Broccoli Over Burgers: the right way to feed a fast growing brain

There were 200 preschoolers at the center, infants to 5 years old. And the place was remarkably serene. Children quietly engaging in arts-and-crafts projects, others listening to teachers reading stories. During a recent visit, I saw only one child cry. And even then, the discontent was fleeting.

At that age, the brain is creating a million new neural connections every second, developing faster than at any other time of life. I could imagine that alone being enough to make a child want to let out a yelp. What we do know for certain is that diet, air quality and the way children are treated during this critical period have a tremendous influence on how well their brains function for the rest of their lives.

At CentroNía, the effects of dietary changes made during the past decade are clear.

“We’ve seen behavior improve,” Peralta said. “Children are able to focus on tasks longer, pay more attention to detail, memory has improved, and they interact better with each other.”

A commercial kitchen with a walk-in freezer is in the basement. Next to it is a large room for food preparation, where crates of just-delivered fruits and vegetables are stacked.

“This is where the magic happens,” Peralta said.

Kitchen staff starts arriving at 5 a.m. Other child-care centers learned about the dietary successes at CentroNía, so each weekday the kitchen staff prepares meals for those sites as well — 2,800 daily.

“If children are hungry, they are usually more passive in the classroom,” Peralta said. “If they are jacked up on sugar, they can get out of control. So we decided to take control over what our children eat.”

At the center, toddlers eat pureed fruits and vegetables, all fresh. Nothing from cans or jars.

The oldest eat solid foods. Some drink milk, others prefer water. No juices or flavored drinks are served. No added sugars. No salt.

Youngsters who come into child care with taste buds already accustomed to salty, sugary and fatty foods go through a weaning process.

“We had a mom tell us, ‘Your menu is way too healthy,’ ” recalled Patricia Montoya, who is the catering services manager. “She said, ‘My child doesn’t eat this. I don’t cook at home. I only buy McDonald’s.’ So I’m like, ‘Mom, I understand that not everybody has the same resources or a convenient schedule. But just give us time.’ ”

Six months later, the child was as pleased with a salad as he had been with a burger, Montoya said.

Children aren’t coerced into eating or given rewards, Peralta said. But there are mealtime rituals and routines that all children are expected to follow. They get breakfast, a midmorning snack, lunch and an afternoon snack. They sit at tables, as they would at a restaurant or at home during a family dinner. The children are encouraged to focus on their food and talk, if they must, about shapes, colors, portion sizes, flavors.

There is also a mini food bar where children line up and get to choose their fruits and vegetables.

Adults are always present, modeling etiquette and offering encouragement.

“Sometimes, the adults have to be like actors and say, ‘Oh, wow, the lentils and rice are so good,’ ” Montoya said, taking an imaginary bite and smiling. “That way, the child will want to try it. But if you’re like, ‘Oh, it’s lentils and rice. Again,’ ” the child is not going to eat it.”

CentroNía is a nonprofit entity founded in 1986 by Beatriz “BB” Otero. It was called the Calvary Bilingual Multicultural Learning Center at the time and began as a bilingual program that served 15 immigrant children in a church basement. CentroNía now provides affordable child care, early-childhood education, and food and wellness programs to more than 2,400 low-income children and families.

There are cooking classes for parents, a way to bring healthful eating from the center into the home.

The center also features a small garden. It gives children an opportunity to plant tomato and cucumber seeds, water the plants and watch them grow, harvest the produce, bring it to the kitchen, and see how it is prepared and served on plates.

“We want them to interact with the food source, understand from the earliest ages where our food comes from — that a tomato doesn’t pop out of nowhere and magically appear on their plates,” Peralta said.

The center has a small indoor gym and a huge rooftop playground. The children also take walks.

Because of the coronavirus pandemic, the center had to close for two months last year. When it reopened, some youngsters had reverted to old eating habits. Then the child tax credit expired, causing additional hardship for low-income families.

But the CentroNía team pressed on, making home deliveries to those who could no longer afford enough healthful food for their families and working harder to retool the taste buds of the returning children.

The payoff continues. A 6-year-old who had left the center for first grade was not pleased with the standard fare being served.

“He told his teacher: ‘You are serving junk food. We don’t eat junk food,’ ” Montoya recalled. “And his mother was like, ‘Yikes.’ ”

Peralta said, “We’re on a mission to improve the way our littlest ones eat because it’s so important to their well-being.”

And now some of the littlest ones are on the mission too.