Thursday, March 1, 2012

Fat Chef

Are you kidding me?  Fat Chef!?  Not the kind of show that speaks kindly of culinary arts from the education or commercial side of the equation. 

I watched an episode tonight of an obese male chef and a female chef.  The obese female chef teaches healthy eating!

Once again I call out to those of us who teach and earn a living in food service to educate ourselves and our clientele on healthy living which involves their relationship with food, front and center.

When will we be able to reach the parents of the 9-year old boy I watched at my son's wrestling match this past weekend eat a huge portion of nacho chips with cheese and pulled pork.  Then one hour later he waddled, and I am not kidding when I say "waddled", past us with a giant pretzel and nacho cheese for dipping sauce?  How can this be?  I then looked around the arena where the wrestling match was being held and the reality of a statistic that almost 70% of Indianans are overweight or obese -- they were all around us.

Ladies and gentlemen, I submit to you that we are part of the problem and must become part of the solution.  I am working to make the menu in our food service industry both trendy, healthy, contemporary, local, and sustainable by having 30% of the menu be vegetarian, 86 the french fried starchy potatoes and in with the sweet potato fries (which are a huge hit), tofu in lieu of animal proteins (also a big hit on the B'ahn Mi) small desserts, and more.

Please for goodness sake let us teach our students how to create taste sensations in moderate portions that support a healthy lifestyle. Indeed we could do our part to reduce health care costs in this nation by reducing demand which results from those who are eating the food our students and our colleagues crank out on a daily basis that IS TASTY BUT NO DAMN GOOD FOR THEM TO EAT ON A REGULAR BASIS.  I am doing my part and hope you will join me!

Never trust a thin chef, my ass!

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