The Despair of Disneyland

Since finishing Michael Pollan's book, "In Defense of Food", I've become more aware of the food I put in my body, and painfully aware of what goes into my sons' bodies.  Pollan's core concept - "Eat food.  Mostly plants.  Not too much." - is surprisingly difficult to live.  It's even harder to get the kids to go along with it.

I have made very little in the way of changes so far.  I'm focusing on observing whether the food I eat normally falls into the Food Rules. and determining what I'll have to change.  However, the act of observing changes that which is being observed.  Just by paying attention, I'm making some changes.

A small example:  the boys wanted spaghetti and meatballs for dinner.  While I was grocery shopping, I grabbed a bag a frozen meatballs so I could get dinner made quickly.  Before I put it in my cart, I skimmed the ingredients.  The ingredients list turned my stomach.  Mechanically separated turkey.  3 kinds of flour.  Both vegetable oil and shortening.  Autolyzed yeast extract.  11 ingredients I couldn't spell without peeking.  So back into the freezer they went, and I got some ground beef instead.  Even red meat has to be better for my kids than the stuff in those frozen turkey meatballs.

This past weekend was really challenging.  We were fortunate enough to spend 3 days at Disneyland.  There are some good choices at Disneyland.  In addition to the stands selling ice and churros, there are stands selling sliced mango and pineapple.  But it's harder in the restaurants.  We had to plot to find restaurants that had something other than hamburgers and chicken nuggets.  We discovered that the kids' Mac and Cheese is a foodlike substance that bears such a vague resemblance to food that even my son was grossed out.  You could get your leathery burger with either a giant serving of french fries or a 2-ounce cup of oil-soaked marinated vegetable salad.

It took work, but we found some real food.  The pizza place in Tomorrowland had really excellent salads - and great pizza.  The french cafe in New Orleans Square had great, vegetable-rich salads and grilled citrus chicken.  That cafe had a kid's chicken meal that came with grilled chicken, rice pilaf, grapes, carrots, and celery.

Now that we're home, I'm ready to stop observing and start making changes.