Playing in the kitchen to combat obesity

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Playing in the kitchen to combat obesity

Famous chefs bring children to cook dishes of fruit and vegetables to make them consume more healthy food.

It is not always easy to convince parents to let their children venture into the cooked, recognizes Conceição Rego, Patricia's mother, aged seven, one of the participants in the workshop and kitchen for children held last week in Evora. "I do not usually leave work because there is always some concern regarding the danger posed by the use of knives and the stove." The idea of such workshops, which are taking place throughout the country with the support of several famous chefs, is exactly attract children to the kitchen in order to combat childhood obesity.

On this day in Evora, the leader was the chief António Nobre, who agrees that the presence of children in the kitchen is "a way to encourage them" to follow a healthy diet. "It does not mean I do not eat hamburgers or spaghetti bolognese that's out there with great abundance. But they must find the other flavors and, therefore, the role of fathers is crucial," he says. One of the tricks, reveals, is to adapt the recipes to each age group. Therefore, Noble put the newest building a "Daddy's Car" (recipe for Henry Moore with pineapple, kiwi, yogurt and cereals).

It is discovering the "art" of playing in the kitchen is a challenge that can help parents and children to combat the problems associated with obesity, says Ana Rito, a researcher at the National Institute of Health and vice chairman of the Scientific Council of the Platform Against Obesity.

Collaborator of the book "Today I am the Chief!" Where it is based workshops and gathering recipes designed for heads of 'foot and a half "by the great masters of the kitchen, as Augusto Gemelli Bertílio Gomes, Henrique Sá Pessoa, Mafalda Pinto Milk and Ricardo Costa, the researcher argues that the kitchen while a playful can help to eliminate the newest of the "obesogenic environment" in which they live, "abundant in foods of high energy density."

"The more children are interested in cooking better get used to cooking a more healthy and avoid fast food," he says, for its part, the chief Henrique Sá Pessoa, author of TV programs about cooking and one of the chefs who contributed recipes for the book, including a "Vegetable Frittata with chicken breast, where aubergines, courgettes and broccoli are served in" Company "of eggs, chicken and mushrooms.

"Almost all children like scrambled eggs in this recipe and I gathered a quantity of vegetables that, in the middle of the mixture with eggs and chicken, are disguised. It's a dish very colorful and is a good way to get used to eating vegetables, a of products that most lacking in the diet of children. "

In worlshop in Evora, color filled the plates of the kids. And as he watched his daughter cut a pineapple to give it the shape of an automobile, over which spread some honey, Conceicao admits that, despite fears it is worth leaving the daughter in the kitchen, occasionally: "In fact , meals can become more neat if participated by the whole family. "

"Maybe one way to end a tantrum whenever we speak in the soup," says another mother, recognizing that "a storm" to convince her son to eat vegetables or fruit. "Before going to school to eat salad but then began to hear colleagues say they do not like the green and now it's hard to convince him otherwise."

JN