Community Corner

Kids Learn to Kick the Junk Food Habit

Volunteers and elected officials gather to stress the importance of healthy eating at the Annual Kids in the Kitchen Community Fair

The women of Bed-Stuy put kids in the kitchen and their minds on healthy meals at the community fair last Saturday.

The Junior League of Brooklyn, a 101-year-old non-profit organization of women volunteers, hosted the Kids in the Kitchen Nutrition and Community Fair at the Academy of Business and Community Development (A.B.C.D.) to promote nutrition and healthy living among youth in the Bed-Stuy community.

The annual event is an education initiative that was started in 2006. It started in response to a statistic from the Center for Disease Control and Prevention which says that almost a third of adolescents and children in the U.S. are overweight or at risk of being overweight.

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Assemblywoman Annette Robinson had her blood pressure taken at one of the many tables that were set up throughout the gym.

"Events like this provide information for the community,” she said. “People need more information to take better care of themselves, and to take better care of their families. If you don't have information, you're in trouble."

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The Junior League of Brooklyn is dedicated to disseminating such information, with League President Tracie Williams leading the charge.

"I've lived in Brooklyn my whole life and wanted to give back to the community that made me," Williams said. "There were people that guided my life and I wanted to do that for someone else."

Williams, along with Assemblywoman Robinson, Assemblyman Hakeem Jeffries, Senator Velmanette Montgomery, Congressman Ed Towns and Brooklyn Borough President Marty Markowitz all spoke about the importance of nutrition education for students and families throughout Brooklyn.

Along with the table for blood pressure screenings, there were Wii sports classes along with Zumba classes, a Latin American-inspired dance fitness program. Face painting and apron decorating were available for the younger students in attendance, and various sponsors, such as Whole Foods, Green Mountain Coffee and Chiquita Banana, also had tables with information about healthy eating.

Nutritionists Nicole Potenec and Shoshanna Levy provided a nutrition workshop and family-friendly cooking demonstration, providing recipes for a raw veggie burrito wrap and healthy snack ideas for kids. This coincided well with the goal of the event, which Williams said was to have everyone walk away with good eating habits and to know how good eating affects the body.

Victor Taveras, a 14-year-old student at Brooklyn High School of the Arts who came to volunteer, believes strongly in getting the word out about healthy eating, especially because of the education gap in that area among his peers.

"Not many children know--I didn't know--that it was bad to eat fast food. And even though it doesn't seem bad now, it affects you in the future."

Taveras went to the fair because of encouragement from his mother, who said that the volunteer work would look good on his college applications. But he also has a personal interest in the subject matter at hand: Taveras said that as a husky teen, he feels a connection to childhood obesity. He has been doing Zumba for two years and has lost close to a hundred pounds.  

“It's important to take baby steps, replacing soda and juice with water,” he said. “Eating fast food in moderation is okay, but only like once a week.” He paused as he thought about the healthy eating habits he’s learned. “Or how about once a month?”


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