Using Ice Cream Right

I know it sounds crazy to use ice cream — the poster child for high fat, high sugar, high calorie junk — to teach healthy eating habits, but you can.

In fact, it's ice cream's sinful status that makes it the perfect vehicle for teaching kids about eating.  That, plus the little fact that everyone loves it.

You might not think it, but ice cream can help kids learn about portion size, new foods, peer pressure, self-control and a host of other eating skills.

The most important lesson you can teach with ice cream is about portion size.

Lots of research points to the importance of portion size as the key to stemming the obesity-tide, and there's no food I can think of which exemplifies the problem of portion distortion more than ice cream.  

Have you noticed how large the servings have gotten lately?  I'm not talking about dishes such as the outrageously huge Vermonster from Ben & Jerry's which has an unbelievable 20 scoops of ice cream. I'm talking about normal ice cream servings.

• One small scoop of Coldstone Creamery's chocolate ice cream has 320 calories. That's more than a 1/4 of the 1200 calories a typical 5 year old needs to consume in a day.

But that's nothing compared to Coldstone's shakes.

• One small Coldstone Creamery Milk and Cookies shake (Live It size) has 1090 calories. Think of that as 90% of a 5 year old's daily caloric consumption.

The good news is that people easily develop habits around portion size, so you can use that to your advantage: Mimic the 100-calorie snack packs and present your kids with appropriate-sized portions.

• One McDonald’s Kiddie Cone has only 45 calories. (That’s the first time I’ve ever written anything good about McDonald’s!)

Read How Big is that Bag? Eating in the Age of Portion Distortion.

You can also use ice cream to teach your children to try new foods. 

I recently wrote about using yogurt to introduce new foods (Read The Magic of Yogurt), and the principle is the same with ice cream: because kids already like it, and because it can be modified in an infinite number of ways, you can help kids expand their palate by mixing up the kinds of scoops they're served.

You don't have to go so far as to insist your child try this lovely Spaghetti & Cheese ice cream (isn't it appetizing?), and you don't have to sell your kids on the lobster ice cream (made with chunks of real lobster) sold on Martha's Vineyard. You can help your children explore the world of new flavors by introducing strawberry to a chocolate-lover.  Or mixing in chocolate chips to help a kid who gravitates towards smooth-textured foods to accept meatier mouth-feels.

You can also use ice cream to teach your kids about proportion, self-control, peer pressure and a host of other eating habits.

To tell you the truth, these other habits are the hardest to teach, but they shouldn't be overlooked. For instance, research shows that children who learn self-control early in life, succeed in ways that are pretty wonderful: they can cope with adversity and stress, they have high levels of concentration, and they develop trustworthiness.  They even do better on their SATs. Read Marshmallows Make You Smart!

And while it's  tough for kids to be different, letting your kids have ice cream every time their friends get it -- it's only fair, many parents rationalize -- teaches children a pretty lousy lesson.  On the other hand, learning to be different can be pretty powerful. Read The Perils of Other Parents.

Every time we feed our kids we’re teaching them something about eating…

…we might as well teach the right lessons.

~ Changing the conversation from nutrition to habits. ~

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Sources: 

https://www.coldstonecreamery.com/assets/pdf/nutrition/Nutrition_Info_Shakes_05_09_08;

https://www.coldstonecreamery.com/assets/pdf/nutrition/nutrition_info_icecrame_070110.pdf;

http://nutrition.mcdonalds.com/nutritionexchange/nutritionfacts.pdf

Ice Cream vs. Ice Slush: The Truth About the Ice Cream Truck Wars

Navigating the ice cream truck.  It’s got to be one of the highlights of spring.

It’s kind of crazy that as soon as the weather perks up a bit, the ice cream parks across from my daughter’s school (bringing the drugs right where they’re wanted).  And recently, some mothers began wondering: which was better for their kids, an ice cream cone or an ice slush drink?

The conversation unfolded like this:

• On one side -  At least the ice cream has calcium and protein in addition to the sugar and the fat. 

• On the other side –But the ice slush doesn’t have any fat.

I’ll answer the ice cream vs. ice slush question in a moment but, before I do, please consider the following …

It doesn’t matter.

Deciding that one frozen treat is healthier than the other will change how you use it, and not in a good way either.

1) Research shows that when people think something is healthy, they eat more of it. 

2) Not only that, research also shows that when people eat food they think is healthy, they eat more (other?) unhealthy food too (because they’ve earned it).

If you think ice cream is healthy (at least relative to the ice slush), you’ll more readily give in to your children’s demands for a cone.  And if you decide the slush isn’t so bad, you’ll more willingly provide your kids with their afterschool rush.

Splitting nutritional hairs by focusing on the good nutrients and ignoring the bad ones leads parents astray.

Since good nutrients can be found in almost every item – it’s the rationale behind Healthy Candy: Made with Real Fruit Juice! – you can always find a reason to give your kids the cr*p they crave.  (Be honest: don’t you feel better handing over the cone knowing the ice cream has calcium?)

It doesn’t matter what your kids eat.  What matters is how often they eat it.

Giving your kids regular treats from the truck doesn’t just foster their fondness for frozen treats.  It also…

• Raises your kids’ sugar threshold so they prefer sweet foods. 
• Teaches them to justify certain treats as healthy, which leads them to eat more (and to eat them more frequently).

It doesn’t matter whether ice cream or ice slush is “healthier” because neither should be considered a source of nutrients and neither should be eaten frequently.   They’re treats!  In this department, it’s frequency that matters most. 

Read It Doesn’t Matter WHAT Your Kids Eat and When is a Cookie Not a Cookie?

Ice Cream vs. Ice Slush

I couldn’t find the nutrition information for my local ice cream truck so here are the facts for Dairy Queen’s child size vanilla cone versus their small Arctic Rush (Blue Raspberry flavor) 

Calories

• Vanilla Cone: 140
• Arctic Rush: 240

Fat

• Vanilla Cone: 4g
• Arctic Rush: 0g

Sodium

• Vanilla Cone: 60mg
• Arctic Rush: 0mg

Sugar

• Vanilla Cone: 16g
• Arctic Rush: 48g

Protein

• Vanilla Cone: 4g
• Arctic Rush: 0g 

If your kids like rainbow sprinkles add 70 calories, 2.5g of fat and 5g of sugar to the cone.

So which is better for your kids: the cone or the slush?

Whichever they prefer. Treats don’t have to be healthy.  They have to be great.  So teach your kids to love their junk, and to eat it infrequently – once a week or so -- but with gusto!

~ Changing the conversation from nutrition to habits. ~

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Sources: http://www.dairyqueen.com/us-en/eats-and-treats/nutrition-calculator/ accessed 4/18/2010; Provencher, V., J. Polivy, and Herman, C. Peter. 2009. “Perceived Healthiness of Food. If It's Healthy, You Can Eat More!” Appetite 52: 340-44. Wansink, B., 2006. Mindless Eating: Why We Eat More Than We Think. New York: Bantam Books.