Food is on my mind in a big way. I read The Omnivore's Dilemma avidly and then spent a month in supermarket paralysis, in doubt about everything, not knowing what to eat. Then In Defense of Food came in at the library, and whew, okay, I get it now. Food. "Eat food. Not too much. Mostly plants." Investigating edible items in my household, I found very little that was not food, but there were some disturbing exceptions. The supermarket-brand graham crackers, for example, contain "interesterified soybean oil." What science experiment am I unwittingly participating in by eating that (or feeding it to my one-year-old)? Turns out "interesterification" is the latest substitute for partial hydrogenation -- another process that makes soy oil solid at room temperature. Uh... no thank you. There were some other oddities, including L-cysteine in the frozen pizza. Food-grade cysteine is made from either human hair or duck feathers, and acts as a dough softener. I'd rather have hard dough.
I'm having a good time spending a predetermined amount at the farmer's market every week, and am starting to think how we could get economical access to healthier animal products, in particular. We're thinking of buying a pastured cow and keeping it in the freezer for the year. A physics professor colleague of mine at Evergreen is also an organic farmer who has livestock - maybe we can get one from her.
I was happy to see the pro-whole-foods editorial in the SF Chronicle, and I am totally delighted that the Obamas are planting a garden at the White House - just like Pollan suggested! Maybe something is really happening.
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