Classic Children's Book Review: How Do Dinosaurs Get Well Soon? By Jane Yolen and Mark Teague

This blog has hit a snag that surely we all knew it would eventually, when Emily lost interest in eating baby food, and started eating what we do. Frankly, I don't think I can really do a banana true justice in a review, so I've had to turn my hand to other pastimes, like work, and spending quality time with my beloved family. We go to the circus, to which Luke asked if I would run away with him. We watch Fireman Sam (my favourite episode is the probably the one in which Station Officer Steel stays in his office all day polishing his helmet). And tonight, Emily and I live tweeted The Bachelor NZ (warning: shameless cross platform plug contains some strong language and adult themes).

But now I find myself with the kids asleep, Rachel out, and some time on my hands, and what else do I have to do but some reviewing? Well... Paperwork, fitness, wash the dishes... But anyway.

I find the premise of How Do Dinosaurs Get Well Soon, albeit well meaning without a doubt, still to be a troubling one. The story follows, in simple rhyme, the exploits of a group of parents whose offspring contracted probably upper respiratory tract infections, and their trips to seek medical attention for their young. But the fruits of the loins of these mothers and fathers aren't your regular snotty nosed kids, no, somehow, these mums have given birth to dinosaurs. And not just any run of the mill T-Rex or stegosaurus, but some quite exotic dinosaurs at that. Here, for example, is the universal childhood favourite the Tuijiangosaurus pretending to read Vogue magazine whilst waiting to be seen, while their GP has presumably suffered a catastrophic sudden loss of vision in being unable to find them in the room.

And herein lies the next problem, as on the next page, the young reader is told that a sickly dinosaur would listen to the doctor as doctors know best. 

Now, as a training general practioner, I feel qualified to comment on the accuracy of this statement. If  a petite young mother were to bring a sneezing, fully grown dilophosaurus into my office, my first reaction would very well not be 'stand back, I know best, here's a lollipop for you, you adorable non-opposed-thumb bearing dinosaur, now you go get well.' First would likely be a sharp explanation to the point of 'JFC there's a giant carnivorous reptile in my room.' Secondly, I would probably express surprise that such an obvious humanoid young lady could be related to such a hideous prehistoric beast. And thirdly, I would unfortunately have to point out my degree is in human medicine, so no, I would not have the first clue in how to treat your offspring's cold.

But unfortunately, there's more, as it's not just the human/dinosaur interaction trap that HDDGWS has fallen in to. Jurassic Park and its inferior sequels have unfortunately a series of serious questions to answer when it comes to their influence on dinosaur taxonomy trends. For this is not a picture of a velociraptor, it is a deinonychus. 

But I suppose, however much we may wish it so, scientific accuracy isn't the end goal of this book, and in the end the dinosaurs do tuck themselves up in bed, take their medicine, and in deed get well soon. So maybe I am just being harsh when I give it a 6/10 for the storyline, but 2/10 for the science. 

The Resurection: Only Organics minted peas, black currant and lamb

Sorry guys, I had to stay late at work. But here I am back with renewed vigour, enthusiasm, and a load of baby food reviews you simply cannot do without. Today I have a lovely concoction I accidentally bought on special. Normally you'd pay top dollar for organic lamb on a bed of minted peas. Chuck in a few black currants, and I was sure at $1.69 this will be an absolute steal.

The lovingly rendered artwork on the front of the sachet doesn't give much away as to the contents of this mash. A few fresh peas in a pod, some artfully scattered currants, and a few mint leaves are tossed in front of a bowl filled with a foul green mush. Not one cute, fluffy baby sheep, alive nor dismembered to be seen. Turn the pack over, and you find a different story altogether, however. 'VEGETABLES', declares the ingredients, first off. Sweet potato and carrot turn out to be most prominent, unsurprisingly, with only 8% pea, with an added 0.01% mint to add flavour. The total lamb content comes in at 6%, less than both completely unannounced apples and water, but more than ground rice. At one percent (ie less than the component of quinoa in most quinoa containing baby foods), the black currants seem to be present only to give the impression that 'whoa, this food is such a whacky combination!'

The food itself gives a good impression of that pictured in the aforementioned bowl on the packaging
art, except that to fill such a bowl from a 120g sachet, it would have to be quite a small one indeed. Mainly a sickly yellow-green, and coarsest granular rather than mashed, but with the occasional fleck of purple-black: is that evidence of a currant skin? A fleck of lamb? Some stray chia seeds from another organic batch? A fleck of paint off the hipster manufacturer's thick framed glasses? Who knows. Surprisingly, the smell is strongly of peas. On the odd occassion I may trick myself that I smell the slight whiff of mint, but then it's gone again, dashed into the rocks of realisation that this is going to be another disappointingly bland taste test.

The taste is strongly of mushed peas. The subtle mint smell is decimated by the starchiness of the sweet potato base. There is a vague hint of the texture of a few strands of pulled lamb, but the flavour isn't strong. I held long in my mouth, vainly searching for some meaty quality, but alas, this only exposed me to an after-taste, no, an after-texture of the discarded shells of peas across the roof of my mouth. This is not pleasant. In fact the closest I could describe it to is the feeling you get on burning your mouth, popping the resulting blisters, then playing with the loose flaps of skin left behind by the
destruction.

To be perfectly honest, I'm really disappointed by this food. The description, the packaging promised so much. Even with the named ingredients constituting only 15.01% of the total recipe, I was hoping for a puréed delicacy. Instead, I got blister mouth. This is not a lamb dish. It is a sad pouch of mushed peas. You could warm it up and serve it with soggy fish and chips in a poorly lit pub in northern England.

In fact, you could feed it to vegetarians. They wouldn't know the difference.

3/10.

Classic book review: The Munch Bunch Series

I loved the Munch Bunch as a kid. Before the age of seven or so, my two go to series that never failed me were the Mr Men, and the group of anthromorphic fruit, vegetables, and later a few select nuts who had escaped from certain doom at the green grocers, and lived at the bottom of the garden around the shed. Part of the allure was the almost unattainable aim of collecting the whole series, but
just as you thought you'd  completed the set on the back of the book, the publishers would release
more!

Anyway, Luke discovered all my old books at my parents' house today, so we've been having loads of read alongs. I'd forgotten so much, but generally the rules seem to be:

1. All the berries are naughty, but don't pay much in the way of consequences.
Billy Blackberry and his friend Scruff Gooseberry decided to build a tunnel for the purposes of stealing the stock of the local confectionaire in order to fully stock their own shop. Despite the seemingly incriminating evidence of the entire inventory of one shop turning up in the only other similar outlet in the neighbourhood overnight, it actually takes several days for local constable Merv Marrow to overhear a confession. But instead of arresting him on the stop, Merv puts together an elaborate plan involving secret tunnels and diversions to land Billy and Scruff directly in jail for a lengthy sentence of... 'Not long.'

Rozzy Raspberry got it a little bit harsher, though her punishment could have been labelled slightly more inappropriate and dangerous when she was locked out of her house overnight for playing a few pranks on her friends.

2. Racial stereotypes are OK 
The Munch Bunch have no difficulties making sweeping stereotypical generalisations of whole populations. To start off with, there's Ollie the cowardly French onion, who's always crying.

Pedro the Orange, who wears a sombrero and strums an oversized mariachi style guitar.

Lizzie the Leek, meek, subservient and wearing a Welsh hat.

Supercool the cool cucumber, who seems to be a caricature of a Rasta, with his oversized hat and glasses, though appearances can be deceptive I suppose.

I guess it probably took all the restraint the author and illustrator had when they created the New Zealand spin off character Charlie Kumara (pals with the other Kiwi special releases, Kiri Kiwifruit, Ted Tamarillo and Patty Passionfruit)

3. So are inappropriate fancy dress costumes
Olly hosts a fancy dress party, presumably one of those frat-house-style ones with a bad taste theme. Tom Tomato decides to try on some cultural misappropriation with a Native American headdress. But, holy crap, is that Professor Peabody behind him, one upping the inappropriateness in a Ku Klux Klan hood?

4. Quackerry is all the rage, medically
Nurse Plum is the resident medical staff, keeping a small hospital to treat any injuries or illnesses which may strike the Bunch. There's no doctor in sight, but that's OK, some nurses are plenty competent enough to manage on their own. Nurse Plum, however, does have an approach to medicine which could be  described  as unconventional, at least.

Rozzy Raspberry, who as you may remember is a bit of a trickster, presents with an arrow through the head, having been 'shot by Indians' (there's that cultural sensitivity being laid on thick again). It's a trick, of course, but never mind that for now. Rather than preparing for neurosurgery, or, you know, examining her patient adequately, Nurse Plum is quick to lay Rozzy Raspberry up in bed and prescribe a course of  milk and sweets. You may think this is just the good nurse being kind, but no, she does actually say 'this will make you better in no  time'. Of course, th injury being a cruel jape, the worst thing that happened was Rozzy got locked outside for the night, but were an actual traumatic brain injury to present, the moral of this story would be a lot darker than 'be nice to your friends'.

5. The Munch Bunch diet is awful
You may have noticed this already. Obviously, any attempt to eat a healthy diet with five plus fruit and vegetable servings daily was going to end in grim canibalism.  So the Munch Bunch turn to sweets. A new sweet shop opens, with 'every type of sweet imaginable', and the whole town has turned out. Not only that, but when sweets start going missing frim said shop, it's a tragedy  that resonates throughout the township, enough to bring several townsfolk together to thwart the thieves to end the biggest local crisis since  the last spring harvest.

And we've already addressed the sweets as medicine fiasco.

This sort of book may have been OK back in the loose eighties, but you're probably safer sticking to reading your toddler Game of Thrones these days. That said, at least the skateboarding Rasta cucumber isn't too cool to use appropriate safety gear.

MEAT! Wattie's Pumpkin, potato and beef

I'm scared.

I'm scared on a few levels in fact. Firstly, this isn't really a review I'm allowed to do, so let's get it out the way quickly. My wife is a vegetarian, and I love her for the conviction she has in trying to avoid all meat. I remember her anguish on finding she'd eaten a slice of bread 'fortified' with 0.05% fish oil. I didn't hear the end of that one for weeks, and as such, decided it best not to mention a few years later, on a trip to Australia, that I thought the chips we were eating were flavoured with chicken salt. This deep hatred of the ingestion of slabs of dead animal has spread to our kids. Luke has on several occasions come close to nicking s delicious chicken nugget off a friend, only to be reminded he doesn't like chicken. Never mind the fact a chicken has seldom been near any chicken nugget.  So, in short, we're not meant to have meat-laced baby food within the house. But this was on special, I was at the supermarket, I needed something to draw readers back in to my blog... So here we are.

and that brings me to the second reason I'm scared.... Now I have to eat the bloody stuff. Still, babies eat it, apparently, so how hard can it be?

Contains: Vegetables (61%) (Pumpkin (50%), Potatoes (6%), Carrots), Water for cooking, Beef (10%), Corn semolina, Cornflour, Herb

Here we go again... Lots of pumpkin, not much of anything else. In fact, I'm going out on a limb here and I'll say that this is going to taste more of pumpkin than anything else. hey Watties, why not just make it entirely pumpkin, aye?

Of note, however, is the mystery 'herb' listed in the ingredients. Singular, note. Is it basil? Thyme? Rosemary? Sage? Do babies even like herbs? I don't know. I'll tell you who does like herbs, though, and that's Sean Connery, though only partially.

First impressions: looking at the label of this, I'm expecting a nice roast dinner. Like one of Willie Wonka's three course gums, but instead of a gum, it's a puréed mush. Beautifully sliced roast beef, and a whole crown pumpkin appear enticingly on the tin. Opening the can, the appearance of said mush isn't as inspiring a sight as the package art work. Very watery looking, bright orange ochre, not the most appetising thing I've seen today. Surprisingly, savoury beef lingers long on the nose, along with water. Very little pumpkin or potato, though I don't really know that potato really does smell like anything, truth be told.

Taste test: guess what? Tastes of pumpkin! There are a few nuggety soft chunks which put me in the mind of small flecks of budget mince in a university flat bolognese, but the beef flavour doesn't really shine through that well. Maybe they don't want to save the finest cuts of sirloin for the under 8 monthers, but Watties could still try and give the meat content a bit more believability. Strangely, the water and potatoes make more of an impression, though the carrot is about as anonymous as it is on the label, however. Guess what, though! Right at the back of the palate, there is indeed the slightest hint of parsley!

And you know what, just for once it is nice to eat a baby food not trying to indulge itself in superfood wankery by trying to include a miniscule portion of quinoa, so ka pai for that, Watties.

Overall: still, despite the lack of pretentiousness, tasting only of pumpkin, yet promising so much more does let this food down ultimately. 4.5/10

Enjoy: you could try with a nice central Otago Pinot noir, but that would be a waste of good wine. My advice would be ditch the food, just buy some proper steak.

Classic children's book review: Where's Spot?

Here's something a little different today. As Emily eats more and more real food, and develops already-reviewed favourites, there are fewer opportunities to write about purees. Fear not, however! A few exciting opportunities and projects are on the horizon over the coming months... Vegetable lasagne in a jar, several flavoured crackers, meat, and to top it off, can I run a 60km trail race fuelled only by food designed for under one year olds? Only one way to find out, stay tuned for January 26!

But today, I thought it might be an idea to review some of the varied literature available for the infant market. I thought a good start would be one of Luke's current high rotation book, Eric Hill's classic psychological thriller Where's Spot?

When reviewing a book, the first step I usually take is reading already existing reviews. Hill's publisher, Puffin Books, makes this easy by including two on the back:

I'm not sure how to take the London Standard review. Clearly, if this is Hill's debut offering, it is a solid book, hinting at the heights he will later hit in Spot's Christmas and Spot Visits His Grandparents. However, the other read of this phrase also rings true: if you had not read a book previously, this would be an ideal start. Not so lengthy as to be a daunting prospect, yet with enough of a plot to draw the novice reader in. However, it is Child Education's review that intrigues me. 'Cleverly designed! Irresistible!' Steady on there... I assume the clever design refers to the flaps within the book, in which this strikes me possibly as a superlative too far... If this is clever design, just wait until Child Education sees pop-up, talking books, or, heaven forbid, iPads! 

The book itself serves as a salutary warning to parents not to be so distracted as to let your infant go missing. Sally, the main protagonist, becomes distracted from her parental duties by her dinner, only to discover that her son, spot, is nowhere to be seen when it comes to eating his. Not only this, but her house seems to have been invaded by a sinister gang of foreign animals. She journeys from room to room, but at each turn is met by a creature of varying threat. Early on, a boa constrictor is found hiding in a grandfather clock. Clearly a future influence for the popular Samuel L Jackson film Snakes on a Plane, this serpent appears to have either been whipped into some sort of hallucinogen-fuelled frenzy by some illicit substance, or suffering from a nasty bilateral conjunctivitis.

Fortunately, Sally is able to escape the maliciously drugged-up reptile, but is confronted by several other terrible fiends. There is a  hippopotamus sequestered in a presumably heavily strengthened grand piano, a crocodile underneath her bed, three cloned identical penguins in a random box, and a lion who, clearly finished with snacking upon adolescent wizards, is looking forward to a canine-sized desert.

Finally, Sally finds a presumably friendly, helpful, but terrified ally: a tortoise, who in clear defiance of the laws of physics is occupying a space much smaller than that of his own body mass under a floor rug. With a look of abject terror on its face, it screams instructions as to where her son is hiding.

Soon, mother and son are reunited. They trot off to complete their evening meal, ignoring the menagerie of doom now occupying their house, and thus setting up the perfect premise for a sequel, which has alas not yet been written.

I found Where's Spot to be a strong, enjoyable read, with strong, thoughtfully created lead characters in Sally and Spot, the unnamed tortoise providing good support. Where the plot is let down is the reasoning behind the hostile takeover of Sally and Spot's home... Who has sent these creatures, and what is their aim? This minor criticism aside, however, Where's Spot provides enough suspense and action to keep readers of all ages entertained for five minutes on end. Overall, a solid 7.5/10.

I'll endeavour over the future weeks, when not writing about food, to review further books, possibly even including my current favourite Maisy Makes Lemonade, number two in a trilogy which also includes Maisy Makes Milk, and Maisy Makes Chocolate Around The Corner.

Only Organics: More Quinoa

This isn't a food review. This is a quick Ost because I found these in the in-laws' cupboard the other day.

I have not tried these foods. This is because I do not need to try these foods. They will taste, respectively, like banana and blueberry purée and kumara and banana purée. The banana will overpower, but there will be a slight aftertaste of berries on the first, and a hint of tannin-like kumara on the second. Yes, the quinoa may be present on concentrations of up to 2%: BUT IT IS PURÉED TO A SMOOTH PASTE. It will not be detectable.

Only Organic baby food, I have tweeted you before on this topic. Please stop. I know if you put quinoa in your baby food you are enabled to write Supergrain Quinoa! in fancy writing on the top of your packet. But here's the thing: it makes no difference whatsoever. The amount of quinoa in one of these sachets is probably similar to that which I would inhale passively whilst walking down Cuba Street at 10am on a Sunday morning.

I've done a little research into the health benefits of quinoa, and actually found it a little mor fifficult than I expected, by which I mean the first four google hits were pretty useless and then I got bored. One site, authoritynutrition.com sounded as though it would be fairly authoritive on nutritional matters. But then the first of their 11 proven health benefits of quinoa (number one is my favourite) boiled down to the following:

Which essentially in my opinion is the title  reworded. Granted, the article goes on to list the nutritional breakdown of quinoa, spell fibre incorrectly, and point out its benefits to weight loss, heart disease, type two diabetes and gluten intolerance, but none of these are particularly of concern to a four to six month old. Sure, quinoa, may be a great source of protein, but if your serving size is 1.4% of 120g, you're still getting  sweet FA protein. Then we come to this gem at number six:

Now, I'm not going to try and deny that quinoa has a low glycaemic index. But you know what has a very low glycaemic index? Kumara. That shit you've drowned your healthy, slow-sugar-releasing, all glorious super grain in. Damn. Anyway, on to proven reason number 8 that quinoa is good for you:

MAY have some major benefits for metabolic health. That doesn't sound so proven to me. Surely they can't pad out these reasons any more?

Fries are also easy to incorporate into your diet. I guess that's a proven health benefit of fries, then.

Oh, and on a side note, authority nutrition dot com, time to get better at clickbait: if you're going to have a list of eleven things, telling people that number one is your favourite then having it as such a let down means they're not going to read any further. Here's an example to help you out with the format!

So, after this brief foray into the world of health food blogs other than my own, I'm forced to conclude that Only Organic's slow morph into Only Quinoa can only be a cynical attempt to cash in on a current health fad. In which case, I fear they are already too late. According to the BBC Good Food blog, the UN declared the International Year of Quinoa to be 2013.

Heinz Organic Summer fruits and yoghurt with oats and quinoa

Remember that time I reviewed that Only Organic food with quinoa in it, and it got over two times as many page views than anything else I've written? Surely it was a one off and no other company would be stupid enough to put the almighty supergrain in a baby food?

WT actual F Heinz? You used to be a sensible company, dealing in ketchup and brown sauces, possibly a few baked beans or cans of spaghetti. Your baby foods have been mostly sensible combinations, albeit with the odd guava thrown in for no obvious reason. So why quinoa? Emily is, admittedly, two months older than last time she tried this fad, so I concede maybe it is slightly more likely she will finish her breakfast, stand up, and with perfect enunciation say to me 'Thankyou for breakfast Father. Especially, I am grateful for your foresight in giving me copious amounts of quinoa, which has given me the energy I need for my morning crossfit session. I'm off to the gym to flip some large tricycle tyres now. Ciao.'

Really. Quinoa in baby food. Next thing they'll have toddler sized Lululemon yoga pants.

Contains: Fruit (banana (31%), mango (16%), apples (5%)), Apple juice, Cooked oats (contains traces of wheat) (7%), Water, Greek style yoghurt (Cultured milk) (6%), Cornflour, Quinoa (1.7%), Cream, Vitamin C.

Two things stand out to me here. First, the very small elephant in the room is the quinoa, and to be fair, there's a whole 0.1% more in this food than in the Only Organic's quinoa based food, so I suppose there is hope of extra grainy flavour. Possibly with the promise of soft lumps within, there could even be some texture... Can you make quinoa into a soft lump?

Secondly, summer fruits: there are only three fruits listed in the ingredients for this food. You want summer fruits? You need peaches, strawberries, nectarines. Apple is predominantly harvested in the autumn months. Bananas, not grown in New Zealand, but are available plentifully year round at a reasonable price. Frankly, in my opinion really only mango can be classified as a truly summer fruit.

Emily's reaction: Generally, was quite favourable initially. However, soon food fatigue set in after half a jar. Emily is entering the stage where she wants to feed herself, and she wasn't about to be left wielding a spoon full of imitation cold sick.

First impressions: Have I used a cold sick analogy yet? In the last sentence, and several times previously in this blog? I'm using it again. It's yellow, and full of little lumps. It looks like cold sick. But to be fair, it's cold sick that smells predominantly like banana, like someone ate a banana, and then thought better of it.

Taste test: Actually against all odds, this goes down a treat. The taste is strongly of banana, with a hint of mango, but very little of the least summery of the fruity trio, the apply. Relatively thick on the tongue, little soft nuggets of rolled oats add an interest as it slides back. And YES! Sure enough, about once every spoonful, your tongue will find a single grain of quinoa! Sure, it's not actually enough to add any flavour, but it's there. That said, a similar texture could be achieved in this food by adding half a teaspoon of poppy seeds, or sand.

Overall: 7/10, not a bad taste or texture. Still can't get over the pointlessness of the quinoa though.

Enjoy: Down at the Hokowhitu Mums' organic paleo vegan coffee group, or wherever such people meet.