FRESH! : A film review

FRESH! was the first film screened by my newborn Food Films Club.

Produced and directed by Ana Joanes, FRESH! highlights inspiring players in the food movement – folks who are key because they’re successfully challenging the status quo and making significant differences on a local level. The message of the film is that these efforts can be supported and replicated by everyone who cares about the safety and wholesomeness of the food we, as a society, have to eat.

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Posts to ponder

The following posts really caught my attention this week. Which ones resonate with you?

Thoughts on Pollan’s Big Food Movement Essay Grist’s Tom Phillpot evaluates Michael Pollan’s essay in the New York Times Review of Books in light of two questions: where is the broader progressive “movement”? And could the “food movement” galvanize progressives to come to a single table with their varied plates? (Lame metaphor mine, not Tom’s).

Mmmm, school lunch!

Eat Lunch with Your Kid Day No it’s not a real thing, but Ed Bruske (in a post featured on Grist, The Slow Cook and La Vida Locavore) lobbed a soft-ball at the First Lady, proposing she and White House chef Sam Kass, along with parents of all the school kids out there, join the young Future of Our Nation for lunch one day. The photo of a likely entree is revolting.

Can Altruism Help Your Diet? This post meant a lot to me because I know it has been true for me. Writer Sara Reistad-Long discusses a study done by Stanford University researchers indicating that “people were far more likely to make healthier diet choices in order to protect the planet or support a whole foods movement than to improve their own health.” Antidote to cravings for bad foods just might be an understanding of the widespread harm they do – not just to us but to the world around us.

Lavender + clothesline = green and dreamy

Grist offers a GreenLaundry Challenge (with prizes!) that got me thinking about ways we could reduce laundry costs AND our carbon footprint a little. I found a cool indoor clothesline and outdoor clothesline for people with small spaces. I’m thinking of getting the collapsible outdoor line to take advantage of the 10th-floor breeze on our balcony. At $50, it is roughly the cost of 25 dryer loads of laundry, so I feel that it would pay for itself (at one load per week) before the weather got too cold to use it).  If it works, I’ll plant a little container of lavender to scent my drying laundry ala Provence.

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The hand that chops the veggies

Michael Pollan is drawing a little fire these days from … feminists.

Photo (c) Sarah Owens via flickr

In a recent article in  New York Times Review of Books, Pollan reviewed several books that highlight the various circles of thought under the “big, lumpy tent” that is the sustainable food movement. It’s a good read, and I’ve got a few more books on my reading list now.

One of the books he reviews (at the top of my to-read list) is The Taste for Civilization: Food, Politics, and Civil Society by Janet A. Flammang. Of this  book, Pollan writes:

In a challenge to second-wave feminists who urged women to get out of the kitchen, Flammang suggests that by denigrating ‘foodwork’—everything involved in putting meals on the family table—we have unthinkingly wrecked one of the nurseries of democracy: the family meal.”

Feminist blogger Anna Clark responded via Salon.com in an article worth reading in full:

My take, as a feminist and local foodie? Blaming feminism for luring women out of the kitchen, stealing the ritual of the family meal, and thereby diminishing “one of the nurseries of democracy” is both simplistic and ridiculous. It’s true that shared meals are powerful spaces for building relationships and “the habits of civility.” But if we’re going to talk about who’s to blame for our current culture of processed food, why not blame untold generations of men for not getting into the kitchen, especially given Pollan’s characterization of the family meal as having a meaningful role in cultivating democracy? If it’s so important, why is their absence excusable?”

My response is, Anna, I get what you’re saying, but your article stops short of doing anything more than stamping your feet about it. I think plenty of men fall under Pollan’s critique – but honestly, who, until you, saw this as a blame game? Lower your hackles, girl! How passe of you to jump right into a tit-for-tat and insist if any woman be blamed a man must also be blamed. Honey, have you read Pollan’s books? Many, many men are blamed for the mess our food system is in. How is it so wrong to say that feminism played a role in the loss of healthier food traditions from days gone by?

Moreover, I say, Anna, accept the credit that Pollan is handing women – it’s in our hands to bring goodness back to our tables. Hopefully, and very likely, our men will help too. But whether they do or not, we know we have the smarts and the skills to feed ourselves and those we love well.

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What progress looks like

In 2006, Whole Foods wrote an open letter to Michael Pollan, taking issue with some criticisms he had of their company (namely, that they – as of 2006 – overlooked opportunities to positively affect local food systems). In June of that year he wrote a gracious reply reiterating how he thought Whole Foods could take a lead role in changing how Americans eat and how farmers are able to successful grow food that’s better for us.

What happy cows look like. God bless 'em.

In 2010, just a month or so ago in fact, I read Pollan’s letter on his website, and was impressed with his eloquent urging of Whole Foods CEO to invest in local food systems for both vegetables and for grass-fed beef. he wrote,

I was pleased to hear you speak of the importance of grass in both beef and milk production, and applaud your efforts to push the organic dairy industry to make grazing mandatory and reject the organic feedlot model. The story in beef is more complicated. I recognize the economic advantages of sourcing grass-fed beef from overseas; it is a commodity in New Zealand while still an artisanal product here. Yet Whole Foods’ commitment to developing an American grass-fed meat industry would have such a profound impact, both on the environment and the welfare of the animals, that I would urge you to take a broader view of the matter…

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