How to Cook Healthy Food for Kids : Advantages of Grass Fed Beef and Wild Caught Salmon Over Farm Raised Counterparts

"I'll have what she's having."

-When Harry Met Sally

 

This is one of my favorite lines from one of my favorite movies of all time.  Not only is this a good line, but I find this quote to be applicable to food and health.  Scientific studies that track the relationship of food and health over time can help guide what we should and shouldn't be eating.  By copying the health-promoting dietary habits reported in studies, you and your kids can "have what she's having" rather than have to reinvent the nutritional wheel. 

This quote is also applicable to the food chain in general.  Being at the top of the food chain has its advantages.  It also has its disadvantages.  When you bite into a beef burger, you are in effect having whatever that cow had previously eaten as well.  This is part of the omnivore's dilemma, a concept introduced by Michael Pollan.  Corn-fed cattle are fattier than grass-fed cattle.  Check out the difference in the marbling the next time you go to the grocery store.  

Similarly, farm-raised salmon are fed on grains while wild-caught salmon are free to feed on algae.  As a result, farm-raised salmon are high in bad saturated fat while wild-caught salmon are high in healthy omega 3 fats.  Read about the importance of omega 3 fats in my previous post:
http://doctorchrisko.blogspot.com/2013/07/cooking-for-your-kids-good-bad-and.html

So, the next time you purchase your meat and your fish, remember that "you're having what they're having:".  I expand on this and show Colin how to be a man in the following video entitled, "Boy Versus Wild."

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Here is a link to the recipe I used in the above video:
http://natashaskitchen.com/2012/06/08/baked-salmon-with-garlic-and-dijon/

References

Pollan, Michael. The Omnivore's Dilemma: A Natural History of Four Meals. New York: Penguin, 2006.

 

Perlmutter, David, and Kristin Loberg. 2013. Grain brain: the surprising truth about wheat, carbs, and sugar--your brain's silent killers.