http://kalman.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/11/26/back-to-the-land/?8dpc
So I saw this photo essay in the New York Times this day after Thanksgiving morn, having just recovered from my 6 hours preparing a feast for my mister and Henny, and it struck me in several ways.
First, despite my yearning for French fries and the autonomic response I have to dessert and various fast foods, I do believe Michael Pollan's creed: Eat food. Not too much. Mostly produce. In one of his books he also says to be wary of foods with more than five ingredients... Something I always weigh internally as my eager little fingers grasp Ben and Jerry's Coffee Heath Bar Crunch ice cream.
I also love the simplicity of the imagery and the way the font--both upper and lower case--complement the essay. Think about it. Remove the photos and you've just got a discussion on how we all eat. Make the font all Times New Roman and standardize the spacing, and you've made it even more generic. Still well written and informative, but not alive.
While in some instances a picture is worth a thousand words, here, it is the combination that elevates both into a higher realm.
I know most of you have little control over the comestibles placed in front of you, but how much do you think about the food you consume--how it's prepared, how the animals who make up that food live (or lived...), how it arrives at your table (and I'm not just talking about the trip from supermarket to home here!)
Well, ever since my mom read this study about the detrimental effects of hydrogenated oils (aka trans fats), I've thought a lot about how food was made. (Did you know the FDA allows food packages to say they don't contain trans fat if they contain >.5 grams?) And my mom prefers buying food at the farmer's market, so that's how much of our produce arrives at our table. As for the animals, I don't think about that much, but I've read the Temple Grandin books (Temple Grandin being the autistic woman who designed the humane slaughterhouse), and she exposes the terrible conditions some animals live in, so if I'm reminded, I wonder how those animals lived...
ReplyDeleteI don't eat much meat (except hamburgers), although I so sometimes think about how they lived, but not to much extent. The odd thing is I always think about how chickens and turkeys lived before they are slaughtered, even though I despise those foods. As for produce, whenever I think about how it grows, corn comes to my mind. I guess it is from the memories of the vegetable garden at my house. Corn was one of the plants in the garden, and it failed miserably.
ReplyDeletebella--i too have read temple grandin. interesting.you really might like reading michael pollan's the omnivore's dilemma, although all the stuff on corn might freak you out. fast food nation too is a good read about food...
ReplyDeletehow would the corn freak me out?
ReplyDelete