Everyone is going to have their own opinion about food simply because food is such an important part of being alive. For most of the population, eating is a pleasure. Yes, I said most of the population. There is one “body type” according to William Sheldon, that does not enjoy eating…the ectomorph. The ectomorph body type is small head, small hands and feet, usually introverted rather than extroverted, and who builds muscle less fast than the other two body types, namely the endomorph and the mesomorph.

The ectomorph thinks about food less often than most…can’t seem to finish a whole serving of anything, is naturally enviably thin and sometimes lives on high calorie, extra sweet foods because they don’t have to chew as much. Eating, after all, for the ectomorph, is a chore. One ectomorph told me once, “If I never had to eat again, it would be great!”

But getting back to the whole concept of opinions about food, most people have them, and they come in all flavors! As someone who has been interested in food most of my life, I’ve gone through a metamorphosis more than once and changed the way I think about food on many occasions.

As a young mother, I was interested in bringing to my home the very best food I could. It was much different than what I had grown up with, because my parents were restaurant eaters…if my mother was not taken to dine at least five nights a week, we all knew it,and so, I had to start from scratch – no pun intended. I had to either buy or make everything we ate. I learned quickly that “store bought” foods like cake mixes, Hamburger Helper and frozen and canned foods were MUCH more expensive than scratch and fresh. With an extremely short budget, and lots of mouths to feed, I worked tirelessly to find the best and the most abundant food I could.

There was the shift from white flour to whole grain…from buying things like noodles and bread to making my own. I’ve made just about everything over the years…from jam, yogurt, bread, refrigerator biscuit dough, yeast, wild bird food, to grinding my own flour and making my own mayo.

When I started offering day care in my home, I began to be interested in what other people’s children needed to eat. I was appalled by children’s preferred diets and their willingness to go hungry rather than eat. One family came in and said, “She only eats Barbie cereal.” One child ate only ice cream. One child vomited everything he ate…he ate only oatmeal.

By the early 1980’s, I began to read extensively on different foods, what each would contribute nutritionally, how foods worked with the body, what a child needs for good health, how many calories, from what food groups they are needed, how to make things children actually want to eat, who will be the eaters, who will be the dissenters. It occurred to me that since my day care children ate most of what they would eat at my home, then morally, my home better offer those children enough quality calories to not only keep them healthy, but make them healthy as adults. Food, after all, is an investment in our health forever.

The biggest problem I encounter both past and present is a general lack of support – a real boredom when the topic of food is even brought up. There is generally little interest from young parents just getting their feet wet with nutrition and feeding their first child simply because it is all so daunting. The world of food seems huge and unsafe and so failure ridden, many parents run screaming into the night rather than face anything more complicated than the packaged food section of the grocery store, the stove, and the table.

And the working parents of multiple children are generally so exhausted from all they have to manage, they usually look for the easiest “something to eat” which as often as not, is filled with empty calories.

Feeding other people’s children and teaching good table habits is not easy. It takes years of trust and habit. Feeding children takes understanding of the human conditions balanced with compassion. OK, most people are not going to go home from work every single evening and make a big scratch and nutritious dinner for their family. First, there is no time, and second, the children are too tired to eat by the time a big dinner is put on the table. Most children will eat ninety percent of what they are going to eat by 4:30. That’s where good child care comes in…and that has been my focus for thirty years. What will they eat balanced on a scale with what should they eat is the constant push-me-pull-you!

It’s no longer my job to make the food that my school children will eat Monday through Friday, because I’ve passed the baton to my daughter Molly and Miss Lisa. It’s time for the younger women to try their skills and knowledge. But that doesn’t mean I’ve stopped thinking about the kitchen, reading, writing, and experimenting with different foods and ways of preparing those foods. Will I ever gain respect from my work and interest? That’s left to be seen, but I will always be interested in food as not only a gift from above, but a means of health, a natural delight…and one of life’s entrusted pleasures!