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| Even a simple carrot can be a miracle |
I recently finished the book Animal, Vegetable, Miracle - A Year of Food Life,
by Barbara Kingsolver, with contributions by her husband Steven Hopp and daughter
Camille Kingsolver. The book chronicles the family's experience with growing
and eating only locally produced foods for an entire year. A best-selling author,
Kingsolver documents the challenges of not purchasing food that has been shipped
hundreds or thousand of miles before ending up on the kitchen table. Overwhelming
the positives of their experiment far outweighed its difficulties and taught the
entire family to truly appreciate how the food that they eat is grown and how
it makes its way to becoming breakfast, lunch or dinner.
I personally appreciate being able to buy imported food items that are not grown
in the United States, but I sometimes take this ability for granted. The book
has taught me to consider source location in my decision-making when grocery
shopping. Reading nutrition labels are important, but so to is knowing how far
an item has traveled before arriving on the self. This not only effects a
product's freshness, but also has ramifications for the environment and the
local economy. When I was looking for citrus fruit that other day, I was surprised
to find that almost every fruit item i picked up was shipped from overseas.
Even the oranges were imported when California or Florida oranges are certainly
in season this time of year.
Along with instant communication, we have also become a society that expects
instant gratification with out culinary desires. Most of us in the United States have
come to expect that fresh fruits and vegetables will be available at the grocery store
year-round. This perpetuates a disconnect between what we put into our bodies and
understanding what really goes into producing that food by the farmer. If one chooses
to buy only local foods then one also commits to eating only those foods that are in
season. This leads greater appreciation and sincere gratitude for
crops as they become available. Asparagus, which is the topic of the second
chapter of the book, is one vegetable which, even as a child, I looked forward
to eating in May. Now it is on store shelves year round. I am not sure how this occurs,
but removing the anticipation for one of the first vegetables to become available in
the spring somehow takes away its uniqueness.
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| December Asparagus |
Another expectation of American consumers is that we want our food to be cheap.
According to Kingsolver, Americans spend a lower proportion of their income on
food than people in any other country. I acknowledge that I am a cost conscious
shopper and will travel to multiple stores for a less expensive product. It is, however,
important to realize that the price that rings up at the register does not
always reflect its true cost. In the United states taxpayers fund large-scale
food production and distribution through government subsidies that keep those
prices on the shelves low. Further, we are all ultimately paying the price for resulting
damage to the environment by large industrial scaled farming practices.
Soils are being depleted of their nutrients which results in continual application
of fertilizer. This in turn leads to excess nutrients that cannot be used by the crops
to run off the land and eventually end up polluting rivers, lakes, and
the ocean. Another example is with genetically modified crops that have resulted in the
need to use stronger and stronger pesticides to combat the chemical resistant bugs
and weeds that have resolved, resulting in unintentional harm to non-targeted species
such as honeybees and butterflies.
Even though most of us do not have the time, nor own enough land for growing all of our food,
most of us can make more responsible choices when we do our shopping. This book is not telling
us that we all have to become farmers, but it does encourage the reader to become more aware
of where our food comes from before it ends up on our plate.
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