Through the Cooking Glass » family

Food Fun

brianglass — Sat, 23 Feb 2008 21:18:07 +0000

If you want your kids to eat your cooking, sometimes you have to make the food fun. For breakfast this morning we had fried leftover mashed potatoes, turkey bacon, scrambled eggs, orange quarters, and Gouda from Holland.

Experiencing the Outdoors

brianglass — Wed, 08 Aug 2007 15:42:45 +0000

My family and I have a tradition. We love hiking in Rocky Mountain National Park (we live in Michigan). No, we don’t eat as well when we’re camping in Colorado, but there is a different type of nourishment in our trips. Not only do we get a lot of exercise, fresh clean air, and exposure to the natural world, we spend a lot of time together as a family. That is perhaps a more important type of nourishment than food.

This summer we spent a week in the park and went on several all-day hikes. The kids, 5 and 8, were excellent hikers and were even heard singing near the end of the longest hike of the trip, Chasm Lake.

My favorite hike was Mount Chiquita. While it seemed an easier climb, the altitude was enough to take one’s breath away – literally. We also did a loop around the Bear Lake and Glacier Gorge area and an excursion down the LuLu City trail. There were numerous smaller hikes as we drove around the park, stopping every 5 minutes.

Someday we’ll move there…

Nourishing Character

brianglass — Wed, 28 Feb 2007 23:56:41 +0000

This blog focuses on nourishing traditions. While Nourishing Traditions is a cookbook espousing traditional foods and methods of preparation, there exist nourishing traditions that are not related to food.

By choosing to prepare foods in a traditional manner, we are saying that we don’t really approve of all the newfangled foods and preparation methods in existence today. We are rejecting industrial packaged foods and choosing instead to go back to older tried and true methods and foods. In essence, this is a very conservative way of thinking.

If we apply this type of thinking to other areas, we come up with some interesting results. If running off half-cocked to do unspeakable things to our food supply in the name of progress causes serious health problems, might not promoting completely new and untested methods of child rearing provoke equally serious consequences?

I happen to have a daughter who is particularly strong willed. She is likely to go far in life with her determination and confidence, but she can also cause consternation in her parents. Enter The New Strong Willed Child (my parents had a copy of an earlier revision of this book while I was growing up. Go figure.) I’m currently listening to an audio version of this book by Dr. James Dobson. Dr. Dobson recommends traditional methods of discipline, including the limited use of corporal punishment, and I think he’s on to something here.

I think this country has a growing percentage of the populace lacking respect for authority, lacking personal responsibility, and exhibiting behavior problems too numerous to count. The children of today are hell on wheels in comparison with children raised just 50 years ago. Perhaps it’s time to consider going back to traditional methods of nourishing the character.

Fun in Vermont

brianglass — Thu, 15 Feb 2007 17:41:50 +0000

My family and I are currently on vacation in Vermont. For photos of the snow from the big storm, read Fun in Vermont on my other blog.