Pamela Schwartz, Director of Program Evaluation for Kaiser Permanente's Community Benefit, discusses community interventions, the changes that are taking place, and what impact those lifestyle modifications have within a community.

Kaiser Permanente, one of America's leading health care providers and not-for-profit health plans, has been creating change and...

At the age of seven I became fixated on learning all that I could about the horrors and sorrows of the Holocaust. As a young Jewish girl, I frequented my synagogue's library and studied every single page, every word, every frail body, and every face. I learned about...

We are so grateful and proud to announce Common Threads has made it to its 10-year anniversary. Through the hard work of each and every donor, volunteer, board and staff member, Common Threads has grown into a national nonprofit, with plans to reach 30,000 kids this...

Sarah Elizabeth Ippel of the Academy for Global Citizenship (AGC) talks food, wellness, and the stepping stones for the future.

I recently had the pleasure of speaking with the Academy for Global Citizenship's Sarah Elizabeth Ippel - the core of her amazing efforts have developed into...

Over the past two-plus years, I have spent time getting to know the Food Marketing Institute team (Anne Curry, Cathy Polley, Liz Garner, and David Fikes). Anne (photographed below), the 2013 recipient of the FMI Woodard Award for Public Affairs, was one of the very first people to...

Having just gone through another Halloween with little people, I can just feel my own teeth rotting as I try to hide the gallons of candy which has infiltrated our home. Try as I may, they know it's here and they're after it! If I really wanted to, I could...

There is nothing more perfect than a simple bowl of oatmeal or cracked wheat with some seasonal fruit, other than watching children gobble it up. That for me is joy.

Knowing the farmer who harvested your kale that you marinated overnight in sesame oil, white wine...

September is National Childhood Obesity Awareness month and as a result I am letting my food snob freak flag fly. As my close friend Chef Bill Kim said to me yesterday on the phone, "It's 2012, you have to decide for yourself what to put into your body."

Bill couldn't...

In my life, food and music have each been synonymous with joy and pure love. The smell of a certain dish or the strain of a particular song can alternatively bring me back in time (one verse of "Eternal Flame" by The Bangles and I'm 12 again at my first...

Early last fall, I sat eating the most delicious chocolate brownie at Sweet Lady Jane's in Los Angeles. Chocolate brownies are by far one of my most decadent guilty pleasures. I was meeting Laurie David, whose cookbook, The Family Dinner, is one of the most beautiful books I have read,...

Last week I wrote "A Love Letter to Chicago Chefs" reflecting on the last 13 years I have spent in Chicago as my family and I prepare to move to Austin, Texas. In it I was able to share the generosity, kindness and care I have been lucky...

So I am moving to Austin, Texas. I joked to my friend and colleague Mary Ann that I finally get my shot at being a southern belle and have an excuse to buy a really kickin' pair of cowboy boots. I think cowboy boots have been on my list since...

The causes of the obesity epidemic are in plain sight. Every time we fire up our iPads or turn on our TVs, we see the disappearance of family mealtime, the increased accessibility of fast food and the proliferation of urban food deserts. At the same time, new schools across the...

A once-ubiquitous feature of American life -- the family dinner -- is in a sad state of decline. A variety of factors -- such as the influx of women in the workforce, the increase of single-parent households, the lack of leisure time among America's middle class and the proliferation of...

Business as usual is changing. Or at least the way business leaders think about philanthropy is changing.

In an era of global connectivity and instant media, companies increasingly view philanthropic campaigns as an intrinsic component of a successful business strategy, rather than an external obligation. They now recognize that...

As temperatures start to rise and skies start to clear, it's time for spring cleaning: open the windows, beat the rugs and clear out a winter's worth of dust. Maybe this year, while we clean our homes, we should focus on the kitchen. Spring is a time of renewal, of...

Despite obesity rates that continue to skyrocket, Congress is expected to vote to substantially cut funding that is designated to help address the number-one preventable cause of death in America.

The Prevention and Public Health Fund, created by the Affordable Care Act...

You probably missed it. It came just before Madonna stepped onto the stage amidst marching, gold-plated body builders and sometime after the first touchdown by the Patriots. In that moment the camera panned briefly to the corner of the field, where a kid, grasping a football and smiling from ear...

The word "Food Desert" was coined to describe Chicago. It was in our city -- in the shadow of the Sears Tower and the Eisenhower Expressway, by the smoking factories lining the south shore and the rusting truss bridges eternally raised along the river -- that the crisis was first...

Maybe you've been looking anxiously at maps this week? There's new violence in the Sudan, mayhem in Syria, and worry that Iran might block the Straights of Hormuz. All of these are critical locations... but what I keep returning to is Feeding America's "Map the Meal...