Can You Get More Engaged with Your Food – and Your Family?

Chef Michael Smith during his visit to TBRHSC

“We’ve all been led to believe that food is difficult,” said Chef Michael Smith. But it’s not, he said. “Here’s the thing: we’re human… and human beings cook.”

Most people know Chef Smith through his TV shows on the Food Network, and through his five (and counting) cookbooks. Chef Smith is also the National Sustainability Advocate for Sodexo, which operates Food Services at the Health Sciences Centre including inpatient meals and the cafeteria.

Chef Smith visited the Thunder Bay Regional Health Sciences Centre on October 14, and made a presentation to staff and the public about making healthier food choices.

One of the major points he made was that getting out of touch with cooking isn’t just a health issue, it is a social issue too. “Fundamentally, that’s what brought us together. As human beings, it is absolutely hard-wired into our genetic fibre. We gather, we prepare, and we share food. That’s what we do,” Chef Smith said.

The ironic thing is that more than ever, we consume information about food: cookbooks, blogs, Twitter feeds, websites, magazines, and an entire TV network devoted to food.

“We have huge amounts of food media… yet at the same time we have fewer people than ever before cooking before. How do you reconcile that?”

In fact, it’s not ironic, Chef Smith said. People who no longer cook themselves are unconsciously trying to live vicariously through food media and satisfy that genetic need.

There is also no irony in the fact that these revelations are coming from one of Food Network’s most popular chefs.

“I’m part of the problem – and I’m part of the solution,” he said, recognizing his role.

It is his celebrity that allows him to talk openly about eating healthier and try to get people back into the kitchen. It’s not an easy thing though, and Chef Smith said that even he has his limits when it comes to getting people to change their lifestyles.

“I recognize that I can stand here on my soapbox all day long, throw facts and figures at you, tell funny stories, and you’ll sit here and nod and be entertained. And then you’ll go home and go right back to your ways. I know that,” he said.

Chef Smith challenged them to change just one thing, and other things will fall into place.

“Really, what I’m asking you to do is just get engaged. In your own way, get engaged. That’s where it has to begin; there isn’t any other first step. Any challenge that we face as a people, it always begins with ‘get engaged’.”

That means making the right choices for you and your family – especially for your kids who rely on you for their health. He points to how on his show, Chef at Home, he encourages his son Gabe to try everything. It’s not as easy as it looks though.

“I want to assure you that my son is not a nutritional prodigy. He’s nine years old – he benefits heavily from editing,” he said.

The bottom line though is that we can all do something to make changes in our “sphere of influence”, and let home cooking make us healthier physically and socially.

“We need to get a healthier relationship with our food,” Chef Smith said. “We’ve lost so much tradition.”

:: Chef Michael Smith: Cheap Food is Killing Us ::

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