If you have children, or heck you just care about the health of our fellow citizens you should be watching this show. In a word the show is heartbreaking.
I feel in love with Jamie Oliver many years ago when he had a show called the Naked Chef. He was a cooking show for people that want to eat well, but are not expert cooks. I heard him once say the objective of the show was to buy local, fresh food and apply some love.
Towards the end of the series he went to an elite prep school in the UK. At the time he wasn't married and had no children. He was appalled by what he found. I think it is safe to say it changed his life.
He was stunned that the children were being served food he wouldn't serve his dog. He didn't understand how this could be. He asked why this was the case and was told it was just the way it was. They couldn't afford to serve them "fresh" food. It was just too hard, expensive, and took too much effort.
To prove he knew what he was talking about and the school didn't, he bought all local, fresh food and let the 10 to 12 year old's fix a meal for the entire school. He was able to do all of this for LESS money and the kids loved the food.
Somehow the Queen of England heard about the show .....
She then put in process an entire program to change everything children in the UK eat.
Fast forward to now and Jamie is trying to bring his "food revolution" to the United States. This is season 2. Last year he was in Huntington, WV. The reason, a study had shown it was the most unhealthy town in America. A young Brit coming to Huntington and telling them they were doing things the wrong way, well it didn't work out so well at first.
None of the adults seemed to want to work with him, much less listen.
So he did something I thought was pretty brilliant, he went directly to the children. He educated them. Talked to them like they were adults. He showed them how their processed food was actually made (not a fun thing to watch I might add). At one point this young lady said something like, "why are they serving us this?"
At that point things started to change. And they are changing to this very day.
But a lot of critics said, "sure you can do that in Huntington, but that is a small town. Your ideas won't work in a large town."
This year he is in Los Angeles to prove you can serve children good food in a huge school district. I would not have thought things in LA could have been worse then Huntington, but I am never ceased to be surprised anymore.
He can't get approval to go to a school, much less cook. They won't even let him analyze what food they are serving. But a progressive charter school has hired him not to cook, but to teach.
He did an easy little quiz with a bunch of high school kids asking them where certain foods come from. He normally does this with a much younger age set, but it was eye opening to see the results. 17 year olds were saying things like butter comes from corn, guacamole comes from apple, cheese comes from macaroni, and corndogs are grown. This is a smart, college prep high school and they don't know the basics of food education. They're smart, but they've just never been exposed to this information or even questioned where food comes from.
Now I am not an emotional kind of a guy. But I can't watch this show for a few minutes and not cry. I don't mean my eyes get a little wet, I mean tears streaming down my face. In the last segment of this weeks show Jamie is asked, by the Principal of that Charter school (he appears to be a scholar and saint), to speak to the PTA.
Jamie breaks down and starts to cry as he talks to them. Now he was to polite to say this, but I have to think he noticed the same thing as I did. Scanning the room these parents were almost all overweight. I don't mean a couple pounds. I mean 50. 100. Even more.
How we eat is learned. At home and at school. Jamie is trying to educate. That forces are aligning against him should be something that pisses us all off.
Note: I am a 5'4 male. I weight 128. Two decades ago I was 240. Weight is a personal thing for me. Something I think about almost every second of everyday, cause it takes effort for me to maintain my weight. My family members are almost all obese. My family is also blessed with amazing health. No cancer. None of that. But we do often die earlier then we should cause of weight related issues. This is personal!