HW 7b- Omnivore's Dilemma part 2

Chapter 6: The Consumer (A Republic of Fat)

Today's craze that draws the vast majority of people toward industrialized food (mainly corn) has uncanny similarities to the nineteenth century, a time when people had the same attraction and addiction to alcohol. Overabundance is the culprit here, where an excess of an industrialized diet has been connected to diseases and disorders that play a significant role in today's society as obesity and diabetes. Americans in particular fall victim to these patterns throughout time because of notable increases in affluence, the need for convenience and instant gratification as well as overall lazyness.

Gems:

-"A recent study in the Journal of the American Medical Association predicts that a child born in 2000 has a one-in-three chance of developing diabetes. (An African American child's chances are two-in-five.)"

-"The human appetite, it turns out, is surprisingly elastic, which makes evolutionary sense... Our bodies are storing reserves of fat against a famine that never comes."

-"Add fat or sugar to anything and it's going to taste better on the tongue of an animal that natural selection has wired to seek out energy-dense foods."

Thoughts/questions:

-How can people bear to buy an excess of foods when it has become a statistical fact that more people suffer from OVERnutrition than MALnutrition? I take very special care personally to not over eat (although this is really quite silly coming from me, who only weighs 90 lbs!)

-I guess if I were ignorant and I didn't really care about where my food came from or what consequences my choice will come with I wouldn't be bothered by the idea of abundance- I would honestly be comforted by it (until that sharp pain known as heartburn strikes once again)

-People today, ESPECIALLY those who fall under the "consumer" archetype described in the chapter, need to learn how to be patient. We live in a world where we can decide what movies show on TV when WE want them to (which means there is almost ALWAYS a reason to watch TV and not to turn it off), today's society is so bent on instant gratification that it is coming at a great cost of human productivity and health in general.

Chapter 7: The Meal (Fast Food)

At the end of the industrial food chain is nothing but an illusion in the form of a silly clown- fast food (such as McDonald's) is anything BUT varied, with its extreme dependence on corn and its endless fractions that make up the "supersized" nutritional information known as an ingredients list. Children fall for this trick the easiest, naturally, because they find the tastes and the whimsy of a fast food establishment to be exciting and generally tasteful. What the mirage is REALLY concealing is the fact that while people and their cars consume an excess of corn (along with several horrifyingly toxic chemicals such as TBHQ and BHT), the real loss is the sheer amount of energy necessary to produce these meals. While there is a growing energy crisis across the globe, a disturbing amount is constantly guzzled down by wet mills.

Gems:

-"According to the flyer, a serving of six nuggets now has precisely ten fewer calories than a cheeseburger. Chalk up another achievement for food science."

-"What this means is that the amount of food energy lost in the making of something like a Chicken McNugget could feed a great many more children than just mine."

-The piece about TBHQ, how it is so casually a part of the cooking process while so little of it can be lethal.

Thoughts/questions:

- I REALLY want to go to a McDonalds and ask for "a large fries... but can you hold the lighter fluid please?" My brother always joked about this.

-Why is considered profitable that all of this food energy is sucked into the production of something as feeble as a single nugget? Does anyone EVER consider ending world hunger???

-Speaking of wasted energy, who in the world dreamt of being a scientist so that they could discover the breakthrough that makes a chicken nugget X amount of calories? What happened to the cure for cancer?

Chapter 8: All Flesh is Grass

Meet Joel Salatin, a rare breed of farmer whose goal is to "go beyond organic", the opposite of the food spectrum from George Naylor. On Joel's farm, organisms of a variety of species from pigs to earthworms coexist in an ecosystem where grass is the main supporter. In Joel's opinion, the definition of "organic" has become bastardized to the point that it has become nothing but a claim by the industrial overlords in search of a hefty profit. The secret to his success is not really a secret at all- humans and animals are drawn to grass, which we all feed on (directly or indirectly), resulting in truly "pure" produce. In return, the animals and us humans nurture and support the grass (even if we don't mean to!).

Gems:

-"Because a healthy soil digests the dead to nourish the living, Salatin calls it the earth's stomach."

-"Like what sort of habitat is going to allow that chicken to express its psychological distinctiveness?"

-"Working together, grass and man have overspread much of the earth, far more of it than would ever have been possible working alone."

Thoughts/questions:

-Joel Salatin is a total bad*** for a farmer! As a filmmaker I could imagine a really awesome character in a movie like him.

-In my opinion the whole idea of "organic on the rise" is somewhat false- people are clearly more interested in organic, wholesome products, it's just that what is being provided doesn't exactly hold water.

Chapter 9- Big Organic

Organic foods, an idea that was established with the attitude of cleaning up people's souls from industrialized produce has dramatically changed. The heart and philosophy that had originally made organic foods a righteous and fresh idea among the American people has fallen victim to the insurmountable greed of corporations and even the few farmers responsible. Just how legitimate is the "organic lifestyle"? It has many uncanny parallels to the industrial food chain, such as the inclusion of toxic chemicals, cruelty toward livestock and its increase in convenience toward the consumer and their needs. Organic, which was once laughed at in the face of slim, powerless farmers has now become a franchise that can no longer hold the credibility of a farmer like Salatin.

Gems:

-"Indeed, the longer I shopped in Whole Foods, the more I thought that this is a place where the skills of a literary critic might come in handy- those, and perhaps also a journalist's."

-"But the free-range story seems a bit of a stretch when you discover that the door remains firmly shut until the birds are at least five or six weeks old- for fear they'll catch something outside- and the chickens are slaughtered only two weeks later."

-"The original organic ideal held that you could not divorce these three elements, since (as ecology taught) everything was connected. But Gene Kahn, for one (and he was by no means the only one), was a realist, a businessman with a payroll to meet. And he wasn't looking back."

Thoughts/questions:

- We shop at fairway, where there are BIG organic claims, and I question my "grass fed beef" that sits in the fridge right now... any farms near here...?

- How can Kahn, someone who was once basically a hippie, transform into such a greedy businessman? I guess money does talk...

- So what exactly makes these "organic meals" the right meals? Is there any meal we can eat that we can feel GOOD about???

Chapter 10- Grass (Thirteen Ways of Looking at a Pasture)

Precis: Joel Salatin, who claims to lead a farm that goes "beyond organic" has figured out the true secret to ultimate sustainability: grow grass, feed the cattle that grass and in return the cattle support the grass. The methods he showed me over the week I visited are energy efficient, helpful toward the planet and lacking of any trace of the toxicity that is the industrial food chain. Growing corn like that of George Naylor might be cheaper and more productive in an industrial standpoint, but it gives little back to the Earth (what little it gives is quite harmful) and Joel's farm is not only keeping animals and humans healthy, but the grass and soil that are so necessary for the sustaining of life in his ecosystem.

Gems:

-"The reason environmentalists in the western United States take such a dim view of grazing is that most ranchers practice continuous grazing, degrading the land by flouting the law of the second bite."

-"Cows eating grasses that had themselves eaten the sun: The food chain at work in this pasture could not be any shorter or simpler."

-"... if the sixteen million acres now being used to grow corn to feed cows in the United States became well managed pasture, that would remove fourteen billion pounds of carbon from the atmosphere each year, the equivalent of taking four million cars off the road."

Thoughts/questions:

-If there are such extreme environmentally friendly possibilities with pastoral farming, why do environmentalists waste so much time talking about things like recycling? It sounds like ALL of the causes of global warming come from food.

-The bit about electric fences in Joel's farm kind of disturbed me. Isn't that cruel? How are cows supposed to know what is electric until they touch it? I can't help but think of a feedlot.

-In connection with Cuba (strictly speaking about your comment Andy) I am curious as to if there is any data supporting the vast improvement that the Cuban foodways had when their supply of subsidized oil was cut off. You have to wonder if the U.S. could simply shy away from all of this demonic corn production even if we WERE cut off. I would think that more people would starve here before willingly taking on Joel Salatin's job.

Chapter 11: The Animals (Practicing Complexity)

Precis: Joel Salatin is not a slave to his animals, he is merely an orchestrator who lets the job get done by the ones most capable of doing it- the actual animals. In the eyes of this rare breed of farmer the animals are not simply a machine for the produce they give, but caregivers and nurturers toward the health of the other animals, and in turn, themselves. So why doesn't every farmer strive for what Salatin has? Because it not only takes real physical and mental input, but it simply does not net the profit nor efficiency that most industrial farmers live for. It takes innovation, a true passion for the message and belief that Joel and his father established, and other farmers today are simply too lazy and greedy to give something so "unconventional" (by today's standards) a try.

Gems:

-"Unfolding here before us, I realized, was a most impressive form of alchemy: cowpatties in the process of being transformed into exceptionally tasty eggs."

-"With the industrialization of agriculture, the simplifying process reached its logical extreme- in monoculture."

-"The idea is to not slavishly imitate nature, but to model a natural ecosystem in all its diversity and interdependence, one where all the species "fully express their physiological distinctiveness.""

-"...in one long, beautiful, and utterly convincing proof that in a world where grass can eat sunlight and food animals can eat grass, there is indeed a free lunch."

Thoughts/insights:

- The bit about the pig's tails was very disturbing to me. Beating a pig who had his tail cut off and didn't even know a good life to death? Ouch.

-Being a city person, I get incredibly uncomfortable with the outdoors... I think Joel Salatin might actually convince me that the farm life can be quite comfortable!

-Also, I envy those locals who get his food... why can't we get such tasty eggs or produce in the city? Wait... it's the city...

-I really admire Joel's philosophy and innovation toward his passion. His inventions of the eggmobile and the Gobbledy-Go show a passion and love for his profession that very few other farmers out there possess.

HW 8- Growing Our Own Food

Growing your own food certainly does make you feel good- until you realize that you completely failed at it like I did. As I taste what little developed sprouts I have I must say I am both bewildered and disappointed. I watered them multiple times every day as I was supposed to, and I DID love them- but they refused to grow more than a tiny bit. Actually chewing them was slightly unpleasant at first because of what little taste they actually have, but as I sit here on the computer chewing on them has become quite soothing, like popcorn. Reflecting on my care for the sprouts, I do have to question myself if I really cared enough. Maybe not. I guess I had taken the "magic of nature's course" for granted and didn't entirely respect the assignment- for that I should be punished (of course I am as I eat these tasteless sesame seeds). If I were to do this again (which I am pretty sure is going to happen) I would try to create a habit (much in the same way as a homework habit) to care for my sprouts specifically and give them their own special attention.

HW 7- Omnivore's Dilemma RR

Michael Pollan, The Omnivore's Dilemma, Chapter Intro

Because we as humans who live in present day have a vast variety of choices for what to consume, our complex minds are often driven to anxiety on what could be considered the 'right choice'. Everything that we eat can fall under three major food chains- that of industrial foods, 'pastoral' or grass based organic foods, or meals of which we forage by ourselves and for ourselves only. Follow me as I try to find justification and non-justification that makes each of these meals the 'right choice'.

Gems:

-"To eat with a fuller consciousness of all that is at stake might sound like a burden, but in practice few things in life can afford quite as much satisfaction."

-"But forgetting, or not knowing in the first place, is what the industrial food chain is all about, the principal reason it is so opaque, for if we could see what lies on the far side of the increasingly high walls of our industrial agriculture, we would surely change the way we eat."

Thoughts/questions:

-WHY is this book going to change my views on food and my foodways, and how is it going to go about influencing those changes?

-I think that realistically, the four meals he mentions coexist and have become intertwined in such a way that we cannot survive- the current day market that is, without the presence of the industrial food chain.

-He is not going to simply suggest we only eat organic and hunt for our own food- in fact I would not have a hard time believing that Mr. Pollan is an occasional consumer of the industrial food chain.

Chapter One- The Plant (Corn's Conquest)

Look at the vast variety of foods that fill the shelves in your Pathmark- many things are naturally identifiable by species such as the fruit and meat, but once you reach those Lucky Charms nearly everything in the store is made of corn. In fact, even the fruit includes corn components, and that meat was raised off of corn. Think of a Thanksgiving dinner with all sorts of dishes- turkey, stuffing, cranberry sauce; you might as well call is corn, corn and corn. Because of what seems today like a once in a blue moon encounter with corn in the late 1400's, corn now enslaves the Earth by penetrating the diet of nearly every living being.

Gems:

-" "What am I eating? And where in the world did it come from?" Not very long ago an eater didn't need a journalist to answer these questions."

-"Even in Produce on a day when there's ostensibly no corn for sale you'll nevertheless find plenty of corn: in the vegetable wax that gives the cucumbers their sheen, in the pesticide responsible for the produce's perfection, even in the coating on the cardboard it was shipped in."

-"So that's us: processed corn, walking"

-"In the plant world at least, opportunism trumps gratitude."

Thoughts/questions:

- This is slightly disturbing, although part of me deep down knew that there wasn't a species called 'fruit roll-ups'. I guess I never connected the dots that would lead back to the same farm on Iowa

-Is corn at all completely avoidable? Is it possible for one to go on an "anti-corn diet" or is this simply impractical?

-If people are starving halfway around the world, why are we wasting corn to make the outside of cardboard feel nice? Does anybody else ponder this disturbing thought???

Chapter 2- The Farm

The majority of food you consume is made of or contains corn, which can likely be traced back to a farm on Iowa- the highest concentration of corn farms in America. This farmer, who devotes his life of monotony and struggles to keep you from starving is having trouble making ends meet himself. In fact, not only do buyers of corn (corporations like Coca-Cola) take advantage of this farmer, but they also encourage them to use less natural techniques such as using synthetic fertilizer to grow corn, which not only poisons the Earth but poison you. In short, biodiversity is sacrificed for further progression in the corn industry.

Gems:

-"Measured in terms of output per worker, American farmers like Naylor are the most productive humans who have ever lived."

-"The true socialist utopia turns out to be a field of F-1 hybrid plants."

-"If, as has sometimes been said, the discovery of agriculture represented the first fall of man from the state of nature, then the discovery of synthetic fertility is surely a second precipitous fall."

-"By fertilizing the world, we alter the planet's composition of species and shrink its biodiversity."

Thoughts/questions:

-If Naylor is one of the most productive human beings of ALL TIME, why in the world is he and his family suffering because of their trade. Who cares about Einstien? Who needs Obama? All hail George Naylor!!!

-It really is startling to me that farmers no longer have actual animals on their farms- why sacrifice biodiversity for something we have so much of that it sells for literally nothing?!

-Farming today sounds so exciting- not. Farming a half-century ago might have sounded quite fun.

Chapter 3- The Elevator

Corn kernels here, there and everywhere. Today's technology takes every individual farmer's corn (which were all grown using different methods) and funnels it in with everyone else's, creating a vast sea of yellow kernels. Tracking down one of these kernels to your dinner plate is like trying to find salt in a pail of sand. The farmer gets little to nothing for his contribution.

Gems:

-"Such corn is not something to feel reverent or even sentimental about, and nobody in Iowa, save the slightly embarrassed agronomist, does."

-"Before the commodity system farmers prided themselves on a panoply of qualities in their crop: big ears, plump kernels, straight rows, various colors; even the height of their corn plants became a point of pride. Now none of these distinctions mattered..."

-"I should have known that tracing any single bushel of commodity corn is as impossible as tracing a bucket of water after it's been poured into a river."

Thoughts/questions:

-I like the way he describes the way the kernels look like a "golden river". They remind me of Willy Wonka's chocolate factory, except with corn and nothing else.

-Having such minimal requirements for the kind of corn you can toss into the elevator is really convoluted. What if I grew mine with anthrax? Minimal insect damage? Check. Moisture under control? Check. Dusted with anthrax? Accepted! And the whole world goes down...

Chapter 4- The Feedlot (Making Meat)

Forget farms and ranches, cattle today stay at the fancy resorts known as feedlots. Here they will enjoy all of the corn they could possibly want (If they did want something their body is not evolved to digest), while standing in their own toxic fecal matter as they enjoy a scenic view of their collected effort- a manure lagoon. During their stay they will indirectly feed on their own kind and will be subject to deadly bacteria such as E. coli. Then, without being cleaned or treated, the cattle are slaughtered as fast as humanly possible while introducing humans to mad cow disease and petroleum ingestion.

Gems:

- "The urea is a form of sticky brown goop consisting of molasses and urea. The urea is a form of synthetic nitrogen made from natural gas, similar to the fertilizer spread on George Naylor's fields."

- "We don't know much about the hormones in it- ... but we do know something about the bacteria, which can find their way from the manure on the ground and to his hide and from there into our hamburgers."

-"Assuming 534 continues to eat 25 pounds of corn a day and reaches a weight of twelve hundred pounds, he will have consumed in his lifetime the equivalent of thirty-five gallons of oil, nearly a barrel."

Comments/questions:

- I don't blame Mr. Pollan for not wanting to eat beef again so quickly- I am actually questioning a burger I just ate... ugh.

- How idiotic could feedlot supervisors be? At least clean up the cattle BEFORE slaughtering it.

- After the dominant rise of these feedlots, can we ever turn back, or will industrial feedlots inevitably change for the worse as time marches on?

- How long can ANYONE bear to work at a feedlot, let alone smell one?!

Chapter 5- The Processing Plant (Making Complex Foods)

Beyond the existence of grounded up corn, the vast majority of the corn we eat is processed behind closed doors and heavy curtains in a wet mill. These industrial powerhouses that have developed rapidly throughout time takes bushels of corn, and through processes of extracting their different properties create a number of different corn-based products (namely anything that ends in and -ose) higher than Santa's list. Food scientists over time have strived to "improve upon nature" by cheating the phenomenon of spoilage, package foods for long distance imports. Now a new achievement has been reached: food can be grown with specific substances to produce more profitable results and the key to the corn kernel has been opened to make anything from artificial sweeteners to sneaker polish.

Gems:

- "It takes a certain kind of eater- an industrial eater- to consume these fractions of corn, and we are, or have evolved into, that supremely adapted creature: the eater of processed food."

- "There's money to be made in food, unless you're trying to grow it."

- "Remember the sixties dream of an entire meal served in a pill, like the Jetsons? We've apparently moved from the meal-in-a-pill to the pill-in-a-meal, which is to say, not very far at all."

Thoughts/questions:

-I've been reading up recently that the name "high fructose corn syrup" has been elected to be changed to "corn sugar". On a radio broadcast I was listening to, people were saying it should be renamed to "corn poison" or "cancer corn".

-I must admit that when it delves this deep (into X number of ingredients), I have a hard time truly caring about how many ingredients are on a label. I know this is lazy and promotes ignorance and non-observance but to be honest, my brother is far better at this than I.

-General Mills may be processing some very unhealthy cereals, but... they make Wheaties, the Breakfast of Champions!

HW 6- Food Diary

FOOD DIARY:

Wednesday Lunch: Ham Sandwich (incomplete in picture)

Note: This is also Thursday's lunch (the same exact sandwich), I just forgot to take a picture.

This is my usual lunch every day that I have school. I usually use rye bread or whole wheat with ham or turkey depending on which I currently have. I do not know where the buns come from because my aunt gave them to me, so I do not know how many calories there are in the buns. However, the ham packaging claims to have 15 calories per slice, and I use four slices most of the time. 60-100 calories??? Why exactly do I keep eating the same sandwich almost EVERY day? It's pretty consistent and is easy on my stomach. It doesn't take very long to consume and I am a big fan of cold cuts.

Wednesday snack: Three Marshmallows. The sugar on the outside really make my teeth feel gross. But marshmallows are oh so good! When they are toasted they are especially delicious, but for the most part I eat these plain. This is probably because I am not very comfortable with fire in my house and mostly because I am too lazy. But putting them in the microwave is fine with me!

Wednesday Dinner: Pasta with Meat sauce! The sauce is from canned tomatoes and it is flavored with sweet and hot sausage. The sauce is not exactly chunky, but it still has a thickness to it. However, it bothers my stomach. Why? I am not entirely sure. Perhaps it is the spicyness of the hot sausage or the tomatoes. Even though I almost always suffer a stomach ache from a bowl of this, it is very delicious. Because my mom makes it! And she is the best cook in the whole wide world! Or maybe it's just that I am accustomed to her cooking- I HAVE grown up with it all my life! I estimate this bowl to be around 1200 calories based on looking at the labels for each component.

Thursday Breakfast: Cocoa Crispies! Clearly the most healthy cereal around, it has vitamin D! In all seriousness though, it is uncommon for me to have a sugar cereal in the house- in fact on most mornings I eat a bowl of oatmeal. Why did I go for this specific cereal? I suppose because I am a fan of rice crispies, I also like chocolate and chocolate milk. I figure cocoa crispies is what you get when adding the three. I realize that the three main ingredients here are sugar, sugar and sugar, but as it turns out (through careful research) my mom's Post Raisin Bran actually has more calories per serving than this. Go mom! I usually eat a big bowl, so I will guess that my breakfast was about 300 calories given that I use much more than the serving size and I also use whole milk. As always, my stomach is uneasy after consumption, but I question it's significance as that is the result of any meal.

Thursday Lunch: Pizza. I enjoy pizza a little less than everyone else in society, but I eat it nonetheless. In addition to the much eaten sandwich in the picture above, my internship actually brought in a pizza. I had a single slice, and because I have absolutely no clue as to where this pizza came from, there is no way to know for sure how many calories I consumed. One site says that the average pizza slice has 230 calories (http://www.dietbites.com/Calories-In-Pizza.html) , so I will go with that. Same effect on the stomach.

Thursday Lunch Snack: Chips Ahoy cookies. Chips Ahoy does a fine cookie, and I guess the only reason it is such a popular and commercial name is because it IS delicious.

Thursday Snack: Fritos. Fritos are VERY salty. And I am not sure why (I do not have any known food allergies) but every time I eat these my bottom lip gets a little puffy.

Thursday Dinner: Pasta with Meat Sauce. Same dinner. Same stomach reaction. Same deliciousness.

Overall I imagine my normal calorie intake for one day to be slightly over 2,500 calories. This is because on most nights I have a big bowl of ice cream. I am not sure if this is a good thing because it is pretty darn close to what a website told me to eat to maintain what little weight I actually have.

Nutritionally, I think I cover most fronts (Dairy, red meat, etc.) but I realize that what I really lack in is fruits. Normally there are a lot of apples and bananas at home, but recently the produce at the supermarket (Fairway) has been below average and somewhat disappointing. Although I am very wiry in my build, I eat well. It's just that my condition holds me back. If my body were absorbing the nutrition as it should like anybody else- perhaps I would be 'bigger' and more nutritionally successful. However, I realize my disposition and know that I have to do better in order for me to hopefully survive in the Bahamas for 100 days, a sustainable living environment.

I find it curious as to why it seems like my mom's cooking is better than anybody else's. No offense to anybody else's mothers of course, but I wonder why we find the food we grow up with to be the best. For example, if my grandma were to whip up some of her holy matzoh ball soup, and I went to a highly praised deli (the 2nd Avenue Deli to be exact), why is it that I just find my grandma's to be endlessly better? This is actually a true story, and to be honest, I really didn't understand what all the hype was about. It was truly nothing special. Is this why I enjoy my own sandwiches so much for lunch? Is it because I am so confident in myself that nothing I personally made could possibly be bad? Do other people find my mother's cooking to be as fantastic as I think? These are interesting questions to me.

My decisions of what to eat over the 48 hours (or most of them, because I didn't decide my mom was cooking meat sauce) didn't really involve deep thinking or consciousness. I just went for what my mind naturally told me I would enjoy and went on ahead. I realize that for most people (especially those with bigger wallets) this can be very bad and promote buying unhealthy drinks and snacks, but almost all of my meals are confined within what we have in the house. Sure, I go help decide what to get when we go food shopping, but usually there I am more concerned about hurrying up and getting home so I can sit my lazy bum down. THEN sometimes I will regret not convincing mom to buy something I really would've enjoyed. I guess it is just my mind telling me to be more active???

My dinner

My dinner:

Eggplant

Stringbeans

Lettuce

Ribs!!!

HW 5- Dominant Discourses

"The baby-carrot industry tried to reposition its product as junk food..." This is extremely startling to me. People trying to market vegetables as junk food? I understand why they are using this approach but I think it is sending the wrong message. What it is saying is that in order to get kids to eat vegetables, it must be considered by them as junk food. This presents me with a clear dominant discourse in food today- kids don't eat vegetables. They should, but they DON'T. Instead, kids seem to follow the foodways of somebody who eats snacks high in sodium, sugar and trans fat. They drink diet sodas and then the population erupts in diabetes. Has the discourse really stooped down to this level of treating kids like idiots and selling baby carrots in the same way as chex mix? Of course it's a great idea and it may convince some but it is clear that child obesity and general unhealthyness has become a topic of dominant discourse.

The foodways of a well-informed person can be two different things: There is the easily manipulated person who looks at a television advertisement or a billboard and is convinced to make their foodways as big businesses tell them. THEN, there is the well informed critical thinker who sees all of the ads and can see through the lies. This person listens to experts not affiliated with any food corporation and is mindful about how food makes them feel. The easily manipulated person will probably go to Starbucks or wherever a commercial suggests and their foodways will most likely be unhealthy. The well informed person who takes everything with a grain of salt will likely stay away from what they know is obscenely unhealthy, but is not ready to give up ALL comfort foods.

When it comes to the actual talking, nobody affiliated with any big chain should have a voice on their own food. They may defend themselves, but in the news today the credibility of "that McDonalds cashier" is not up to that of a consumer- somebody on nobody's side that has food experience. Professional chefs- those who make $100 meals, will probably know what they're talking about when it comes to food. However, the ones with the most credibility today among those who participate in food discourse are the doctors. The ones who spent two or more decades studying the human body and nutrition probably know a lot more than the chief executive who has spent the same amount of time counting profits and swimming in cash from food they would not likely even touch themselves. These are the highly acclaimed professionals who are not only the most legitimate voice in the dominant discourse, but the most listened to (or if not the most, just second to slimy ad campaigns).

Sources used from: http://www.nytimes.com/2010/09/25/health/policy/25vegetables.html?_r=1&emc=eta1

HW 4- My family's foodways

When it comes to generational changes in foodways, I think scientific advancements play a big role in how people approach food. I think one connection that can be made is to smoking. In my grandparent's generation, smoking was considered healthy for the body and mind, and people who did NOT smoke were looked at with mistrust. Today, through scientific discoveries we now know that smoking is actually DETRIMENTAL to the body and mind, and those who smoke today are given an ugly look. My grandparents, when they were young, were all about McDonalds and fast food in general. However, when fast food was found to be unhealthy and generally "unhip" my mom's generation was totally AGAINST fast food. Today, fast food is laughed at by those who are brought up by critics, but still stand tall to the mainstream population because THIS generation is all about saving money, which fast food promotes.

Which leads me to my next point: Cost is a major factor on foodways. This is something that has to do with a family's financial situation. In MY situation, we always look for the best quality product for the cheapest price. However, when my grandfather (who played the stocks quite well) was alive, a trip to grandma's meant a really good meal at grandma's! Some people (like me) have learned to adjust their foodways so they can thrive off of very little. I could definitely imagine a rich person crying when their only choice is a box of macaroni and cheese, when they are used to a multiple course meal.

Perhaps the biggest change in generational foodways though, is lazyness. When big chains weren't around some time ago, people knew how to cook. Or at least someone in a family knew how to cook. Maybe they weren't the next Iron Chef, but they could cook a full meal every night, at a decent cost. Today however, things have radically changed. With the introduction of a McDonalds on every corner, a full affordable meal is just a short walk away. Why bother with pots and pans, or wait for an oven to pre-heat? Who wants to wash dishes afterward? Nobody. Not unless they know they can put other restaurants to shame with their own skills. People are LAZY. Families today know how to make frozen chicken legs, but constant lazyness is what brings outside restaurants so much business. Money doesn't mean a thing as long as you get a good meal. It's not like you can make it yourself! This is why women want a man that can cook! Better start cooking lessons!