Moms Weigh In on "Deceptively Delicious" With Some Choice Words
by Mir Kamin

My children are reasonable eaters; at least, in the intersection between one who eats everything and one who is picky in that typical kid way ("I like this and this and this, but I do not like them TOUCHING"), I consider them to be fairly typical. And I cook whatever I feel like cooking and they can eat it or not. I don't prepare separate food for them; I don't fret if they refuse to eat something; and I give them multivitamins and call it a day.

The internet chatter about Jessica Seinfeld's new cookbook, Deceptively Delicious, is sweeping across the parenting blogs. The book's premise is simple: Various kid-friendly foods can be "secretly" enhanced with fruit or veggie purees to up the nutrition, with junior being none the wiser. The implication is that this is every mother's dream, right here. Delicious, good-for-you recipes where the children will never have to know that they're eating well!

Color me... skeptical. For a variety of reasons. But I started reading and some folks do, indeed, declare Deceptively Delicious at hit.

Over at The Opinionated Parent, MuchMoreThanaMom gushes:

I tried a couple of the recipes and plan to try many more. My faves so far are the french toast (with pumpkin puree in the eggs), scrambled eggs (with pureed cauliflower that you totally can’t taste) and pita pizzas (which we make all the time but now will be spreading spinach puree on) and macaroni and cheese (with butternut squash). The four recipes I had time to try all took just a few minutes and hardly any work. And yes - they were delicious! When I have some more time, I can hardly wait to try the coffee cake and some of the muffins!

Wait, did she say she loved the mac and cheese? I've been following Melissa Summers' series of posts on trying Seinfeld's recipes, and her opinion of the mac and cheese was not so favorable:

I like squash and I adore macaroni and cheese and somehow this recipe has managed to ruin both these things for me. Perhaps permanently.

My son Max is a fellow macaroni and cheese lover, we often share some for lunch, homemade or from a box. I thought he might like this because he likes almost every version I’ve ever made. He did not like it at all and if he knew it was from the same book which ruined chocolate chip cookies and banana bread he’d probably want to pull Mrs. Seinfeld’s hair as well.

(You can read Melissa's account of the cookies and banana bread here, at which point I think you'll agree that even continuing to try recipes from this book was quite brave of her.)

Over at The Full Mommy, Amy from Binkytown details her objections, most of which have nothing to do with how the recipes taste.

There's the ideation of hiding vegetables:

I can see this approach if you are dealing with an infant, yes, it makes sense, but for a six year old? Can you really equate blitzing and hiding food as something that is deemed habit changing for your kids? I want to prepare real food in a way that is appealing to my little one, thereby acclimating him to the taste or texture of a vegetable in hopes that we will build healthy eating habits for a lifetime. No, it usually doesn't work, but at least I've tried. By the time he's ten I hope he'll be somewhat familiar with a carrot. Picky kids reject things dozens (and more dozens) of times before they give in and admit they might like it. I can't imagine the fight I would have on my hands if I first started introducing real vegetables at age 10.

There's the time involved in prepping all these extra ingredients:

Then there's the practicality. I have exactly 30 minutes from the time I walk in the door to prepare dinner or everyone spontaneously combusts into a wild explosion of super crabbiness.

And finally, she doesn't like the cover much, either:

Then I just couldn't help it, this is just my style preference but I was totally turned off by the kitschy 50's-esque June Cleaver design. Last time I checked, being a woman of the '50s serving up martinis to your husband and vacuuming was not my ideal.

BMGmom -- like Melissa -- prepared multiple recipes from the cookbook before she ultimately had to concede defeat:

After eating Turkey Chili (with carrot and red pepper puree), Tortilla Cigars (with yellow squash and carrot purees), Banana Bread (with cauliflower and banana purees) and Scrambled Eggs (with cauliflower puree), my family announced, “Sorry, but this stuff is honestly awful.” Rats! I was really looking forward to making Gingerbread Spice Cake (with broccoli and carrot puree).

Seriously (or truthfully), I wanted to like this food. Of course, I wanted my kids to like it, too. It seemed like such a great idea!

She points out, however, that she didn't take that crucial step of hiding the "secret" ingredients from her kids. She showed the recipes to her kids, and her son had his own opinions of the notion of deceiving your family to feed them better:

He didn’t like the idea of moms deceiving their kids. Then when he tried a few of the dishes, he sounded like a food critic from the New York Times (or maybe just a son who felt angry at the notion of parents trying to pull a fast one on their kids). “Mom,” he said emphatically, “I’d much rather have real carrots in this Turkey Chili than this orange…goop you put in it.” Then he told me he would rather eat brussels sprouts than anything I made using the recipes from the cookbook.

And finally, the Yummy Mummy wants to rename the book Deceptive and Completely & Utterly Ridiculous:

Why completely and utterly ridiculous? Because Jerry’s wife wants me to spend a couple of precious hours a week, standing in front of the food processor in my bathrobe, cutting and prepping vegetables, steaming or roasting them, pureeing them into baby food and then, washing up all those dirty dishes (mind you, all this work and I haven’t even cooked a meal the family will eat yet) all so that when my kids turn their tiny, little, innocent, mommy-worshiping backs to me, I can squirt some bland, palate-numbing, over-processed beet puree into their cupcakes…is she high on crack?

She continues on to present a well-reasoned and -- if I may just put it this way -- utterly kick-butt list of ten reasons why the book is ridiculous, and you should absolutely read the entire thing, but number one pretty much sums it right up for me:

1. Hiding veg in your kid’s food does not teach them to love and savor and enjoy food. It does not teach kids to enjoy gathering at the table. It does not teach them to try and experiment. It doesn’t develop their palates and make them healthy eaters. It’s a short cut and a quick answer to a more provocative and time and energy-consuming challenge. It makes cowardly eaters, not brave ones.

Amen. Want your kids to eat more and different and healthier foods? Here's an idea: Invite them to cook with you, and explore new recipes together. Is that really so hard? I guess it's pretty hard to get a book deal based on that principle, given that it's just plain common sense....

Contributing Editor Mir also blogs about issues parental and otherwise at Woulda Coulda Shoulda and Cornered Office, as well as sharing the joys of mindful retail therapy at Want Not.

Submitted by Mir Kamin (view blog) on Sat, 10/20/2007 - 13:40

Comments

 

anyone realize she the book is a copy of
someone else's

I dont' know if anyone has been reading the papers but this gal's book is a copy of one that already exists. Of course I can't think of the name b/c well, I'm a single mother with a four year old and i can barely remember to pee.

I would not pay a dime for this b/c Ms. Seinfeld apparently copied a copious amount of her ideas from a book of an unknown who harper collins publishers refused to publish b/c this woman wasn't married to someone famous.

Submitted by BERNTHIS.COM on Sat, 10/20/2007 - 16:39
 

see Liz's comment below ;)

I purposely refrained from touching on the current allegations because 1) it wasn't the focus of what I wanted to cover and 2) I happen to agree with Liz that it's highly unlikely that there's plagiarism involved.

--
Mir from WCS
(BlogHer Mommy & Family contributing editor)

Personal: Woulda Coulda Shoulda

Having it all with less: Want Not

Submitted by Mir Kamin on Sun, 10/21/2007 - 08:52
 

I prefer Cooking Incognito

I think the idea most moms had years ago and just experimented. I try adding things in regular meals before this book or the other one came out. I think most moms are clever and creative.

I don't like that she copied a lot of the recipes, but there are only so many combinations one an come up with. There are a billion recipes out there for mac and cheese but they are slightly different here or there. I like the recipes I get from Healthy Habits, Healthy Kids www.hhhkids.com. They had a good mac and cheese one with butternut squash. It's my daughter's favoriite. I think Seinfeld's book calls for Sweet Potato (yuck). Butternut squash is much milder and easier to hide. They call their recipes Cooking Incognito. They give out free tips every week on helping parents deal with finicky eaters, and other behavioral issues. They occassionally give a free recipe. This week was a berry smoothies with lemon flavored fish oil. It was awesome, couldn't taste the fish oil at all. And it was TOTALLY FREE which is the best part! You just go on their site and click on Get Free Tips. I haven's subscribed to their paid monthly newslletter yet, but I may soon as I'm really liking what I'm seeing.

I think Seinfeld should have given credit to these other authors and to say she was perhaps inspired by them, etc. I think she would have an easier time now.

Submitted by SarahN. on Mon, 10/22/2007 - 07:05
 

Another opinion

I reviewed the book for Cool Mom Picks and to tell ya the truth, I liked it. That aside, I want to address the plagiarism accusations that are flying around. Missy Chase Lepine wrote The Sneaky Chef which is a really wonderful cookbook as well. It came out in April. Similar ideas - totally. If I were Missy I'd be majorly bummed.

But plagiarism?

But having co-authored a cookbook myself, there is no way on God's green earth that you can steal some recipes, pitch the same concept, write the book, have the recipes tested and photographed, get it through the Harper Collins powers that be, get a marketing plan together then have the book on shelves 5 months later. Impossible. She probably had the manuscript to them a year ago.

Sometimes people come up with the same ideas at the same time - two movies about Truman Capote, say.

As for the 50s esque kitschy icon? Yeah. Hate that. Why would anyone revert to a 50s esque kitschy icon in this day and age? Not me. Uh-uh. No sir.

Mom-101
Cool Mom Picks.com

Submitted by Mom101 on Sat, 10/20/2007 - 17:18
 

haha

Point taken about the icon, Liz. ;)

--
Mir from WCS
(BlogHer Mommy & Family contributing editor)

Personal: Woulda Coulda Shoulda

Having it all with less: Want Not

Submitted by Mir Kamin on Sun, 10/21/2007 - 08:58
 

Not That Bad Of An Idea

I don't think it's such a bad idea. My son is utterly picky, and with a lot of trial and error, I have finally gotten him to the point where he eats his green beans first. However, we do both. I involve my son in every aspect of cooking, from planing the meal to buying the ingredients to cooking it. I refuse to make meal time a battleground and he doesn't have to eat something if he doesn't want to. But he doesn't get treats unless he eats well and he has to try one bite of everything. I put vegetables on his plate with every meal, but I also hide vegetables in other foods. As insurance. Because babies and toddlers have bizarre eating habits. I don't do purees though, because I don't have the time nor the inclination to do it. Finely chopped or grated carrot hides wonderfully in meatloaf.

Submitted by MdMommy2Two on Sat, 10/20/2007 - 19:28
 

Amen

I'm sickened by the idea of tricking my kids into eating something, and bothered that anyone would think it's too much of a hassle to teach their children to actually EAT WELL. You are setting your little one up for an unhealthy adulthood by doing this kind of thing, and that's just stupid.

So, yeah, prepare for (and WITH) them a variety of foods to try and discover. Then let them choose what they like from that. They'll settle on some things that are good for them if you are consistent. And if they don't, that multivitamin will make up for it. ;-)

Sarcastic Mom
A Braden A Day
Taking life one paci at a time....

Submitted by Sarcastic-Mom on Sat, 10/20/2007 - 19:31
 

I've reviewed both The

I've reviewed both The Sneaky Chef and Deceptively Delicious on one of my blogs, No Lemon Juice, and I did like The Sneaky Chef better.

There is no rule however that you can't both sneak the veggies into the food AND serve them with the meal in their traditional form. When I use these recipes, that's typically what I do. You can serve the butternut squash mac n' cheese along with green beans. You can still teach your kids to eat food in it's regular form while making sure they are still getting some good nutrients whether they know it or not.
Jenn
Jenn's Journal
No Lemon Juice

Submitted by jlraynes on Sun, 10/21/2007 - 05:26
 

Full Disclosure? C'mon!

My few contentions with the criticisms (believe me, I'm not a Jessica Seinfeld worshipper) is that people haven't read the book! The title is racy -- it's not about deception. It's about making foods healthier. My mom put wheat germ in my yogurt growing up -- I thought it was granola and it wasn't that far off. If I had asked her, she would have told me. But when do we all of a sudden explain each and every recipe we make with our kids?

Of course, mine is three. She could really care less.

If the recipes are crappy (I'm not one to puree -- but I am a casserole queen and that's how my kid eats veggesi), that's one thing. But to just say it's terrible to hide food so our kids will eat it is a different story. And to take it further to say people are wimps if their kids aren't good eaters is totally unfounded. My daughter happens to eat fairly well, but still spits certain things out. There's only so many times that can happen until you just decide to give up and say it's okay for this week to only eat green beans as your vegetable. But if I can give them to her in another way, perhaps she'll grow a taste for them outside of her meal.

And to be clear, I'm quite pleased when they throw vodka and white wine in my cream sauce without me knowing. Deceive away! Just make sure it's Grey Goose please.

Motherhood Uncensored
The Mom Trap
Cool Mom Picks
Parent Bloggers Network

Submitted by Motherhooduncensored on Sun, 10/21/2007 - 10:33
 

I completely agree with Motherhood Uncensored

Isn't all cooking or adding seasoning of any kind changing what the food tastes like to make it more pleasing to a certain palate?

And is lying to kids any worse than insisting on trying foods when they clearly don't want to try them? To me, that's about the same as throwing a hesitant kid into water to teach them to swim because you know that after a while, they'll do it. All it teaches the child is that you - someone bigger and stronger and who they must obey if they want to survive - know their body and mind better than they know themselves, and that is a far more dangerous message to send to my children than "mommy didn't tell you about the yams". I'd rather follow my kids' cues and not insist on trying anything fifteen times let alone once. Most pickiness begins when toddlers go through a normal picky stage. If they've been offered healthy foods up until then, I don't see the big deal in continuing to let them eat those two or three healthy foods for as long as they want. I mean, we're not talking Twinkies and Pixie Stix, right?

As someone who cooks a wide variety of foods and who offers foods both raw and dressed up and not from a typical American palate, I still ended up with a child who remained picky beyond the normal picky stage. It happens.

But you know, the mommy wars keep shifting and the game board continues to move. Onward we go.

Submitted by jozet on Fri, 10/26/2007 - 19:15
 

Mommy wars?

Hi Jozet,

Sorry for the delay in seeing your comment. I did want to respond, though, as I feel that I was at best misunderstood and at worst had some words placed in my mouth.

I never said picky eaters don't just happen, or that there is any way to insure that kids won't end up picky. I have a picky eater, myself. No judgments on that from me, believe me!

I also never said (and don't believe anyone else did) that you FORCE children to eat things. I believe what was being discussed was simply repeated presentation of said foods. And should it matter, I think that sending a child the message that Mommy (or Daddy) exists to be a short-order cook for them is just about as bad as letting them subsist on twinkies. Again -- I have a picky eater, myself. I cook what I cook. He can eat it or not. There's always SOMETHING on the table I know he likes, so it's not as though he goes hungry.

Do I need to run an ingredient list past my kids at every meal? Nope. But do I take issue with the suggestion that hiding ingredients become a way of life? Well, yeah, I do. That's my opinion. You (and everyone else) are welcome to have a different opinion. I'm not sure that makes for a war, mommy or otherwise. I was hoping it would just be a discussion. ;)

Regards,
Mir

--
Mir from WCS
(BlogHer Mommy & Family contributing editor)

Personal: Woulda Coulda Shoulda

Having it all with less: Want Not

Submitted by Mir Kamin on Tue, 10/30/2007 - 12:38
 

There are better ways...

to get your kids to eat veggies. I agree that infants and sometimes toddlers need to have foods pureed, disguised, whatever, but once children are of preschool age there is no reason to do any of that. Children need to learn how food tastes and have their palates developed. I would recommend the Spatulatta Cookbook and say start cooking with your kids and showing them how good food tastes over either of these other options.

Andrea
Andrea's Recipes

Submitted by Andrea Meyers on Mon, 10/22/2007 - 08:59
 

On our minds

I just wrote a review on the book before I came across this site. (Actually, less of a review, more focus on an even better way to get your children to eat vegetables without conning them into it).

http://mandymom.com/edublog/2007/10/22/deceptively-delicious/

I think the idea of adding more nutrition to our foods is a great one. Not everyone is going to like the addition, but many will (and I suppose its up to the baker/cook to tweak it).

Submitted by MandyMom on Mon, 10/22/2007 - 11:48
 

Kudos to Moms who want their kids to eat
better...but...

I am thrilled that people are trying to get their kids to eat better, but I don't love the fact that they are being sneaky about it. By bringing kids into the kitchen to help you prepare meals, you are increasing the chances that they will taste their culinary creations... and you are spending wonderful quality time together with your kids at the same time.

We tried some of these recipes, but my kids helped me to prepare the secret ingredient (the puree). They knew that there was spinach or squash inside their meal and ate it anyway (even if they did say it tasted a little funny!).

I know it sounds idealistic, but it would be nice if we could openly celebrate foods that keep us healthy instead of hiding them...

Here is a link to one of my blog posts that is getting a lot of attention on this book:
http://whatscookingblog.wordpress.com/2007/10/08/is-deceptively-deliciou...

What's Cooking: Cooking Classes and Gifts for Children
What's Cooking Weekly: A Healthy Online Menu Planning Service for Families
www.whatscookingweekly.com

Submitted by mamamich on Mon, 10/29/2007 - 08:38
 

It's a small web, after all.

Mir,

I'm a long-time reader of WCS but haven't commented b/c I guess I'm a bit shy and don't have kids, so I don't feel qualified to weigh in. But I love your blog and look forward to each new entry. (What can I say, I enjoy peeking into other people's lives and experiences.)

However! I also have been a fan of Veggie Venture for awhile, so when I read about the squash-mac'n'cheese controversy she mentioned, I clicked a link that brought me to this article. Doo-doo-doo, reading along, probably should be working, and bam! I see your name! You're everywhere, lady.

Anyway, I just wanted to comment on that. Also, I agree with how you feel about not wanting to hide healthy ingredients from children rather than introducing them to vegetables and encouraging them to try new things, both culinary and otherwise. Keep up the funny, thoughtful work! As a technical writing student who feels wary about freelancing, I'm inspired by your ability to write all over the web and make a decent living at it. Thanks.

Submitted by wakingkate on Mon, 11/05/2007 - 12:02
 

Tricking your kids?

Not sure that tricking your kids is a great way to go--- some interesting points were made by an kid/food expert in NY--- www.donnafish.com

Submitted by angelachaseme on Tue, 11/20/2007 - 08:14
 

Teach your kids, don't trick them

At the end of the day, I sort of agree that if you have to call broccoli something else to get it in their body, then something good is being done. BUT, the long-term message terrifies me. REALLY.

They are learning their long term eating habits from their parents, in every mouthful of food they eat as a child. If they believe mac and cheese is just mac and cheese, and that it's good for them, they'll keep doing it all their life.... And there won't always be someone there sneaking cauliflower into it. That really scares me.

If they think brownies are good for them as a child because you're sneaking spinach into them, they're gonna keep snarfing brownies, even when there's no one there sneaking spinach into them. In fact, most nutritionists agree that when they are young it is as much about teaching behavior patterns as it is about the food that is consumed...... Missing the educational and modeling part of that is risky business - and is shirking the primary obligation that we have as parents - modeling healthful and productive behavior.

No can do. I just think it's a bad idea.

Back when my daughter was in her finicky eating phase (thankfully, she'll now eat anything.....) the only vegetable she would eat was broccoli. with soy sauce. so, no matter what we were eating foe dinner, she had a little dish of broccoli with soy sauce (and an apple, with soy sauce, go figure)...... it may not have been sneaky or diverse, but she learned that she HAS to eat fresh fruits and veggies with every meal. and now, even though she often makes her own meals, they always have a fruit and a veggie in them.....

and really, it's not that hard. i just had a bag of frozen broccoli in the freezer at all times, took about 2 minutes to steam it up in a little pan of water....
___________
Alyssa Royse
JUST CAUSE
make some good news!
www.JustCauseIt.com

Submitted by alyssaroyse on Tue, 11/20/2007 - 08:48
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