"We want to get them in the kitchen and teach them how to make a delicious meal that is healthy," said Heidi Diller, Albertsons.
A cooking lesson was on the menu Thursday at the UC Learning Co-op in downtown L.A. where ABC7 and community partners Albertsons and PowerPlay teamed up for a Kid Healthy cooking lesson with 5th graders from Hamasaki Elementary School.
The Kid Healthy program puts a focus on sensible food and fitness for Southern California 4th and 5th graders and their parents, with the goal of reducing the incidence of obesity, Type 2 diabetes and other chronic diseases.
"I actually helped my mom cook yesterday," said Bitia Hernandez, a 5th grade student from Hamasaki Elementary. "We made spaghetti, but instead of with the ground beef we used chicken."
"As parents we all want our kids to live a long life. One of the best things we can do is to teach our kids how to cook," said Diller. "We're not born with the skill right?"
Smoothies, pita sandwiches and chicken tostadas were featured in Thursday's lesson to get kids excited about being in the kitchen and tasting fun colorful food that has nutritional value.
Along with all the dicing, slicing and blending, they learned one very important thing about food -- portion control.
Portion sizes are so important, we can teach them nutrition, but all of that goes out the window if we don't teach them the appropriate portion size too.
Along with cookbooks, workbooks go home with the children so families can do some fun homework on everything from counting servings of fruits and vegetables to counting steps, as the other component to the program is activity.
