desserted

Sunday, August 24, 2008

QCX 521 Website Reviews

Food Network is a good website for the young and old to view and learn new recipes and cooking techniques from. It maybe written more from the western context with focus of recipes more on the western cuisines, but due to the multi-racial communities in major cities such as Los Angeles and New York, there have been various multi-national (international) cuisines added to the recipes recommended.

As indicated next to the food network logo, this website is DEFINITELY
the "#1 Cooking Site"!

You can find not just recipes for every meal of the day, but also other information that will help you plan and prepare for the perfect meal.
Information provided :

Recipes, Cooking Guides such as cooking weights and measures, seafood guides, basic kitchen protocol and more.
Food planning for parties and holidays such as weddings, Christmas, birthdays.
Quick & Easy meal preparation - mostly within 30 minutes. Recipes used on popular TV shows are used with guided videos to follow.
Healthy eating recipes and meal ideas that cater to the different diet groups like the vegetarians, the diabetic and also those with heart problems.

MANY MANY videos that provide clear instructions of cooking, cutting, baking and more techniques used in preparing all kinds of food. All these amazing videos can be viewed through broadband streaming and note: most have been shown on the FoodNetwork TV channel in America!

Lastly, shopping is available for recommended kitchen equipment by renowned chefs and professionals!

HOW CAN THIS WEBSITE BE USED IN HOME ECONOMICS LESSONS?

Basically this website provides a good platform for teachers to teach and show demonstrations commonly used cutting techniques in the kitchen such as dicing, slicing and before/during practical lessons using the videos provided and also explain the terms from the encyclopedia available on the website.
-> This is a good form of incorporating ICT - online videos into home economics lessons.

For the Upper Secondary Food & Nutrition lessons, students are also able to use this website for coursework research by navigating this website for historical background of how certain dishes came about, and also for recipes - both thematic and task-based.
-> This is a good form of incorporating project research development into the students.
-> The racial harmony aspect of one of the National Education values can also be incorporated into the lessons by searching on various cultural food recipes.

2. Nutrient Data Laboratory - http://www.nal.usda.gov/fnic/foodcomp/search/

This Nutrient Data Laboratory website provides detailed information on the nutrient contents found in most kinds of basic food products. The search format is made really easy for students to use as single food keywords are only required and then they just need to select the food group which the food belongs to from a drop down selection. This is simple for secondary students of all levels to follow and use.

For better illustration purposes, I will use 'milk' as an example.
-> Keyword : Milk
-> Select food group : Dairy & Egg products

Next, choose the item that is the closest to what you are looking for. Let's say I'm looking for 2% fat liquid milk.
-> Milk, reduced fat, fluid, 2% milkfat, with added nonfat milk solids, without added vitamin A

Note: The options may get a little confusing after a while due to the numerous varieties available to choose from and it can also get very wordy. So choose carefully to get the closest option as possible.

The next page asks for the amount/ weight of the food product desired to be analyzed. Nutrient values can be calculated for any desired gram weight by clicking on the amount field for the weight to be reported.
-> We can choose from weights in grams, cups or quarts units.

There you go!
A VERY DETAILED analysis of every nutrient possibly present in the type of milk chosen.

HOW CAN THIS WEBSITE BE USED IN HOME ECONOMICS LESSONS?

This website comes in extremely handy for the Upper Secondary Food & Nutrition students for the coursework component. They are able to utilize this week for nutrient analysis on their chosen food products for the research part. They can also sieve significant nutrient information from here to explain and create comparisons between recipes.
-> Project research skills are learnt by the students.
-> Students are trained to think critically whilst interpreting numerical information and eventually concluding on them.

As for the Lower Secondary students, this website can serve as an exploration platform for them to find out about the variety of nutrients that can be present in a single food product. It also allows the students to apply the theory of nutrients into actual food.

Labels: Review

by Jacqueline @ 11:46 PM - 0 comments