You Become What You Eat:
Cooking up Prevention
At The Phytochemistry Grill

You can involve students in this activity in a variety of ways, provided you keep in mind the central focus of the lesson. That focus is the existence of compounds in foods called phytochemicals which provide some protection from cancer.

Your assessment of whether students understand this idea may be as simple as asking each student or teams of students to find recipes with a list of phytochemicals of your choosing. It will be best to stay simple and use just the four categories: terpenes, phenols, organosulfur compounds, and organic acids. The list of meal recipes and the phytochemical category in which each recipe is listed is given below.

It might be much more fun, however, to ask teams of students to prepare recipes for either a meal or a meal plan for a day with some of each type of phytochemical included in the plan or meal. You do not have to limit students to the recipes provided here. They might be encouraged to bring in favorite recipes from home.

A still more inclusive activity is to have the class actually prepare and eat a meal including each type of phytochemical. Be cautious about how you make this assignment, however. There is always the risk of a student including an "unauthorized" ingredient in a recipe.

The links below list all the recipes in this activity organized by phytochemical content or by meal. In both cases, the ingredients containing the phytochemicals of interest are listed. Note that some ingredients may be from a category other than the one in which the recipe appears. For example, in the first recipe in the terpene category, Baked Stuffed Tomatoes, the spinach ingredient contains the terpene, but shallots and garlic contain an organosulfur compound. Also, there is no distinction made on the list for relative concentrations. Some foods contain greater concentration of phytochemicals than others.

Phytochemical Content Organic Acids Organosulfur Compounds Phenols Terpenes

Meal Breakfast Lunch Supper Dessert Beverages

Relevant National Science Education Standards

Physical Science — Chemical structures of major phytochemicals are shown.

Science in Personal and Social Perspectives — The activity leads students to an awareness of good nutrition.