Proud of Massachusetts

Today in my reading, I came across an article regarding a study being conducted in Massachusetts. There are 50,000 households in three cities that are on the Federal Food Stamp program. The study will provide a 30 cent discount on fresh fruits and vegetables for 1/2 of these families. The idea is to find out the choices that will be made if more "healthy" foods are made accessible to the food stamp program. Click here for the entire article.

Now my question would be is anyone teaching these families how to cook fresh fruits and vegetables? As seen on the Food Revolution show this past spring, many families are third generation of packaged and processed foods. They know how to pull something out of the freezer and pop it in the microwave but actual cooking on the stove is foreign to them. I know this first hand as just two years ago I taught my 25 year old girlfriend how to peel an onion as she had no idea what to do with an onion.

I believe the program above is commendable but is only half of the equation. Without proper teaching and guidance, we can't expect miracles. It's like the you can bring someone a fish to eat but until you teach them how to fish it's useless. This is the same. You can bring fresh fruits and vegetables to those on food stamps but if they don't know what to do with these items, it's useless. I hope someone is going to teach as well as provide.