My boyfriend, whom, if you don’t follow the main blawg is known as “the boy”, is a veggie freak.

Me?

Not so much.

I mean, don’t get me wrong, I like green beans and carrots and peas…

I like brocolli if it’s got cheese on it or in soup.

But I won’t voluntarily pick out vegetables, at least I never did until I started dating the boy.  Now I make sure we have veggies at every meal.

Yeah, I know, it’s funny what love will do to a person.  I’m cooking and cleaning, which is something I warned him I didn’t do.

Despite the fact that I am now selecting vegetables and presenting them in a manner in which my children will eat them (not his much younger children, but my children) I’m far from being a Vegetable Champion.

But maybe you’re closer than me.

Want to know what a vegetable champion is?

A veggie champion is a TRUE vegetable advocate or, rather, community members who are committed to children’s health and wellness to submit their brainstorms for a community garden.

So, if you have this idea for a community garden and you submit it and they pick you, (and they are picking 10 people) you get to go on a two-day retreat with Chef Art Smith aimed at learning and sharing tips and tools on planting, harvesting, cooking and eating vegetables with children. These moms will also receive $5,000 to start or maintain a community vegetable garden in their hometown.

If I could keep anything alive, I would so be all over this contest.

Seriously.

But my mother says I’ve not yet “grown into” gardening.  I love to plant things and get a wild hair once a year only to watch it die because God gave me a black thumb.  If I could figure out this whole gardening thing, I would have a garden full of green beans because my FAVORITE thing in the world is fresh green beans, with butter of course.

I also like carrots and ranch dressing.

Which, speaking of, this whole contest?  The one where you can get away for two days with a renowned chef?

Yeah, that one.

It’s being put on by Hidden Valley.  No, not my kids’ school, silly, the makers of the salad dressings.

The ones that I love to use for everything other than putting on salad… like chicken and veggies and the like.

Yeah.  Them.

They’ve created a website called Love Your Veggies which offers parents tools to help children develop a life-long love of vegetables through activities at home, at school and in the community.

And do you want to know why they are doing this?  (I love companies that get involved in something worthwhile!)

They created the Love Your Veggies™ program after a study found that children consumed 23 percent more vegetables when paired with a moderate amount of ranch dressing (2006 study of two Northern California elementary schools conducted by the University of California Expanded Food and Nutrition Education Program and the Butte County Cooperative Extension comparing vegetable consumption with Italian and Ranch dressing flavor enhancers).

Yeah, this doesn’t work on my daughter.  She won’t touch them no matter what you cover them with.

So, if you’re a true veggie champion, then you need to go, right now, not later, but right now, and enter to win.  You could be one of the 10 moms that are selected.

And Mom Central?  Thanks for the heads up.

Until next time…

Filed under websites |