Nom Nom Paleo: Food for Humans (27 page)
Read Nom Nom Paleo: Food for Humans Online
Authors: Michelle Tam,Henry Fong
Tags: #Cookbooks; Food & Wine, #Cooking by Ingredient, #Natural Foods, #Special Diet, #Allergies, #Gluten Free, #Paleo, #Food Allergies, #Gluten-Free, #Healthy
A
word to the wise: if your crispy bacon strips are super-long, snap 'em in half before you make these sammies, or the guacamole will squish out when you take your first bite.
THE BIG QUESTION: DO THE KIDS EAT PALEO?
For the first few years of their lives—before Henry and I adopted a real-food-only approach to nutrition—our children ate what we ate: a low-fat diet with a heavy dose of factory-processed “healthy” snacks.
Smugly congratulating ourselves for feeding our kids as healthfully as possible, we kick-started each morning with homemade granola over low-fat yogurt or egg white omelets with whole wheat toast. Our family broke bread over nightly meals of “heart-healthy whole grains”—followed by desserts that were “naturally” sweetened with cane sugar or agave nectar. Never mind the digestive woes and sugar crashes.
When I made the decision to stop eating hyper-processed, bad-for-you food products, it was tough to break the addiction—but at least I could appreciate the health benefits that came with the change. My kids? Not so much. They just wanted to know why we wouldn’t have syrup-drenched waffles for breakfast anymore.
I envied the model Paleo parents out there who successfully took a cold-turkey approach to weaning their offspring. From what I could tell, they stood firm as their kids screamed and wailed in vain for their waffles and toast, their bean burritos and churros, their spaghetti and garlic bread, and their brownies and ice cream.
The theory was that once the junk food withdrawal symptoms subsided (and hunger took over), the kids would be good to go.
Sadly, our experience didn’t go quite so smoothly.
It all started promisingly enough. We did the big pantry/fridge/freezer purge. Breakfast cereals? Gone. Bagels? Gone. Organic cheddar goldfish crackers? Gone. Boxes of mac & cheese? Gone. For a while, the boys kept asking for cereal or waffles at breakfast. “Nope,” I’d say. “But you can have eggs with bacon or sausage, and I’ll cut you some strawberries.”
“We’ll just have the strawberries, then,” they’d say.
Owen—three years older than his brother—handled the transition pretty well, all things considered. He didn’t complain or demand grainy or sugary foods. But Big-O’s never had much of a sweet tooth, and his palate is fairly broad; this is a kid who’s always wolfed down Indian curries and dishes of
ankimo
(monkfish liver) at Japanese restaurants. While on a family trip to Mexico, he happily munched on a plate of deep-fried maguey worms.
These days, Owen eats pretty much whatever we put in front of him. He tends to be especially enthusiastic about Paleo dishes that he has a hand in making—even if all he does is help stir the pot.
Ollie, on the other hand, made abundantly clear that he was not on board with this Paleo business. This wasn’t a surprise; our then-two-year-old was a “healthy” junk food addict of the highest order. Even before we made the switch to Paleo, Henry and I were concerned that Lil-O refused to eat anything but highly refined carbs: pasta, rice, bread, and sweets. He wouldn’t touch meat, but we couldn’t call him a vegetarian, either, because vegetarians eat vegetables.
One weekend soon after we started eating Paleo, Henry decided to serve Ollie only meat and vegetables until he was willing to try a bite. In response, our son went on a day-long hunger strike. Finally, desperate to get him to eat
something
, Henry tried to bribe Ollie with a new wooden toy train. “All you have to do is try one bite,” my husband pleaded.
Ollie burst into tears.
“Kiddo,” Henry reasoned with him, “in this house, we only have real food.” My toddler stared at his dad, and then flung open the front door and ran outside.
“Then I don’t want to live here anymore!” he yelled, tears coursing down his face.
