Hello cooks!
I was putting together a list of resources for the folks joining us for dinner + movie at Corner Table (Go forth! Buy tickets!) next week and I just couldn’t help but feel like this information is so important for all of us that I’d just post the list a bit early so that everyone can learn and we can have an really excellent discussion on these topics with those who come to the dinner.
As anyone who has been within earshot of me knows, I’m really most interested in good food. For me, good food is good food, and a lot of the time I don’t much care where that food comes from. It just so happens that animals and vegetables that are treated well are the best food. So, I get to eat yummy stuff and feel superior. Yea!
I don’t feel like I have the luxury to do that anymore. I think we have to start fighting. See, what we’ve done is sold our food system, and by extension, our bodies to corporate America. And what we’ve gotten for that is obesity and disease. Now, I’m not against corporate America, but I’ve worked for large corporations and really, they don’t care about you. It’s not that they’re not caring people or out for world domination. It’s just that they care about making their shareholders money and what their stock prices are at each day. That’s what they’re there for, making money. If keeping you healthy and giving you awesome food was what they existed for, then they would do that. They’re not.
See, we have to make it so that we’re a priority for them, so I made you this list of stuff to look at.
If you haven’t seen it, you should check out The Future of Food. It’s a very important critique of food corporations and their modification of the DNA of foods like corn and soy beans and it’s free to watch on hulu.
Do you keep rolling your eyes at all of the freaking out about food allergies in the news? I do. But allergies in kids under the age of 18 are up, way up:
In terms of the absolute number of children below 18 who were hospitalized each year with diagnoses related to food allergies, there has been a sharp increase, too. From 2004 to 2006, the average annual number of discharges related to food allergies for this group was 9,537. This is marked higher than the corresponding figures of 4,135 from 2001 to 2003, and 2,615 from 1998 to 2000.
Holy crap! That’s more than double over in two years! And that’s hospitalization – not some little sniffly business. This specific quote is from a blog Natural News – but you can find the same information from traditional news sources as well as the CDC. There are several problems with the loose way this data was collected, but the experts agree that the numbers are way too high to be an anomaly.
Natural News goes on to talk about possible reasons:
Broadly speaking, the root causes of allergic reactions are a state of over-toxicity in the body, or poor health and a weak immune system in general. When the body is overloaded with toxins, it cannot cope as well as it should with certain foods.
(If that doesn’t make fodder for an interesting conversation on keeping our families healthy, I don’t know what does. And I’ve stopped with the eye rolling, turns out that was just mean.)
More info:
UK article on the link of hyperactivity to food colorings
Allergy Kids – an organization set up to inform and advocate for kids with allergies.
So just in case I’ve depressed you so much that you’re going to have to eat an entire cake sitting cross legged in a dark closet all by yourself, here are some links with information you need and ways that you can avoid the worst offenders and/or join some great advocacy groups to try to instigate change for the better. (Remember if one person claps in a room, they just look weird: whole bunch of people clapping makes a big loud noise. Noise is good.)
Additives banned in Europe still legal in the US
Slow Food’s movement to get real foods in school
And last but certainly not least Cooking Minnesota! I plan to continue on with the classes and events I started last year creating great food from scratch and building a community of like-minded folks to share information as well as strategies to incorporate whole, artesanal, yummy foods into our hectic schedules. We’re working on classes on curing, cheese and yogurt making, creative bread making, beer brewing, mother sauces, how to deal with ingredients you’ve never used before and more events with my favorite chefs. We’re also working on a Harvest Extravaganza™ at our member Michelle’s farm. We will have a day full of workshops on subjects from preserving herbs and vegetables and canning to how to design your kitchen to be more green. (We’re even working on some fun stuff for the kids!)
I hope this didn’t get to be too much. It is a lot. It’s also very important. I do hope you join me with the clapping – I think we can make a lot of noise.
Love always,
Kris
Kris Hase
