Random food musings
I have to admit it; lately I’ve been spending a lot of time thinking about food.
Now, this usually isn’t all that unusual for me. I think about food a lot. However, as of late I’ve been thinking about food a bit more broadly than simply pondering what to cook and eat next (a preoccupation that takes a not-insignificant portion of my days).
At least part of my culinary ruminating stems from my preparing to teach cooking lessons at a local summer camp. The camp itself is situated in a local community garden, which means I have access to all sorts of fresh and exotic ingredients. In walking the facility and planning the menus I initially wound up with an entirely vegetarian menu. Reflecting on this, I think it has as much to do with a desire to connect these kids back to the natural cycles that provide us with food as it does with healthful eating, access to the gardens, etc. I was struck by two thoughts today in market:
1. How very little we know about what’s going into the things most of us choose to eat
2. How very little we know about how to prepare the fresh, whole foods that are readily available
I’d like to work more fresh fruit and veggies into my diet. The funny thing is… I get pretty intimidated in the produce section. I’ve always thought of myself as a foodie and cook, so if I’m overwhelmed by simple, fresh produce, how do most other people feel?
Which leads me to the other part of ruminations. I’m reading The Omnivore’s Dilemma, an account of how various food products are raised/produced, grown/assembled, and eaten/distributed. I definitely fall into the target demographic for this book (young, moderately health-conscious, and yearning for simple improvements to make in my own life), and it is having its intended effect on me (unabated culinary paranoia and a distrust in the industrial food complex). Will it have any lasting effect on me? Maybe. I did cut fast food out of my life shortly after reading Fast Food Nation. It wasn’t that their science opened my eyes to unseen evils. I think it’s fairly universally accepted that Fast Food is only marginally food at best. And, truth told, I find the science of both books falls short at times (as a statistician and self-proclaimed evaluator, the last sentence applies to just about everything I read, anyway). However, what these books seem to accomplish is to provide me with a reason to take actions that I already knew I should take.
My most recent plans are to start regularly hitting the local farmers’ market, increase the variety of fruits and veggies I eat (I don’t eat meat too often, but my faux vegetarian palate has been pretty limited), and to maybe (maybe) start a small compost pile on my patio garden.
Anyway, I’ve emphasizing the negatives (fear of processed foods, uncertainty in the produce aisles) for a bit of contrast with a happier experience I had today. Part of the Omnivore’s Dilemma is the discussion of the meanings of food. It argues that eating food says something about who we are: what we choose to buy, where we choose to shop, etc all serve to define us to some degree. It’s a concept that I rarely think about, and (as often as not) dismiss as mumbo-jumbo. Yea, there’s a difference between being a strict organic vegan and living off an exclusively off Pizza Hut, but are there really any meaningful distinctions for “normal” everyday people?
Well, today I had a weird bonding moment over food. I was being rung up at the grocery store when my cashier stopped, looked down at the fruit I was buying, and started grinning.
“Sapotes? You really like Sapotes? I didn’t even know we had these here – I haven’t seen one since my childhood. My grandmother used to have a tree growing out in her yard…”
My cashier was a young Hispanic man. I had watched, in the way we all sort of vacantly look around while waiting in lines, as he had dully rung up the last few customers without a word. At the sight of these sapotes, however, he decided we had some small, instant camaraderie. In just a few moments as he spoke of growing up in Mexico and seeing sapote trees everywhere, he shared a little bit of what sapotes meant to him. They were more than fruit… they had all sorts of context. Childhood, happy memories of his family, and a country he no longer lives in. When I told him I was trying them because I couldn’t find any cherimoya, he got even more excited and told me about the cherimoya tree he was raising in his yard. Where he got the seeds, what the tree looks like, etc.
It’s funny – if I saw him again I doubt either of us would recognize the other. We’d both look at each other with the dull, indifferent look that’s so often tossed around, “I’m just looking at you – not looking to interact with you” … but at least for today we had a nice moment. Two people for whom sapotes mean something (albeit radically different things: comfort/home versus exotic/foreign)…
I guess the point isn’t what specific meanings ours food hold. I think the point is that we take the time to give our food meaning.
Now, this usually isn’t all that unusual for me. I think about food a lot. However, as of late I’ve been thinking about food a bit more broadly than simply pondering what to cook and eat next (a preoccupation that takes a not-insignificant portion of my days).
At least part of my culinary ruminating stems from my preparing to teach cooking lessons at a local summer camp. The camp itself is situated in a local community garden, which means I have access to all sorts of fresh and exotic ingredients. In walking the facility and planning the menus I initially wound up with an entirely vegetarian menu. Reflecting on this, I think it has as much to do with a desire to connect these kids back to the natural cycles that provide us with food as it does with healthful eating, access to the gardens, etc. I was struck by two thoughts today in market:
1. How very little we know about what’s going into the things most of us choose to eat
2. How very little we know about how to prepare the fresh, whole foods that are readily available
I’d like to work more fresh fruit and veggies into my diet. The funny thing is… I get pretty intimidated in the produce section. I’ve always thought of myself as a foodie and cook, so if I’m overwhelmed by simple, fresh produce, how do most other people feel?
Which leads me to the other part of ruminations. I’m reading The Omnivore’s Dilemma, an account of how various food products are raised/produced, grown/assembled, and eaten/distributed. I definitely fall into the target demographic for this book (young, moderately health-conscious, and yearning for simple improvements to make in my own life), and it is having its intended effect on me (unabated culinary paranoia and a distrust in the industrial food complex). Will it have any lasting effect on me? Maybe. I did cut fast food out of my life shortly after reading Fast Food Nation. It wasn’t that their science opened my eyes to unseen evils. I think it’s fairly universally accepted that Fast Food is only marginally food at best. And, truth told, I find the science of both books falls short at times (as a statistician and self-proclaimed evaluator, the last sentence applies to just about everything I read, anyway). However, what these books seem to accomplish is to provide me with a reason to take actions that I already knew I should take.
My most recent plans are to start regularly hitting the local farmers’ market, increase the variety of fruits and veggies I eat (I don’t eat meat too often, but my faux vegetarian palate has been pretty limited), and to maybe (maybe) start a small compost pile on my patio garden.
Anyway, I’ve emphasizing the negatives (fear of processed foods, uncertainty in the produce aisles) for a bit of contrast with a happier experience I had today. Part of the Omnivore’s Dilemma is the discussion of the meanings of food. It argues that eating food says something about who we are: what we choose to buy, where we choose to shop, etc all serve to define us to some degree. It’s a concept that I rarely think about, and (as often as not) dismiss as mumbo-jumbo. Yea, there’s a difference between being a strict organic vegan and living off an exclusively off Pizza Hut, but are there really any meaningful distinctions for “normal” everyday people?
Well, today I had a weird bonding moment over food. I was being rung up at the grocery store when my cashier stopped, looked down at the fruit I was buying, and started grinning.
“Sapotes? You really like Sapotes? I didn’t even know we had these here – I haven’t seen one since my childhood. My grandmother used to have a tree growing out in her yard…”
My cashier was a young Hispanic man. I had watched, in the way we all sort of vacantly look around while waiting in lines, as he had dully rung up the last few customers without a word. At the sight of these sapotes, however, he decided we had some small, instant camaraderie. In just a few moments as he spoke of growing up in Mexico and seeing sapote trees everywhere, he shared a little bit of what sapotes meant to him. They were more than fruit… they had all sorts of context. Childhood, happy memories of his family, and a country he no longer lives in. When I told him I was trying them because I couldn’t find any cherimoya, he got even more excited and told me about the cherimoya tree he was raising in his yard. Where he got the seeds, what the tree looks like, etc.
It’s funny – if I saw him again I doubt either of us would recognize the other. We’d both look at each other with the dull, indifferent look that’s so often tossed around, “I’m just looking at you – not looking to interact with you” … but at least for today we had a nice moment. Two people for whom sapotes mean something (albeit radically different things: comfort/home versus exotic/foreign)…
I guess the point isn’t what specific meanings ours food hold. I think the point is that we take the time to give our food meaning.
posted by Nik at 2:46 PM
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
<< Home