Americans do not have a good relationship with vegetables.
Almost 90 percent of us don’t meet intake recommendations for vegetables (2020-2025 Dietary Guidelines). And even more of us fail to eat enough from the five vegetable subgroups: dark green; red and orange; beans, peas, and lentils; starchy; and other.
Yet, plant-based eating is a hot topic. There’s something wrong here!
How can we help our clients or students learn to love vegetables? It starts with the basics – how to select, store, and prepare different veggies.
If your students or clients can’t work with veggies hands-on, the next best thing is our Building a Plant-Based Eating Pattern: Vegetables DVD.
This DVD offers an unbelievable amount of material – everything from the nutrients and health benefits of different veggies to their flavor profiles and culinary uses. But my favorite parts are the cooking demos that show kitchen hacks for preparing all types of vegetables to perfection.
You can use the cooking demos on this DVD all year long to show your clients or students how to prepare what’s in season. One demo shows how to use roasted tomatoes, onions, and peppers to make a marinara sauce that’s served over zucchini noodles – perfect for the summer farmers market season. Other demos show how to prepare veggies like artichokes, Brussels sprouts, kale, cabbage, and more.
Even the best home cooks (and the most seasoned registered dietitians!) will learn something new from these fun segments that show how to use every part of plants and learn to love vegetables.
Hollis Bass, MEd, RD, LD
