Pizza certainly has its place in school meals but equating it with broccoli carrots and celery seriously undermines this nation's efforts to support children's health and their ability to learn because of better school nutrition.

We know that there are significant health benefits from consuming more fruits and vegetables and that's an opportunity for us to sort of move away from some of the meals that we've been preparing in the past.

Motherhood is a great honor and privilege yet it is also synonymous with servanthood. Every day women are called upon to selflessly meet the needs of their families. Whether they are awake at night nursing a baby spending their time and money on less-than-grateful teenagers or preparing meals moms continuously put others before themselves.

They took their meals together and it was remarked on such occasions when the friendship of animals is put to a hard test that they never quarrelled or disputed the possession of a favourite fruit with each other.

I remember that at the beginning of the month the kind of menus my mom and father would prepare for us would have fish chicken. But at the end of the month - because my father would be waiting for paycheck - the refrigerator would get empty. I remember that without a lot of food left some of the best meals happened right there.

You think about some of the most memorable meals you've ever had the food will be good but it will often be about locating a mental memory and taste is inexorably linked to all the other senses and memory so ultimately it is all about taste.

I wouldn't say that processed food ready meals and even takeaways aren't relevant to modern life it's just that over the past 40 years there are three generations of people who have come out of school and gone through their home life without ever being shown how to cook properly.

It does kids no favors and sets them up for a potential lifetime of poor health and social embarrassment to excuse them from family meals of real food. Everyone benefits from healthy eating but it is particularly crucial at the beginning of life.

At one point I had to shove as much food in my body as possible to pack on calories. My trainer wanted me to do six meals a day and not go two hours without eating. If I would cheat on eating one day I could tell - I'd drop a few pounds.

My family can always tell when I'm well into a novel because the meals get very crummy.