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My kids really like food, and they like to cook, so it's a lot of fun to shop with them.

I don't think there's one thing more important you can do for your kids than have family dinner.

I just don't know when we all decided that if it doesn't fit in a Happy Meal box, it's not for kids. I remember flying monkeys in the Wizard of Oz, and I grew up watching Monty Python. I think that kids can handle a lot more than we give them credit for, especially when it comes to the absurd.

The problem is that restaurants have assumed that kids don't want to eat anything other than chicken nuggets or fast-food burgers, but they do. They want to eat things that taste good.

Kids love food. It's about putting materials out there that get kids thinking about food - to get kids interacting about food. It's about simple things, like kids thinking about pasta - getting kids to work with food.

Even if you can't afford to travel the world, you can take your children to the museum, zoo or local park. And don't be afraid to take them to grown-up spots. Eating out in a restaurant teaches children how to be quiet and polite and gives them the pleasure of knowing you trust them to behave.

I think family mealtime is really important. There's a lot of research that shows kids are going to do better in school and have more self-esteem if you can all sit down and eat together.

Kids see cooking as a creative outlet now, like soccer and ballet. It gives me hope that things like fast food, childhood obesity and the horrible state of school lunches can be addressed by kids and their parents.

My husband has the philosophy that if you can work a Nintendo control, you can chop an onion. So, we have our children in the kitchen. We sit down every night for dinner. We're trying to give our kids a sense of what's going into their bodies, and it's also good for family time.

You go to a restaurant in the States and kids have these game boards at the table. You don't see that in Italy or Spain. It's not because they can't afford to buy them, it's because that's not what eating together as a family is about.