once you have the kids in school, you have to eat the lunch there unless there is a very particular problem, you know, because kids can be allergic to the food you bring and they can taste the food, so this would cause a lot of problems. So once you accept the school meals, you have to accept them.

Right. Yeah, I don't think you have as many choices as Giselle says, you know, or maybe Maggie, I don't know if there's— you probably have tacos, you have this, you have that. Here you have variations, and then there's variations based on religion, and that's about it.

Yeah, when I say we have, you know, we have two options for the entree. It will be one that's a meat dish, one that's the same thing, but it would be like if you're going to have chicken burritos, then you get the option of having a bean burrito, you know what I mean? You have salad, you have your different options of what you can put on them, and the state dictates, because charter schools are public, The state dictates that there has to be a protein, so like on every salad bar, if you don't have a meat protein, you'll have eggs, boiled eggs or something like that. I'm stunned at, still, in other states, how bad the lunch program is. Then they complain about obesity in children, diabetes, etc. My daughter's never had a soda, nor does she want one. Never. She's 9.

She chooses. That is a big problem that Europe, here in Italy, obesity in that sense, we don't have that junk food culture. Exactly. In America. And that's why I think James Oliver, who we're celebrating this week as we're talking, I mean, I remember he's gone to the States to, you know, look at his program of bringing what he did in England bringing it over to the American school system, and that's very, very—

And I saw— sorry, Maggie, go on.

I was just gonna say, again, I'm in California. Gisele, you're in California, aren't you? I'm in LA, yeah. Oh, sorry, you're just up the street. I mean, I'm just surprised at how San Diego, you know, we have such a bad, uh, the bad school lunches. Again, it's amazing, but teaching your kids to identify certain things. Like, you know, my son will tell me, he's like, mommy, this is organic, or this is the kind of milk that we're supposed to be drinking. And he can go around and tell me what he should be eating. And he's 6. And I love that. I love knowing that he can do that. I have half custody with my ex-husband. So I'll ask him. I'll say things like, hey, are your eggs organic? Or what do you guys do?

Oh, I do the same thing. Trust me.

Let me ask you a question on that. Let me ask you a question on that subject. Is it a cost issue in the United States maybe that it's been so standardized in the school system that to keep costs down we really have to dumbify the food and bring it a little bit down?

Okay, but hang on, hang on. It's just an excuse, okay? It's a very complex question, Nazim, that leads back to big agro and pharma, okay? That's what I thought. It is completely— the issue of what is most cost-effective can be very easily resolved if we stop subsidizing multinational corporations that are raking in billions and billions of dollars at the expense of American kids' health. I mean, I can go on on this. Dennis, stop me now, because you know I will get on this train.

It's not just that, though, Giselle. Having worked on the inside in schools, I mean, I only ever worked at one school. I was a chef for executive dining. I was a chef for white tablecloth. I went to school that I just left for 8 years, and from what I saw on the inside working with different food service companies, the biggest problem I saw was the fact that you had no trained staff. I agree. We were used to getting everything out of boxes, everything out of cans, and it was okie-doke. There was no problem. Then all of a sudden, we learned what we were doing to the kids and ourselves. The problem comes from is you don't have a chef, and not that you need a chef, but you don't have anybody that really knows how to cook in a kitchen. Then there's no one to train the rest of the ladies. All these employees and these kitchen staffs, and from being a salesman before that, I ran into them. They've been there for 100 years. Yeah. Get rid of them. They're really high paid, and there's just no way to work them out. So they bring in food service companies, and some of them are like the kiss of death. I mean, they make garbage, really garbage. So getting the foods and that, you know, it's almost impossible.

I think it's obviously— it's a complex issue. It's what's happening at the top, top-down, what's happening at the food service companies, because there is a bottom line issue. There's a total lack of education. Which is the problem with not having trained staff, and they don't care, you know what I mean? I mean, I'm assuming, I don't know, but I think at the base is that these companies come in and they pitch the school board and the administration of these school districts about why they can make this cheaper. We'll, yeah, we'll throw in some chicken, but It's chicken parts, or it's hot dogs or pizza. I mean, it's disgusting. It's food I don't eat myself. It's obviously a complex issue, but it definitely starts at the government. I agree. We agree, yeah. Who's really controlling the food supply?

Actually, Aslan, I'm curious about the UK. How is it over in the UK, the food supply? In the school system?

I homeschool my kids, I'll have to say that, so— we know. So as far as the schools themselves are concerned, the first two didn't go to school for a number of years, a couple of years, but they took packed lunches. We did have the option of school lunches or packed lunches, and we went for packed lunches. I think that the problem is the same here. I don't think we're any different from what I read and from what I hear from my friends. And Jamie Oliver did try and do something. He did try and change, and he's not the only one. There's this guy, American chap as well, Lloyd Grossman, I believe. He tried to do something as well with our school lunches and stuff. There have been improvements, but you know, there are always going to be the bad apples. There will always be bad apples. I think public schools, I don't know what you guys mean in the US when you say public schools, but over here public schools schools are paid for, the expensive schools. Yes, the private schools. As opposed to state schools. We have private schools and we have public schools. So private schools you pay for, yes. Public schools you pay for but more. So the private and public schools tend to have better meals. So you know, that is an answer in itself really. The state-funded schools don't generally have great lunches. Some have improved over the years but There are loads more. As you say, people who actually cook the lunches aren't any good at it, have absolutely no idea what's good and what's not, you know, overcooked vegetables, soggy vegetables, soggy pasta and stuff like that. So it's the same.

I couldn't believe how they were actually cooking some foods when I got into the system. And it's really— it was like, oh my God, are you really doing it? Like she said, I wouldn't cook for my dog that way. Do you cook for your dog, Chef?

Do you cook for your dog?

I do. I do. She won't eat, Daddy makes her something.

Chef, let me ask you something. You've been in the system, in the school system from way back. Has there been a deterioration? Because I remember when I was a kid in New York, I thought that the school lunches were decent. To say the truth. I mean, there was milk. There was— I don't know how it is today, obviously, because I don't have any friends that have their kids. Their kids are all grown up. But while you were inside the system, did you see that it was kind of deteriorating, or was there—

I honestly didn't have a problem with the school lunches when I was in school. I did not think they were bad. I really didn't. I mean, granted, we weren't eating restaurant-style food. I don't know about health as much, but I don't think the food itself that was sourced was quite as complicated as the foods that are being sourced now. You do have some companies out there that are raising standards. I was lucky enough to work for one that really did have some standards in place. We were getting grass-fed beef. We were getting organic chicken. We could get organic milk if we could afford it. —there were a lot better options available to us, but for the whole— that wasn't public school either— from the whole, for a government subsidy school, you know, the options— when you're paying almost 50% for labor or more, you know, it reduces what you can spend for food. And a lot of it is because of the overpriced labor that really doesn't know what they're doing. And I did work for a small company for a while, and their belief was to hire all chefs because they could train a chef to do paperwork, but they couldn't teach a paper pusher how to cook. So that was their philosophy, and that worked really, really well in the places we were in. But, you know, it's just— it breaks my heart to see some of the things that these kids are getting fed, and especially when that's the only food they're getting for the day, a lot of them too.

Yeah, that's a good point. There's one thing that I just want to mention, because Nazim and Dennis Littley and I are pretty much on the same plane as this. My mom gave me horrible food for lunch, so the school lunches were great. Like, you know, a bologna sandwich to me with American cheese is disgusting, right? Okay, so— and white bread. I mean, please, my God. But here's the thing, and that's what I would eat, or Spam, or those crazy, like, ham something in a jar that you spreadable Oh, deviled ham.

I remember that. Underwood. Underwood. Underwood. Deviled food cans.

Just nasty ass food. It's huge in South America. Okay, so here's the thing. Remember, one thing you gotta remember is 20 years ago Monsanto introduced— our country took the very dark and devilish step of allowing GMOs. There's been a little thread here on the comment tracker with corn. 20 years ago, school lunches started changing radically, which is why you're talking about this degradation in food, because they started adding corn syrup to all kinds of food that really didn't need to be there. They started changing what tomatoes were like and modifying them with chicken genes. They started doing all kinds of stuff because I'm going back to big agro. That has led to where we are now, which is study after study showing that a diet of GM foods is causing multi-generational problems with sterilization, fertilization, pancreatic dysfunction, liver dysfunction. We're seeing that now. Hopefully, things are swinging back. The tide is starting to swing back. You guys already know. If you— if you're following me at all, that I post about this all the time. Dennis, I'm sure, is sick of hearing it. 20 years ago, something very evil happened to the food supply in this country, which Europe, thank God, at least you guys are labeling your food.

Russia, China, India, you're putting up a hell of a fight, to tell you the truth.

Monsanto is big money, and Obama's not helping us any because he's trying to get Monsanto's Roundup Ready seeds out in Europe, and Africa, and Latin America. It's insanity. That's one thing that really happened that was such a change. We got milk and everything else at that time, too. I didn't know anything about organics because we just didn't eat that way, and we grew food. That's one issue that really we have to deal with when talking about why the epidemic in diabetes, particularly in my culture, in the Latin culture, and obesity.

Great point. Great point.

Fantastic. You can see the change of food over the years, too. When I first started eating organics, it wasn't because I was trying to be healthy. That was the added benefit of it. This was before I really thought a lot about what I ate, but I changed to organic chicken because it tasted like chicken.

Hello?

Oh my gosh, organic food tastes better?

Are you kidding? Yeah. I changed to organic milk because it tasted like milk. I'm thinking, where did these things happen over the years where foods— I'm eating this one day and going, "This isn't chicken. I don't know what the hell it is, but it's not chicken." When chicken doesn't taste like chicken, there's a problem. Everything else tastes like chicken.

That's right. When we met in Miami, I remember she went with me to the supermarkets. And she looked at the tomatoes. And you know how Italians can get a little bit picky about their tomatoes, no?

Huh? Oh my God. The tomatoes, they radically changed during my lifetime. Do you remember how they were? The skin was so much thinner, and they would be bruised, and there would be that pile, and it would not be perfect and waxy and hard and nasty. I'm sorry, Nazim. I just can't help myself. I get on this topic, and I go crazy.

Oh, well, we do.

You were saying you were in Miami, and Italians are fussy about their tomatoes.

Yeah, exactly. So basically she was like, you call this tomatoes? Remember? And I was like— and she goes, I can't wait till I get you back to Italy. You'll see what a real tomato is like.

Have you— has he been educated, Elisabetta? Yes, he's much better now. I have to say, though, Sorry, go on. Go on, Elizabetha, you were saying?

Yeah, he's getting much better now. At the very beginning it was a disaster, but now he's learning.

So you can't teach an old dog new tricks.

I wanted to say that, you know, I totally agree on the GMO and stuff and organic food. We buy organic food as much as is possible. We grow our own stuff. But organic food is more expensive. And for so many people, not only cannot— can they not physically get their hands on organic food, they can't afford it.

So it's all well and good saying organic is good, et cetera, et cetera. That is true for some things, because I have also done lots of testing on this. And I've even got it on my show. What a surprise. Like, for instance, I did an entire test on spices, which I didn't even know. I went to the Albertsons, of all places. And I compared the exact same things that were organic and conventionally grown herbs, and seriously, the price points were either organic was less or it was the same. It may have been a little bit more on some things like turmeric, which are the more exotic things that are grown here. But you have to be smart about what you buy organic. For instance, if you go to the Environmental Working Group, ewg.org, you'll see every year they post the Dirty Dozen and the Clean Fifteen. The Dirty Dozen are the 12 most pesticide-ridden foods that they found that year. When I say pesticide-ridden, I mean like they found 60 different chemicals on a blueberry. It's disgusting. Then there are the Clean 15. The thing that I like to tell people is if it has thin skin or no skin, buy it organic. For instance, things that are grown in the ground, celery, potatoes, root vegetables, Usually, I would buy them organically. Berries, absolutely always. They are highly sprayed because people want them to be beautiful and big. Those are the things that you really should focus on buying organic. Mangoes, pineapple, papayas, bananas, a lot of the tropical fruits have thicker skin. You're good with not buying them organic. You just have to be smart about what you're buying.

Dr. Pompa: Now that you guys brought it up, what about growing your own vegetables? Maggie, are you guys all doing this? All the time.

I can't. I'm on an island. You know, our— yeah, we don't have the space. I would love to. And it's funny because my dad and my family, they own a huge ranch in Mexico where, you know, apples— we have a whole acre where we just grow our own food. But I'm not in Mexico. I'm in Coronado. And I don't have the room. And I also kill things too. I can't grow a flower to save my life. You're not a green thumb.

I— no.

We tend to— sorry, Chef Korn. We tend to, well, you know, depending on the weather, of course, and the season, of course, but every summer our kids have projects, garden projects, summer projects, and we grow everything we possibly can, really. Corn, capsicum, zucchinis, eggplants. Chilies, we always grow chilies. This year we've got the Carolina Reaper growing in the house, so we're very excited about that. If you guys don't know, that's the world's hottest chili. Larry must know about that too. Only because I've educated him. He thought it was still the Trinidadian scorpion.

Those are fighting words, Azlin.

Yeah, put him out. Yeah, we love growing our own too when we can.

Maggie, it can be a little bit hard. You know, there are some things online now that you can— those all-in-one, you can grow a bunch of things that are easy. You put different seeds in.

Oh, how cool.

Yeah, but one of the things that I think is really— that people can start trying to grow are herbs because they're just usually so much easier and you can grow different types of herbs in a different pot and then you know they're organic and so you can add all those different flavor profiles to your food. You can actually make a beautiful tomato basil marinara, you know, like the Italians do with 4 ingredients: olive oil, garlic, basil, and tomatoes. Boom! You know, right there. Make a huge pot of it and then use it for different things throughout the week, but at least you've got it there, you know what I mean?

You've got fresh herbs, Maggie, don't you? You've got fresh herbs in your kitchen?

Yeah, I have herbs. That's the only thing that I— yeah, I make sure I have that. So, but yeah, and it's nice. I remember being a kid and being on the ranch, my grandfather would hand me a basket and be like, okay, whatever you want to eat, put it in this basket. And we'd go out in the fields and I would put— and he'd always tell me, is this all you want? I would pick like maybe 2 apples. Oh yeah, it was nice. We always had, of course, jalapeños and beans. It was fun. It's fun during harvest time. And I miss it, I miss it.

See, I would have been looking for the lasagna tree.

No, there is no such thing as a lasagna tree, chef. Well, he said pick what you want to eat.

I would have been looking for the tree.

Nazim, somewhere in a science laboratory there is a lasagna tree. There you go.

And I may have to plant one of them, GMO or not.

My daughter, because that's all she eats is pasta, lasagna, pasta, lasagna, pasta.

My kids, you'd think I had an Italian tennis coach. My kids eat pasta for lunch every day. They're pasta bots. If I cook them something else, I have mutiny on my hands. That's so bizarre, honestly.

So here's a great way to sneak vegetables into your pasta. Sauces, okay? So my lasagna, obviously I make, and I do it with turkey, and I do it with turkey sausages or whatever that I take out of the casing to add even more flavor. But my tomato sauce has tomates and basil and sometimes oregano and carrots and fennel and 3 different kinds of red bell peppers. And so I'm sneaking all that goodness-daciousness into my tomato sauce. So she loves to eat her lasagna from that Dennis Lasagna Tree. You know, just make sure that that sauce is loaded up with veggies, spinach, and the whole thing, man. Chop it all up and throw it in.

I can see when you go to somebody's house and they have plain tomato sauce, she's like, this is not tomato sauce. This is not like how my mom makes it.

No way. No way, man. You got to have that Latin flavor, baby. I even put green olives. I had an Italian boyfriend, and I was like, you're about to have Puerto Rican lasagna. Eh, no. It's not Puerto Rican lasagna. I'm like, try this. And I use different cheeses and whatever to make it great. I don't make it with a béchamel. So I'm sorry, but I don't. But he was like, what is this green olive? You guys can be so— Italians can be So snobby about their pasta.

Oh! More fighting words.

As long as I make it al dente, just eat it!

Those are fighting words, girl. Take it outside.

Take it outside.

It's like if Nazim had blonde hair and he was white skin and with blue eyes, I couldn't call him Nazim. I would call him Paulo. It's just another dish. You guys are great.

That was good, Elizabeth.

That was very good. Speaking about sneaking vegetables in, somebody posted earlier, and I meant to say something about the smoothies. I love different types of smoothies and whatever, and you can sneak in spinach because I don't know why spinach will just blend with whatever's going on around it. Throw in spinach and some great things, even beet juice, which is so radically healthy and antioxidant-rich. You can throw a little of that in your kids' smoothies as well. Ooh, look, it's Christmas. We're going to have a red smoothie, and we're going to have a green smoothie. Those are great ways to sneak in vegetables for those foods. Dr.

Pompa: I love this technique. Have you patented this Giselle sneak the vegetables in? Yeah, they work.

It works. My kid eats it all.

She was small, and we were taking her by starvation. So when it was 7 o'clock at night and she didn't have food for a while, we put her to see some cartoons and stuff, and we used to give her raw carrots and fennels and all those things. And of course she was hungry, so she was eating them. But if you tried to give them raw vegetables during the meal, they wouldn't eat it. I love what Stan Bush—

sorry, I'm going to interject. Did you guys see what Stan Bush wrote? The lasagna tree is right next to the Ben Jerry vine.

Stan would say something like that.

Can't beat that. Oh, and Stan Bush, speaking of Stan Bush, says— Stan, I owe you a phone call. "When you're figuring the expense of organic foods, be sure to add in cost of the medical bills attributed to the alternatives. P.S., I grow my own stuff when I can." Good, good, good.

More organic vegetables and produce is being readily available. I forget who it was, Cindy Wright or somebody mentioned they were getting theirs at Target. Target, and I was in BJ's yesterday, which is like a big wholesale store. I don't know if you have them around where you are, but they had a huge line of organic vegetables now. I was really amazed since the last time I was in there. You can. You just need to look for them a little bit.

Dr. Pompa: Also here in Milan, we're starting to see a lot of supermarkets that are going with the natural organic lines. The more people start looking at it and people are asking for it, the market starts shifting.

And the prices weren't bad on this stuff either.

Not that bad. Maybe 10% more.

15%. Yeah, they are still. I mean, when I— you know, don't forget we're in Europe, you guys are in the US, especially in the UK. We're much, much smaller than you guys are, you know. So our organic stuff is going to be more expensive compared to yours.

This is the thing. This is why it's so important to eat locally. A lot of the chefs here have that 100-mile rule. What's happening is the reason a lot of this stuff is also more expensive, one, is because of the subsidization of big agro for all the chemical-laden crap that they're putting in the soil and destroying soil by planting in very different ways, which is They only plant one crop, deplete the soil, and then dump a bunch of stuff on it that's fake and chemical in order to maintain a single crop environment, which is not the way the earth is made. Two is because of distribution and manufacturing costs. I really stay away from eating cherries in February because I know that they've come from Chile. A, I don't believe they're organic because I just don't— I can't believe the certification is really appropriate, the same as it is here. And B, because I know that the kind of pollution that's happening trying to get that fruit from Chile to the United States is much worse and dumping a huge amount of particulate matter into the atmosphere. I mean, I'm always thinking holistically about what I'm what's on my plate. So if you try to think about eating locally as well, I think that helps. But Aslyn, there is that—

Sure, but we don't have— we have a certain number of months when we can grow things. I know. So there's always going to be that. I appreciate what you're saying. And I totally agree. I mean, we are about eating seasonally as well, as much as is possible. Otherwise we won't get any food. Fruit in January and February.

I think it's the same thing here in Italy. We're more of a very seasonal— we don't do the importing stuff. It happens much less. Italians are extremely, extremely picky about the products and the products that they work with, food-wise.

That's funny, we love that about Italians.

When you buy vegetables in the street market, they always show where it comes from. So yeah. I see people trying to buy stuff that comes from Italy. Consistently, yeah. Let's say fruits most of the time comes from Spain because, I don't know, they have a— they're cheaper or something. But Italians tend to buy stuff that comes from Italy. So this is the average attitude that people has here.

We love Italian tomatoes, right? San Marzano. Somebody asked a question about GMO, about olives. One of the things that's interesting about Spain and Italy is you're pretty safe with all of your olives, whether it's certified organic or not. Olive oil is usually— if it's Italian, If it's an extra virgin cold-pressed Italian olive oil, you're very safe because Italians are so picky about their olives. I can't imagine that they're doing much spraying.

It can be very tricky here, too. For instance, in the bottle, they write— what is it? Spremutto? Cold-pressed. Cold-pressed, produced and put in the bottle in the country. But if there is not an A and E in between, it means that all these olives can come from another country. So you always have to read all your labels, you know. So it doesn't mean that you're in the country where they grow the olives and there is a big tradition about it. They can always, always, always trick you.

I am with you there.

Well, guys, that has been an hour. It went really, really fast, and we had a lot of lively discussions here on food and on feeding kids and on the state of food across the world. So I'm very happy that everyone could join us. You know, we had a little trouble getting on, and I'm a little blurry but we're still here. I want to shout out to Larry. Larry couldn't be here with us today because his dad wasn't feeling really well, and he went to check on him and to see. That was much more important than being here on an HOA, was to go check on his dad and see how he was. He did send his well wishes and apologize to everyone for not being here, but we know where priorities are, and that's a good priority for him. Also, Elena Bellamonte was supposed to be on, but she really had a bad connection, and we couldn't keep her on, especially because my connection wasn't real good, too. It was affecting the quality all around. Thank you so much for initiating this Hangout, because it was really her idea to do the Food Revolution Day. Merci. Guys, one last quick go-around, and we'll say our goodbyes and want to announce any projects you're doing or anything you're working on, please let us know. Shows upcoming? Lynn, I know you have a show coming up.

I certainly do. Another new series this Sunday, Savor the Flavor. I've got one of my very good friends from the Alsace region going to be cooking a white and green asparagus flan. So join us, GMT 8 PM. Sounds good.

Giselle, you have some shows coming up, I know.

Oh, I've always got stuff coming up. Eco Rico TV, you can find me all over the place.

Watch our YouTube show.

I have a lot of fabulous recipes and health tips, and a new one coming out on the 21st called tostones. Tostones are fried plantains. If you want the secrets from my mama's kitchen, you must watch, watch, watch.

I almost thought that was the one that Pacino said when he was playing— hey, who am I to die? Tostones. No, that was a different thing.

Yeah, I have a big announcement coming very, very soon, but those details are still shh.

Oh, alright, we'll be waiting for that. And Maggie, what you got coming up?

Well, I just finished a food tour, food and wine tour of the Central Coast, and very excited about that. All the posts and all the different things that I sent out recently, it's on my blog, so check out my blog. I also have a show on the 24th, another bilingual show, Cuentos en Español Familia, and that is the 24th. Very cool.

Nazim and Elizabeth, anything coming up? Any more news on the Casa Chiesa?

Casa Chiesa, yes, yes. We just got back in— we lost you for a second. Casa Chiesa, it's an interesting project that's coming soon. We're probably looking at it, analyzing it precisely, and it's going to be dealing with a lot of things that are related to Italy from the perspective of a couple that live there. Who?

Wait a minute, who are you going to be talking to?

It's going to be you two shoppers.

Well, that sounds like that would be a wonderful show to watch and to take part in, so I'm looking forward to seeing more on that. Well, guys, thank you so much for joining us on Food Revolution Day, and we hope to see you again soon.

Gracias. Bye. Bye. Ciao. Auguri. Grazie. Ciao.