First lady Kim Hea Kyung joined children with glycogen storage disease on Wednesday to make “hope cookies,” a low-carbohydrate snack developed for young patients who must carefully manage their blood sugar.
Kim visited a special cooking class at Seoul Children’s Museum, a children’s experience facility inside Seoul Children’s Grand Park in Gwangjin-gu, Seoul.
The event, held ahead of Children’s Day on May 5, was arranged as a follow-up to a Christmas Eve meeting last year between President Lee Jae Myung, Kim, rare-disease patients and their families.
Glycogen storage disease is a rare inherited disorder involving abnormal carbohydrate metabolism, which can cause repeated hypoglycemia. An estimated 370 people have the disease in South Korea. Patients must carefully manage their blood sugar, including by eating small meals at regular intervals and consuming cornstarch.
Kim said the story of hope cookies, introduced at the Christmas Eve event, had stayed with her.
“When raising children these days, it is actually more heartbreaking to stop them from eating than to see them hungry. These days, there is hardly anything children cannot eat,” Kim said. “So it really weighed on my mind, and it means a lot to be making these delicious sweet potato cookies together today. I hope we will have many more moments like this.”
Kim added, “Just like the word ‘hope,’ let us stay healthy with hope.”
Kim also introduced Jang Jun-woo, a student with glycogen storage disease who attends Minjok Leadership Academy, an autonomous private high school, Ahn Gwi-ryeong, deputy spokesperson at Cheong Wa Dae, said in a press release.
Kim told the children, “I hope you grow up healthy and wonderful, just like Jun-woo.”
Kim and the children made the cookies with steamed sweet potatoes, unsalted butter, oatmeal and sesame seeds, shaping them into hearts, stars and cats before baking them.
Kim also said the cookies could be a healthy snack for ordinary households and joked that they would make a good late-night snack for Lee.
While the cookies baked, Kim and the children walked around the park, took photos and played with soap bubbles.
dagyumji@heraldcorp.com
