Good Food Is What You Are Used To

Apparently 17% of British high school students and 9.6% of elementary school students do not want to eat Jamie Oliver's healthy lunches. 

What that actually means is that the kids are not familiar with real, non-processed food. The reason they are not used to real food is that their parents either can't or won't prepare meals.  They open the box, pop the lid off a tin, microwave the stuff and feed it to their kids.  These kids don't know what real cheese tastes like.  They are used to that processed cheese food you get in handy plastic tubs.  They certainly aren't familiar with real meat.  All they've ever eaten was reclaimed meat products processed into some kind of patty or tube.

Of course they are going to think the real food is yucky.  They are not familiar with it. It's "weird". 

Having said that, Jamie Oliver is trying to feed them another version of "weird" food. Tagine, ratatouille and other food that they have never, ever heard of, never mind seen, touched or tasted. Perhaps if he had presented them with real macaroni and cheese, chili or a chicken thigh, they would have at least tried it. Kids are notorious for being non-adventurous with their food. Why would you present something with strange smells and unusual names?

At the heart of the problem is the fact that our society does not value food. Yet we eat too much of it and of that food, most of it is junk or processed until any nutritional value is sucked out of it!

Time for the world to start cooking again.