Childhood Obesity Battle Your Health Journal | Your ... - Len Saunders

From The Clarion Ledger?..

One tool in Mississippi?s attack on childhood obesity? The combi-oven.

A cross between a steamer and an oven, cafeteria managers say it can make those french fries crisp without all that waistline-expanding oil. Plus, its computerized brain can be programmed to cook almost anything, and it doesn?t stink up and splatter grease all over the kitchen. The only problem? One oven will cost a school about $18,000. And most schools actually need two to cook for hundreds of children.

But a foundation created by a retired physician has stepped in to help.

Dr. John Bower spent his career caring for Mississippians with kidney disease, setting up a nonprofit chain of dialysis centers. Using money from the sale of those centers, his Bower Foundation is now attacking one of the root causes of kidney disease ? obesity.

The foundation recently announced $900,000 in grants for schools to buy combi-ovens, with school districts required to put up half the cash. That should be enough to buy 100 ovens, equipping 50 schools. The foundation has already funded purchases at 84 schools.

?We ask the schools to remove their fryers when they put these products in,? executive director Anne Travis said. ?It?s been a great way to improve the nutritional content of the food.?

Federal money has paid for ovens at 59 other schools. But many districts, once they?ve gotten some outside money to introduce them to the appliance, have become believers and started paying for them on their own.

?We are ready not to wait on grants,? said Cynthia Coleman, child nutrition director in DeSoto County, Mississippi?s largest public school district.

Today, 11 DeSoto schools have combi-ovens. Coleman said that her goal is to install ovens and replace fryers in one school cluster each year. Besides the expense of buying the ovens, Coleman said more than $5,000 in electrical and plumbing work is usually required for installation. Because the oven is a steamer, it needs a water line connection.

For the foundation, the main benefit is a reduction in fat and calories. A half-cup serving of traditional fries has 88 calories and 4.6 grams of fat, while a half-cup of baked fries has 73 calories and 2.1 grams of fat. Over one school year, a large high school switching to baked fries could take 5.4 million calories out of the cumulative diet of students, with 900,000 fewer grams of fat served.

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Source: http://www.lensaunders.com/wp/?p=7351

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