Rob’s Advent Calendar©

Every year around this time, some well-meaning aunt sends my children an advent calendar. Not one of the cool, new, weird advent calendars. Not the advent calendars with booze or beauty products or fishing tackles or coffee or rocks or the one for your pet. (Fun Fact: If there currently isn’t enough friction in your marriage, you can even get your spouse a workout advent calendar.) Nooo. This well-meaning aunt gets my kids an advent calendar with chocolate. So, come December, every morning, like clockwork, my kids start their day right out of the gate with, sigh, chocolate.

There are many reasons I don’t want my children starting their day with chocolate but here’s one: the recommended daily suggestion for sugar for a 4–6-year-old is 19 grams. That’s for the whole day. All day. In one, dumb little, plastic-tastingy, chocolate there is 17 grams.

There is so much added sugar in so many regular, everyday things (cereal, chips, granola bars, ketchup, fruit juice, etc.) that my kids don’t need more.

So next year I will do the old switcheroo. I won’t even tell The Wife. Well-meaning aunt’s chocolate advent calendar is out and Rob’s Advent Calendar© is in! Twenty-four days of exciting, evidenced-based surprises! ‘Tis Rob’s Season!

Day 1 – What children really want this holiday season is… a great foundation! That is why my kids will start Rob’s Advent Calendar© with a copy of “In Defense of Food: An Eaters Manifesto” by Michael Pollan. This book is not for children which is why I will happily summarize it for them: Eat food, not too much, mostly plants.

Day 2 – Now that the children know what food is and what is not (if it’s in a package, not food), on the second day, children will love to open Rob’s Advent Calendar© and find a bowl of holiday spirit that’s the perfect shade of Christmas green. Merry, Happy, broccoli!

Day 3 – Sated with cruciferous vegetables, the children now clamor for the story of sugar and spice. Well, children, we must save spice for another day but let’s talk about sugar. More specifically, Robert Lustig’s “Metabolical” says: 1) that a calorie is not a calorie and 2) what the body and, more specifically the liver, does with too much sugar. (Spoiler alert – it’s not good.)

Day 4 – How many times have the children come to me and ask me to tell them the story of flavonoids? “Again,” I ask? Yes, please, Papa. Again! Alright, gather round. Let us consider and eat – the humble apple! What can I say? Kids just love stories about high in fiber and improved artery function and, of course, flavonoids!

Day 5 – On the fifth day of Rob’s Advent Calendar©, children will open up the door and find… Nothing! Yes, Nothing! But Nothing is really something when you’re consuming just that. Yes, Day 5 will be the beautiful story that takes us back to the beginning: what the human body does at the cellular level when it’s on a fast.

Day 6 – Kids love a glass of orange juice which is why they’ll really love a very small glass (it’s really just a shot) of orange juice – lemon, turmeric, and pepper! Yes, the combination of curcumin and pepper in your body is a real Christmas Miracle!

Day 7 – This time of year, children always clamor for more! Thus, I will share an excerpt from Dan Buettner’s “The Blue Zones Solution” about how the people who live the longest on this planet eat beans! These little joys to the world will sometimes make you toot, so no more silent nights!

Day 8 – Of course, the only thing kids love more than stories about beans is real, live, actual beans! So, I give the kids what they want. A bowl o’beans, prepared like the ones Blue Zones centenarians eat almost every day! This bowl of holiday cheer will bring comfort and joy to one and all!

Day 9 – “Oh wise-wise Papa,” as the children will call me, “are there additional resources for us… online?” Oh, wonderful children, this time of year I reference ewg.org for varied but detailed lists on fruit to sunscreen to toothpastes to learn what’s safe and what’s not. And because I am neither a doctor nor an epidemiologist, I head to nutritionfacts.org where Dr. Michael Gregor explains the latest studies from around the world in uncomplicated English. And when processed food is unavoidable (cereal, soup, salad dressing, etc.), Santa’s reindeer fly me to TrueFood.tech to see ingredient trees and make the best available choice.

On Day 10 The Wife discovers the Rob’s Advent Calendar© and immediately shuts down the entire operation, including my future plans to beguile the children with teas, flaxseeds, nutritional yeast, and a story about the completely unregulated supplement industry. I suppose the most wonderful time of year has to have a Grinch. I just thought that was supposed to be me.