Food Attitude

Thanksgiving 2009

2009-12-14T19:16:00.003-05:00

Thanksgiving for me, by definition, means food and family. This year it was down to Austin to visit my Mom's parents. This was a first for us and about darn time if I do say so myself. Here are some amazing family photos of our week long celebration.

Buds

2009-07-26T11:46:00.000-04:00

2009-04-19T12:33:00.002-04:00

It has occurred to me that there are many things that we do on a day to day basis, because we should or because we have to.

I am challenging myself to move forward with the "do it with love" or "do it for the love of it" motivation. If there are things that I have to do or should do than I will challenge myself to do them quickly, do them efficiently and move onto doing the things I love for my own personal love of it.

Yesterday I stayed in bed until a crazy hour and was nothing but a home body. I spent part of the day thinking that I should be doing something else, something on my personal to do list. But, it was my Saturday and I did what I wanted which was absolutely nothing and it was absolutely fantastic! I live in my own reality right, so why should I make myself feel guilty for taking charge of my day no matter what I did or did not do?

Life is all a mindset right? Live it with passion, Live it with love, even if for one day you spend your whole day with yourself on the couch enjoying the having nothing to do.

2009-04-05T22:51:00.002-04:00

Food World View

2009-04-05T22:49:00.000-04:00

We, as a human race, are all interconnected on this Earth. We all require the same basic needs to survive: air, water, and food. Without these basic things life simply cannot be sustained. It is our social responsibility to lead lifestyles that ensure these needs are kept clean and available to one another. In this light, even our everyday food choices need to be socially responsible as well as environmentally responsible to ensure a sustainable food system.

2009-01-24T12:54:00.000-05:00

Christmas Cookies

2009-01-06T20:00:00.000-05:00

New Year

2009-01-06T19:40:00.001-05:00

The arrival of a new year always seem to throw back the old pomises that you made to yourself the last year; I was going to accomplish this, I was going to stop doing that , I was going to become an all around better person....
We are thrown into a tail spin about what we want this next year, this new year, this seemingly brand new fresh start. What are you thinking about doing differently this year? What are your new resolves? Are they your own or are they the things that you think they should be due to societial influence? Why does it take the ending of an entire new year to remind us that our lives should be full of the things that we want? That we can finally start living our lives rather than waiting for it to start?
Our lives are our own to live. Life doesn't wait for us to get back on our feet....Life is the good, the bad, the worse, and the best days of our lives put together. It is your own every day resolve that makes up our lives, not the resolve of the ending of a calendar year. But, if it takes social norms and traditions to remind us that we need to make changes to "better" ourselves, our lives, for the year than I guess I'll take it. I just feel sad that the lives we have created for ourselves don't allow us to strive to be the best we can be every day. I know that sounds total chiche and go army of me but if you think about it if you really think about it do you enjoy being run down. Do you enjoy that the only thing you feel like doing every night after you get home is to eat something and go comatose in front of the TV? I know I don't. I know that at 22 years old I don't have the vibrancy that I used to anymore. I, just like everyone else, have let my life fly by without my active participation. Why is this the social norm? This is what I am asking myself this New Year. Why does it feel like the everyday mundane activities of my life have sucked away my personality?
So I guess the point of this is that we should remind ourselves every day that we need to do the things in our life that make us who we are, that make us happy, that make us our own unique self. It is a shame that some days it seems too much like a chore to do the things that we love. Too much of a chore to connect with people. Yes, these are hard economic times. No, not everyone has a job that they love and are passionate about, no, not everybody has a job. But everybody has a life everybody has some small thing that they can live for. So I ask what is the point of life if you cannot enjoy it?
I said while travelling this holiday season, I can feel myself turning into a bitter shrew. Somehow it is easier to give into being mean and angry. Being happy and helpful takes too much energy and risk of being let down. But if this is the way my life is going then I am in serious trouble. I have a lot of years to live and If I am slipping now, if I am letting my heart harden and becoming resistant to happiness a little more each day then I will be a sad life very very soon.

So I guess having a new year and a tradition of resolutions isn't all that bad if it reminds us all that life is to be lived and everyday is a chance to do that.

2008-09-14T11:38:00.002-04:00

2008-08-19T22:04:00.002-04:00

I work for a publicly owned company. Some people joke that you should ask yourself at the end of every day, "How have I helped to improve share holders value today?"

I honestly can say that I don't do that. That is not the reason I go to my job every day.

My passion is food. My belief is food.

I ask myself "How have I helped improve the food for our consumers today?" or "What did I learn about the science of food today?" or even "How have I shared my passion for food with the people around me today?"

People may think I am crazy in that I center my life around food. People may think that I have eating complexes. However, that is the furthest thing from the truth. I love food, therefore I respect food. I want to share it with those that I love to create memories. I want to cook with people to share understanding of the science of food, experimenting with flavors and creating balanced and nutritious meals. Food is the connection of all things.

My life is a life rich with food and the memories created around it. I ask what better way is there to live?

2008-08-13T21:55:00.002-04:00

It has been a while since I've written about food. I have been trying to figure out the many facets of my new job. It is amazing to see how products go from development to shelf. It is also amazing to see how such large volumes of food get produced.

What is funny is that it makes me want to be even closer to my food source and really support local economy. When I am in town I have been frequenting the farmers markets still. I should go and take some pictures but tend not to bring my camera.

I know this isn't much of a post but I just wanted to get a post in, in hopes that I will inspire myself to write more frequently.

Cheering for Chicken

2008-05-31T12:16:00.002-04:00

I JUST BOUGHT FREE RANGE CHICKEN FROM THE FARMERS MARKET!!!

If you could not tell I am very excited. I believe that we all need to reduce our meat consumption and when we consume meat we should try to ensure that it comes from sustainable sources. Sometimes I believe that I am the biggest paradox, a food scientist that is adamant about local food as much as possible. Oh well, I don't fit in, I am different, and that is how I want to be. Changes don't come about by following the crowd.

My Life Right Now

2008-05-30T13:48:00.000-04:00

I am running a gamut of emotions right now. I guess it is finally hitting me.

I had a rather inspiring talk with an old acquaintance last night. He has changed the direction of his career goals. He originally went to culinary school, but is not sure he wants to pursue that route because he doesn’t want his everyday career to spoil his enjoyment of cooking for his family. He is still not certain what he wants to do with his life. In asking him what he wanted out of life, he had the most peculiar response I’ve ever heard. He said that he “wanted un-attachment to everything”. This struck me as very peculiar; most times people respond, “to be happy” which leads to my second question of “what does it take to make you happy?”. But, he wants a lifestyle where he can pick up on a whim and go wherever he chooses. Not many careers allow that kind of freedom, but it is an interesting thing to think about for sure. It reminded me of a quote that I read long ago “ Any man who is attached to the things of this world is one who lives in ignorance and is being consumed by the snakes of his own passions.” I guess he does not wish to live in ignorance.

This morning I believe things were resonating inside of me from that conversation. I had awoken early to make a trial run in morning traffic to determine my commute time. (Traffic wasn’t too bad, busy but not impossible. However, changing lanes might be an issue, I need to ensure that I know where I am going because last minute lane changes don’t come easily out here. It is funny how the temperament of drivers’ changes by the city you are in. I also passed by a semi with hogs in it, obviously being transported for slaughter. Normally whenever I see those trucks they are empty. Then a while later I saw another one, this time with cattle in it. I wonder if this will become a common occurrence.) After my trial drive I was feeling good about things. Just in general being happy with myself, my situation. I ventured into a grocery store that I had wanted to visit. With quite a few turn-arounds to boot, but not really stressing about them, and generally laughing at myself. It’s fun when you can amuse yourself. I had needed to pick up a few items and chose to mosey around the store. Two previous stores that I have visited have not satisfied me but I just about fell in love with this one. It seems to be the middle road, my baby bear store if you will. It isn’t as cheap as the first one I went to nor as expensive as the second one I went to. What first grabbed my attention is the type of pharmacy type products that were on the side isle, shampoo, lotion, soap they were some of the more natural ones. Then the food in this section was other specialty type (gluten free) and organic type products, it really made me actually smile to see. But, what really sealed the deal is when I saw that they have milk in glass bottles from a local dairy. I about melted with the warmth I felt in my heart. My heart sings when this happens, when in today’s market I find a break through, a retail store that is giving business to local business. In my heart of hearts I know the reality of the market place and it always feels like a constant struggle for me always, fighting against the current making my head hurt and my heart feel tight. I want to do what is right. I want there to be a happy medium between food production and having convenient foods regularly supplied to American consumers. I always feel like it is a constant battle between big companies, corporations and big business, against the little guy, the blue-collar farmer, and the extreme environmentalists. I know that there needs to be a way to sustainably produce food and have it available to lower, middle, and upper class consumers; not just to those lucky enough to have a farmers market or lucky enough to have enough money to buy the “politically correct” food.

I walked away buying more than I had intended. I allowed my consumerism to kick in. And then I realized that I need to work on being more mindful in practicing what I preach. But at least my daiquiri glasses were made in the USA and not china.

Later this afternoon I also caught up with another friend. She spent college in Chicago and has now moved to Boston with her long-term boyfriend. She likes what she is doing for the most part but cannot see herself living in Boston for the rest of her life. She wants to also live in California and perhaps somewhere in Britain if not London proper. She is mostly struck by how snobby the people in Boston seem. She mentioned that there is snobbery everywhere but that it seems like the majority of the people in Boston are. We talked about how there are so many different ways to be in the world. It seems as though one could create a new identity for every city there is in the world. So she wants to explore in her lifetime, not to be tied down to one place, one way of being.

And even another long time friend called to catch up with me; One that I have commonly shared my fears and concerns with; A friend who also has angst when throwing things in the trash. She is getting ready for a job interview, as she has just returned to the US from Ireland. She finds things here to be the same yet different, and had tried to get more funding to stay in Ireland. She mentioned that she was thinking about questions that the people would ask her in the interview. She said that if they ask her about alternative fuel sources that she’ll have a good answer and had thought of me. Sometimes I wonder about the persona that I put out into the world, how people see me. The differences between how I see myself, the truth of myself and how others see me. I fear often that people think that I am smarter than I really am. Or perhaps I am selling myself short. But, it strikes me that it again seems like the theme of the week is ways of being and how environment changes it.

She asked me how I was doing; if I was excited or nervous. I explained that I wasn’t really giving it a lot of thought but that I could tell I was nervous because my stomach has felt funny lately. Sometimes it feels more like what is happening to me rather than how I am being actively involved in my life. Most of life is perception of life. Once we realize this a lot changes.

Shortly after that phone call ended my phone rang yet again. This time it was someone new. It was my new manager touching base with me. Which, I greatly appreciate, however it was strange to meet for the first time on the phone. I now find myself wondering how I made myself sound. Did I pitch my voice funny? Did I not ask enough questions? Did I seriously say “cool” and “fun”? Could he tell that I was nervous and started to get a little tongue-tied?
Before I wasn’t nervous, before it was I have to move, this is the next step. But now it is real. I start work on Monday. All of these what if questions are going through my brain. “What if I’m not what they are looking for?” “What if this isn’t what I’m looking for?” “Do I really believe in this product?” “What if I’m not smart enough?” “What if I don’t like it?” “What if I can’t handle it?” “What if this?” “What if that?” I, for a moment in time, found myself terrified.

But then reality and perspective came into play. This is a job. I am a person, I am capable of learning, and I have a good school background, and my last internship everyone appreciated my work ethic. I know that I may not be the smartest, fastest, prettiest, wittiest, funniest, nicest, or the est of anything. But I work hard and am nice. That hopefully will be appreciated anywhere I go. This job has the capability of being whatever I want it to be. A stepping-stone to something else, or my career. It is like that quote “Whether you think you can or you can’t, you are right.” Half the game of life, probably more than half the game, is about how you approach things and attitude. I just hope that I can continue to have a good attitude with this job. I allowed my attitude or myself to be worn down at my last job. I couldn’t get out of the rut of feeling stuck. Hopefully I won’t let that happen here. I can let this job be what I need it to be.

“Losing illusion is good, but not at the price of losing hope”.

This comes up now because, like I mentioned in my grocery store story, I think a lot about food systems. I care about the environment. I know that the way we are treating it now is destroying the earth. Our simple day-to-day life is destroying the planet. One of the biggest polluters is our food system. From growing, to shipping, to processing, to packaging, to consumers going to get the food to preparing it at home there are a lot of steps that create a ton of pollution and use up valuable resources, some of which are nonrenewable and lots of water- which depending on how you view things could also be a nonrenewable resource. This company is part of the system. I am learning to accept that things need to be shipped, sometimes across oceans. I like things that aren’t grown in my area, coffee, chocolate, various fruits, and nuts. These are things that I consume regularly. I know that they need to be shipped. I can accept that people want everything whenever they want it. Meaning that people (American consumers) are going to demand produce, even if it is out of season. I am learning to accept the fact that people will never be on all local diets. I am learning to accept that not everyone can afford to buy organic all the time, let alone even care. I am learning to accept that people can’t always cook from scratch. I am learning to accept that some people don’t want to cook from scratch. I am learning to accept that some people consider eating alone in their car a meal. I am learning to accept that people think of a family meal as making something from a box and eating it in front of the TV. There are things that I am learning to accept, but that is not to say that I will give up hope that we can make changes that will reduce pollution, carbon emissions, and ultimately our food systems footprint on the earth. Not to mention not giving up on hope that people will realize that some family values can and do start with food, or that our lifestyle and relationship with food is greatly reflected in our health and happiness.

I take myself seriously; I take the world’s issues seriously. I have been inspired by many different people and by many different quotes.

“ Integrate what you believe in every single area of your life. Take your heart to work and ask the most and best of everybody else too.”
“Foster a desire to make the world a better place and act on this desire.”

“ We each have only a limited amount of time here. We have to do more with it - - pay attention, explore, be open to all of life. Because we have only one chance, we have to make life seem longer than it really is.”

“Happiness comes when your work and your words are of benefit to yourself and others.”

Although these things weigh heavily on my actions and thoughts I must also remember “Don’t take life too seriously, you’ll never get out alive.” As well as taking work seriously, myself seriously, I also need to take enjoying life seriously, having fun seriously, and making myself happy seriously. Seriously.

Just because things are important doesn’t mean you can’t have fun, or be happy, while doing them. Otherwise what would be the point?

City Entitlement

2008-05-27T08:52:00.000-04:00

There are many things that I don’t talk about much on this journal, or maybe things that I have just not mentioned. I mostly write out my thoughts, what is currently going on in my life etc. There are some thoughts that I just don’t share. Or things that I normally do that I just don’t mention. There are parts of us that we find inherent, and sometimes other people don’t realize it about us. It is no one’s fault just the way it is. But lately I have been racking my brain about the system of the US and the world. I am in food science, as most of you know. But I also come from the Reduce Reuse Recycle campaign of long ago. I guess it stuck in my mind because lately I have been stumbling over it in my brain. As I look around in the world I look at the amount of consumption and the mentality of consumerism. It eats away at me to think that every single thing that is thrown away is a material that took energy, time, and money to make, not to mention resources, and it is going to stay in a landfill never to be used again, never to be of any help ever again. Some of the things that we toss are degraded back into soil but it is still useless because of all of the toxins that are leached into the soil surrounding the things that will not degrade, or will take thousands if not millions of years. Thinking this way can drive me crazy thinking about the millions of tons of trash that is in produced every day. Packaging and plastic bags drive me nuts! It would be interesting to see if it is possible to find the amount of paper that could be saved if packaging were reduced, or if all packaging and packing materials could be recycled.

I drove throughout some of the Omaha area. This city is much larger than many people realize. Everyone I told that I was moving out here always remarked something along the lines of, “What’s out there?” Well it is, actually, very developed and very large. I drove west past my apartment complex for the first time, and there were large areas of housing development with those huge houses with vaulted ceilings, rather overbuilt for my taste. In other words it is huge “Urban Sprawl”, really. The city is encroaching on all the land that used to surround it. What of the land that is lost? What of the people that are now filling those plots? How are they to be sustained?

I found myself wondering if we can ever sustain cities with only the farmland that surrounds them?

I did finally get to some land cleared for farmland, but this is the Midwest, the Corn Belt. As the areas are currently plowed I cannot tell you what the crop will be, but in all best guessing it is most likely to be corn and if not corn than more than likely soybeans. And let me remind you this is the Midwest. There are many, many months of the year when things aren’t being grown. In pilgrim days people would have to have cold storage and life off tubers, root veggies, and whatever apples they could store. But today the majority of our food is trucked in from other states if not other countries so we can have what ever we want whenever we want it. Not only is there demand for things that that aren’t in season, but there is great demand for things that simply cannot be grown in the region. Citrus fruits cannot be grown in the northern parts of the US; and I don’t believe we grow coffee or bananas.

Our way of life simply is not sustainable. The things we want, the amount of things we buy and keep buying. The waste that we produce. The land we trash, the water that we use and squander.
It is our nature to continually make our life’s easier. In doing so we have changed the worries of our lives, of our nation. Because we do not have to spend our time farming in order to survive we have created other professions and have created vehicles to make the world smaller.

But in doing so, we have created havoc on the earth. We have not prepared or innovated to protect what we live on. We have been so far removed from the planet from the earth we live on we do not give a second thought that everything we throw away in the trash is a material that will never be used again and will continue to stay on the planet in an un-useable state for eons to come. The population has boomed and grown at huge rates that we have not predicted. Countries are developing and using the US as a model, people in China all want cars like Americans. We have increased consumerism in our own country and in countries around us.

I don’t believe it takes a scientist to realize, to make the connections that we are getting to a point where we cannot continue to live like this.

It will take all of us to change this. It will take more than all of us to stop throwing away things that can be reused, and buying and throwing away things that can’t. It will take system changes. Changes in the way we build our homes, our cities. Changes in the way we grow our food, buy our food, and prepare our food. Changes in our expectations of life. We need to change the idea that it is our right to live like this and not preparing for the future. We need to change our feeling of entitlement and start feeling the urgency to preserve what we have not yet destroyed, and fix the damage that has already been done.

Big Business and Local Production

2008-04-21T08:17:00.003-04:00

Big Business and Local production

Our food system is so complex no wonder everyone is confused. The industry uses words like natural, all natural, organic, make with organic ingredients, reduced fat, fat free, reduced sodium, and now we are entering the sustainable and local phases of food marketing. However, there are many rules and regulations about what each of these words mean. I can call a product low fat or fat free depending on fat percentages, and an "organic" product is different from a "made with organic ingredients" product if .

So therefore what does free trade mean? What doe local mean? What about this term sustainable? There really isn't a definition in industry for sustainable. And there usually is more to the story of fair trade than is realized by most consumers.

Now the trend in food systems is to have local production. Mostly this can only be met in the fresh produce section or by very small and specialized processors.

I am curious to see how the trends in the market place will continue to grow or fade out. Will local production have a place with big business? I can't wait to see what develops.

My Wish

2008-03-27T09:08:00.003-04:00

Many times people talk about what they want for the world. Usually it is the most practiced question for the Miss America pageants and the pc response is "World Peace" and who knows maybe the new answer will be "To Stop Global Warming". However, I have been reflecting on my life and the lives of my fellow Americans. What I see is vast and different. But I have seen some similarities among most things. We are BUSY! Busy Busy. Adults are working at least 40 hours a week and trying to raise families. And looking around my college campus people are even busier going to classes all day, working, then staying up half the night to study/write papers. So what is it I wish for the world? Really, I might be influenced by Europe in my answer. But I really wish that people could slow down and take time for themselves. That people could slow down and every day share at least 2 meals with other people. That in this people could connect and have meaningful conversation. That people would then also take the time to see what they are eating, slow down and savor it. We have started trashing our bodies with fast food and in turn the great demand for this fast cheap food is trashing the planet. I have a strong sense that stressed out people are quick to jump to conclusions, are quick to judge and that can lead to misunderstanding and even worse hate. I wish for people (especially Americans) to slow down and share meals, and hopefully this will lead to happier healthier lives. For in this day and age I do see people that are happy, or think that they are happy, but I also see a lot of angry stressed out people that just need a break. Instead of saving up for vacations we should be putting time into making today great. Into having a 30-60 minute vacation every time we eat. Because isn't that a huge part of a vacation, going out to eat and experiencing culture through food?

Maybe what I am really trying to do is reaffirm to myself that I need to slow down and savor the life that is right in front of me. Because, before too long this part of my life will have passed me by, and I don't want to remember me passing up living for working/studying.

Morning Chicken Thoughts

2008-01-31T08:10:00.000-05:00

"What we eat determines, to a considerable extent, how the world is used" ~Wendell Berry

Reading food industry news in the morning has become a habit for me. Most of the time the email I receive "The Morning Cup" contains information about company buyouts, new products, new trends, and commonly new scientific research releases that pertain to the food industry (the hot topic now being about salt especially in kids' diets).
But, more and more, there are articles about how consumers are thinking about where their food comes from. There are more and more things about organic, free range, fair trade, hormone and antibiotic free. Personally I think this is wonderful! More and more restaurants are buying local organic produce; Which helps the environment and local economy. Many people don't realize how much is tied into the food industry. Think about it for a minute where does everything start? what is the chain? We have: seed companies, pesticide companies, water, fertilizers, machinery, farm hands, trucking, processing facilities, more water, energy, packaging, more trucking, more trucking, more processing, more packaging, more trucking, and finally into supermarkets where consumers get to pick out their "food" and don't even realize the true cost of their pre-prepared foods. Not to mention what goes into growing our meat.

Speak of meat there has recently been a lot of press about chickens. How they are raised, treated, what they are fed with, and if they get exposure to the outside or not. Jamie Oliver recently did a show about chickens, (which I regret I have not seen), and there have also been numerous reports against companies like Tyson about their treatment of chickens. PETA claiming that they have seen workers stomping on them (true or not I have no idea, but I'm sure the conditions are worse enough for that to be a secondary issue). I have read a lot on where meat comes from and how it is processed. I, myself, do not buy chicken and I buy limited amounts of other meat that claims to be range fed and locally produced. This is my personal choice (I don't buy chicken because, well, frankly the free range birds are well out of my price range, even at my local co-op, but when I go out to eat I sometimes get chicken- that in the back of my head I know was treated with hormones, antibiotics, and was probably crammed in a cage somewhere, processed with thousands of other birds in the same day, and then shipped across America, then moved through three different suppliers before it ended up in the restaurant freezer and onto my plate. So I know that I am adding to the demand of chicken even if I don't buy it from my grocer)
That sure was a long winded aside :)

What all this leads to, for me, is the question of is it possible to have free range chickens be the only chickens in the marketplace? In my assumption at this point it is possible, but with a cost. Just like anything else that we have access to in America. Raising free range chickens takes space, amongst other resources. In being honest, in my heart and in my brain I don't think it is possible to supply enough free range chickens to Americans at the rate in which we eat them now. Especially not in a sustainable manner, think about all the land that it would take to give that many chickens the "proper" space they deserve.

I am not trying to bad mouth the free range. In fact I wish I could support that market myself. And I am not trying to support factory farmed chickens either. I am just trying to think out loud here about what the reality is. The conclusion I have come to is that we have started mistreating our food supply (chickens, cows, pigs etc.) because the demand has grown so much. With so much supply, prices are cheap and the average person tends to eat meat at almost every meal. Honestly we don't need that much protein, besides the fact that we also get protein in other ways ( milk, nuts, beans & rice). This over consumption, mass production cycle is a vicious cycle that will only come to an end when people realize what this is doing to the environment, the animals, and our health. So next time you are in the supermarket or out to eat, think about where the meat you are buying is coming from, think about how much you think it is worth, and think about how much meat you really need in your diet. Having a nation that reduces it's consumption of meat is one step closer to having a food system that is more sustainable and an American population that is healthier. Hopefully, industry will then cut back on production and nothing will be wasted.

Textbook Quote

2008-01-29T21:45:00.000-05:00

" As infants grow and develop, they are incorporated into society through a variety of experiences, and some of these experiences involve food. Children learn food provides comfort when hungry and is a pleasurable dimension of family activities, celebrations, and time with friends. Adults share meals with friends, family and coworkers as part of their social interactions."

Sometimes required reading for class isn't so bad :)

Cloned Meat...

2008-01-17T09:11:00.001-05:00

I receive morning emails called the Morning Cup. These are filled with stories about happenings within the Food Industry. There is a gentleman named Bob that does little editorial pieces about random thins such as his overweight doctor that told him to watch his carbohydrate intake. Many times below his post he will post comments that he received from people about previous editorials. This is one of them in response to his discussion about how the FDA has approved the sale of cloned meat.

"Bob, cloned animals will be pressed on us from the industry and eventually, over time, become familiar and therefore acceptable. However, I doubt that the public will go along quickly nor easily. The need for cloned animals is similar to the need for bovine growth hormone to get more milk per cow when there was already a surplus of milk or irradiating meat that can still be contaminated later: These things are not driven by any lofty desire to help mankind or improve our food supply but simply to improve economics for business, and they offer little or no benefit to the public. The fact that our wonderful government (who of course is never influenced by lobbyists, big business, pro-business administrations, politics, bureaucratic blindness, or self-interest) has also approved and certified as safe such famous things as DDT, thalidomide, DES, defective polio vaccines in the early days, etc., certainly makes me feel good about eating meat or dairy from cloned animals. Hey, I'm happy to eat anything so the food companies can create distorted creatures with more meat or higher milk output or longer shelf life so they can save or make more money! Sure. Really! ..... Certainly having some solid science and greater peer concurrence behind a decision is important, but what these folks keep missing, over and over and over, is that people for some reason don't completely trust the FDA nor big business, and people don't want to find out x-years from now that it was all wrong and they've been harmed. Let's see: Should I take a chance on my health for no good reason or just go safe? Mmmm ..... Maybe food from cloned animals will be proven as truly safe after much time to rule out long-term effects not picked up yet, and maybe the public will embrace it after a time as it gradually insinuates itself on us. But for now, I'm in your camp, Bob, maybe for some different reasons but same endpoint. I just hope the FDA displays enough respect for the public it allegedly serves and enough integrity to control the companies that it's supposed to regulate by insisting that food from cloned animals be so labeled so we dumb unenlightened consumers can make our choices. The companies will survive, not to worry."

I believe that some of these views are shared by many people and I find it interesting that the writer states that people don't completely trust the FDA. To me it is amazing how that role of governmental bodies has changed from making decisions like fortifying flours with folic acid and fortifying milk with vitamin D to now regulating artificial flavors and passing cloned meat as safe.
I believe it is necessary to make changes within our food system in order to be able to effectively and sustainably produce food for the whole US. But I don't know the reasoning behind the cloning of animals and the desire to use these animals for a meat source. As far as I am concerned animals are capable of breeding. They do not need humans to physically remove DNA from them and make a clone.

Enough is Enough

2007-10-22T19:02:00.000-04:00

Lately I have been very busy with my school work. Being a senior is no easy task, especially when the job hunt is thrown into the mix. I've found myself revamping my resume and trying to get interviews. It is very scary to think about, there are so many thoughts about finding a job, should I accept any job that is offered to me? Should I be selective because I am trying to start my career? Do I know everything that I need to? Will I fail to enjoy what I select? The list of questioning goes on and on.

I have been in a state of puzzlement and anxiety lately. It is hard to pinpoint the main reason for this but I feel like it comes down to food....I am confused about what foods to eat...

This may sound like a funny statement, here is a food science person, who loves food, and she is confused about what she wants to eat. Well my confusion stems from food sources and diet. I have been reading a lot about the goodness of eating a raw diet. But I am resistant to going in that direction because 1 I love to cook and love cooked food and 2 because the diet is usually based on a lot of tropical fruits and veggies- I have been trying to reduce my footprint on the planet by buying more local fair. But I still want to be healthy, and somehow I feel guilty for not diving into the raw food thing (?).
In conjunction with changed habits over the summer, to the discovery of a food co-op, and the participation in the Eat Local challenge, I've switched where I choose to buy my food, I now buy at the local co-op, a student organic farm stand, and a health food store. I also have been trying to base my diet on fruits and vegetables and limited amounts of organic, free range meat. However, I've gotten myself stuck in a rut. I eat mostly apples, salads, eggs, bread, and some meat products. Then when I do buy something like ramen noodles ( a college staple) I feel guilty that it is unhealthy and not organic. I'm going round in circles with these types of thoughts. It has really taken a toll on me.

So tonight I have thrown caution to the wind and have whipped up one of my favorite desserts. A dessert that relies solely on the quality of it's ingredients: creme brule. Luckily I have kept it to organic cream, Michigan sugar (Pioneer), free range eggs( which two of the eggs I put in were double yolks, what are the chances of that!) and some Madagascan vanilla beans ( A gift from a friend who traveled there). So I am going to have my fabulous dessert and remind myself of my life motto Good Food, Good Friends, Good Life. The job search will work out in the end, I will continue to challenge my food choices but should not feel guilty for any "short comings" I see in indulging once in a while.

The Real Eaters

2007-09-16T09:20:00.000-04:00

There are so many different ways to live a life in the US. In that way it is an amazing place to live. But when it comes to the food world there are so many choices and advice that it can become overwhelming. Now as a soon to be food scientist it has come time for me to ask myself the question of what do I want to do with my life? What part of this vast food system am I going to take part in?

One way to help me decide s to try to identify what all is out there and I'm sure I don't have to tell you that there is A LOT!

Omnivores
Vegetarians
Vegans
Raw Foodists
Localvores
Convenience Seekers
Health Conscience
Indulgers
People on the Go
Children
Mothers
Elderly
People with Allergies

But what is the average or Real Eater out there? Is there one? I guess I would describe the real eater is being someone that may have a family and a 9-5 (or more) that wants fresh convenient food. This person probably also indulges once in a while on packaged foods such as chips and perhaps cookies and ice cream. This is probably what I would call the real eater. This is pretty much what my family is.
However, there are many more emerging trends of people that want pre-prepared foods, diet foods, snack foods, fair trade food, organic foods. So what is it that I want to involve myself in.

I have developed many opinions about food and food systems in the past four years. Without going into much detail about how I feel about all the other categories, the two that I am most interested in are Locally produced foods, and foods catered to people with allergies.

That's all I have time for, for now.

Farmers Market

2007-09-16T08:54:00.000-04:00

Within the week of the eat local challenge there were many activities to partake in; kickoff pancake breakfast at a local restaurant, several farmers markets, and even a wine tasting event at a local bar. I was fortunate enough to have a wonderful friend of mine go with me to a special farmers market. This market was held on the front lawn of the capitol building. There were around 50 vendors selling everything from fish, fresh veggies and fruit, maple syrup, bottled sauces, pickled veggies and even handcrafted soaps. It was remarkable to be out on the front lawn of the state capitol buying food. Here are a few snapshots I took between my purchases.

Eat Local!

2007-09-11T15:53:00.000-04:00

This is the week of eating local (I know I am a little late in starting). However I'm jumping on....although I was already partially on the bandwagon anyway. I try to buy from farmers markets and buy Local or Michigan produced products as much as possible. However I do have exceptions such as coffee, chocolate, nuts and some fruits. I believe in supporting local economy and I also believe that local food is not only more tasty and nutritious for you but also more environmentally sound. I have pledged to do an entire day of all local food. I have not yet done so but plan on blogging about it when I have it all figured out. Here is to everyone that is going local partially or 100% every little change makes a difference!!!

Travel Info

2007-06-14T09:14:00.000-04:00

Thoughts on Food

2007-06-10T23:51:00.000-04:00

Going to grandmas meant having her famous apple crisp, making strawberry jam, and warm bran muffins in the morning. It is no stretch to say that you could feel the love in the food. Food for me started with family dinners, meals and stories shared around the table. The meal started by a trip to the grocery store, usually earlier in the week. Sometimes I got to go and pick out apples and vegetables. Then the meal started in the heart of the house, the kitchen. Preparing the meal was as important as eating it. Shucking the corn, making the salad, and chopping veggies together instilled values; learning the nutrition of a balanced meal, the skills of cooking and bonding with grandma, mom, and sometimes sister. Preparing and sharing a meal instills family values of responsibility, taking care of one another nutritionally and socially.

My family doesn’t get together as often as we used to, because of distance. But my immediate family always makes a point of having dinner together whenever we can.

However meals around America are changing for many families. With both parents working and many single parent families dinner is usually take out, a quick stir together from a package, or worse frozen from a box. Dinner simply is getting further and further away from food. It is now “product” carefully formulated with lots of fat, sugars, salt and preservatives that are unpronounceable. All this for the sake of having a meal in the freezer that will be good tomorrow or six months from tomorrow.

Not only has dinner changed for the average American family, lunch has changed for every member of the family as well. The adults are inhaling fast food, or microwaveable meals in front of the computer or behind the wheel of a car. Lunch is no longer the social event that gives people pleasure in eating and talking like it used to. School lunches for the little ones are filled with fried foods and un-nutritious breaded meat patties, with canned veggies that remained untouched on the lunch tray. Drinks are sugar laden sodas or “fruit juices” from concentrates. No wonder so many kids are “diagnosed” with ADD, they are all on sugar highs with little of the proper nutrition that helps kids to be focused.

Breakfast is almost the worst out of the meals that people are eating now, if they choose to eat it at all. Sugar cereals, pop tarts, toaster pastries that have been marketed to kids and parents buy because something seems to be better than nothing. Most adults are now grabbing a breakfast bar or just having coffee in the morning. Some even start off the morning with hash browns and an egg and sausage McMuffin that has a thirty percent of the recommended daily calories that are needed for the average American male.

Why has all of this happened? The new corporate world. With both parents working in order to provide their children with all they need. To be able to send their kids to outrageously priced colleges, buy SUVs, and once in a while go on vacation. So they can be without want. But what have we created? A fast paced life where we are too busy to sit down to a home made meal and discuss our days, desires, our dreams, what we want to do on the weekend. We have created a void in our lives.

Millions of Americans suffer from depression, stress related illness, high blood pressure, heart disease, diabetes, other ailments that affect the quality of our lives. But what is it that caused this? It is the way we live our lives that affects our health, which in turn affects our quality of life whether mentally or physically, or both. We should be the healthiest we have ever been with therapists, nutritionists, personal trainers, spas, dermatologists, specialists, and all other assortments of doctors. But we only go to these people when there is a problem. We go to the doctors to fix what we have broken, what we have caused. We don’t treat our bodies well enough to prevent illness, and barley change our habits to fix the problem. Instead, we rely on pharmaceutical companies to come up with that miracle drug that will lower or blood pressure, change the chemical imbalance in our brains, and suppress our appetites. We have allowed our habits to pass onto our children who are developing the same diseases that an overweight 45 year old would, type two diabetes at 8, high blood pressure, heart disease, arthritis the list goes on.

This lifestyle is not only making us unhappy and sick, it has caused our children, the future generation, to have a life span less then our own. The first generation to live a shorter life than our own! How can we ignore this any longer? What is the cause? Our life style, poverty (relying on food stamps and cheap fast food for sustenance), our lack of prevention and or obsession with fixing the problem with a band aid of a pill instead of changing our life styles.

Many people may be saying that this does not start with food. But I beg to differ. We make choices every day what we put into our bodies and how we put it into our bodies. This can have consequences if the decisions are poor. If we take the time to go shopping, and prepare our own meals and eat them slowly with family or friends we will make conscious decisions about our nutrition. About how much, and what we allow ourselves to eat and what we allow our children to eat. If we continue the unconscious food choices that we are making, and eat high calorie low nutritious foods more and more we will continue to have a nation that is increasing it’s waistline and a decreasing quality of life.

Organic Strawberry

2007-06-08T16:13:00.001-04:00

Riverside Farmers Market

2007-06-02T23:41:00.000-04:00

As I have gained an interest in local and sustainable farming I really wanted to find a local farmers market that I could frequent. Well downtown Riverside has just that. Every Saturday from 8-1 there is a little farmers market set up. It is small but sufficient for all of my cooking needs. Sometimes complete with life band, cooking demonstrations, and a clown with face painting for the little ones. This first trip yielded yellow nectarines, apricots, green beans, and small squashes.

Across The Country

2007-05-28T18:32:00.000-04:00

"We would like to offer you an internship. We've express mailed a welcome packet to you." This sentence may have well changed my life. It certainly has changed my summer. After many discouraging interviews I thought I would be spending my summer at my part time job at school. Scooping ice cream was great for last summer but an internship, oh an internship is what I longed for. Well I believe the good came to those who had to wait, me. I was offered an internship after a phone interview that went too well to be true.
Thoughts of the internship faded as project deadlines loomed and finals quickly approached. After moving home, I had one week to pack it all up again and drive across the country. Not an easy feat when I have a Saturn and an entire household to pack into the back of it.
What to take? Clothes, bathroom items, my computer, pots, pans, my new Kitchenaid, microwave, printer....the list goes on. And for me weaning down the kitchen essentials was like cutting off one finger at a time. My Cruset roasting pan, left behind, my wooden salad bowl left behind. Will all that I brought be sufficient to get me through the summer? Only time will tell.

The trip started....

...and continued....

....and then I arrived. My new studio apartment in California. This little Michigander has her own place for the first time! Here are some quick snap shots of the new place. What adventures will come next?

Time flies when you're working

2007-05-02T09:59:00.000-04:00

I cannot believe that my spring semester of my junior year is ending...and that I didn't post once! But I have been busy on product development type things, school, work, and trying to be social. Here are a few pictures of the wonderful time of developing Mmm bites for competition. I'm not going into detail because I am sworn to secrecy, seriously

They don't look like much here but with some toppings they look a little more appealing

All set to go in some packaging

The rest of the team hard at work.

I hope to post a ton over the summer since I will have a kitchen to myself and I hope to bring my Kitchenaid along to experiment with things. I will explain more about this summer later. Right now I have to study for finals.

Feel Like Dessert?

2007-02-19T10:19:00.000-05:00

You Are Tiramisu

Light and lovely, you pack a punch.
You never overwhelm... but you always leave a lasting impression.

What Dessert Are You Most Like?

Sustainable Food- Niche or Necessity

2007-02-04T12:58:00.001-05:00

One great thing about this campus and the fact that it started out as a school of agriculture is that there are many groups around that still heavily think like an agi. Yes, we have our dairy plant and our sheep research and even a forestry major that no one really knows what it entails. But and this is a big But, we have many many groups of faculty and students that are dedicated to sustainability. We all know that our food system is based on agriculture, however we all aren't aware of how this agriculture works and how it is actually affecting the earth. Several of these groups have supported the UN Decade of Education for Sustainable Development Speaker series. I am fortunate enough to get the emails about when these are coming up. And in light of the dinner that I recently attended I took the night off of work so I could see John Turenne speak about his jouryney with sustainability.

John started out as a cook, going to culinary school and landing a gig with Yale University as the foods service chair. John worked this job like anyone really would ordering from a large supplier and getting deliveries every morning. But one day he was called to the office of the President. One of the students mothers was there and really wanted to speak with him. This mother was no ordinary woman, she was Alice Waters. She is a chef who runs a resturant that depends on local and organic food. She was there to talk to John about going local, and being sustainable. Now after 25 years of conventional food service one might think that John was a lost cause, but no. He looked into it (partially because the president was sold on this idea). Now the school has a menu that varies by season (What a concept!) and gets it's supplies from a form of a middle man who gets produce from local and organic farms within the area.
Through this turning process John had a lot of battles, especially with the staff that would have to do much more work for prep of the meals, without any more employees to share in the new work. How does one convince a staff that the extra work is well worth it for the taste of the food and also for the good of the earth? Well he did that by showing them what sustainability is. Taking his crew to one of the local farms and talking to the farmer who used a pollycroping system. He explained what plants where where and how the farm worked. Later they moved onto the composting area to explain how the extra biomass would be transformed back into rich soil and used again. One woman brushed a tear from her eye. John being curious about why this woman was crying asked her what was wrong. Her response suprised him (thinking that she might be hot and that the smell was getting to her) She said to him "This is the way that it is supposed to be isn't it? The plants going back to dirt and the cycle continuing...it's almost spiritual."
With Yale being the jumping point of sustainability for John he has moved to having his own business where he helps schools change their program into sustainable ones.
With the average mileage of 1,500 traveled food today isn't sustainable at all. From 1940's with 131 million people, 6.1 million farms at 175 acres each to today's world with 261 million people, 2 million farms at 461 acres each it is easy to see why we are in trouble. However instead of turning things around we are only trying to fix them with biotechnology and poisons called herbicides and pesticides.

Long term will sustainability infiltrate big business and factory farming? Will food defined as sustainable be a niche or a necessity? Only time will tell.

Night out

2007-01-20T15:44:00.000-05:00

January 19th 2007 will be a night that I will remember for probably ever. I attended a special dinner with two great friends. This dinner was as the Green River Cafe here in East Lansing. The Green River is special to begin with because it is one of the few places around that support the student organic farm on campus, as well as other local and organic suppliers. Some groups collaborated to have a special meal featuring a young Chef recently coming out of the French Laundry and moving on to other things. When I heard about this I jumped on it and had to call some friends to support this and have a great night out.
The menu was all vegiterian and consisted of
Soup: Squash or Creamy potato Leek
Salad:Mixed greens with toasted walnuts, dried cranberries and homeade organic balsamic vinagrette
Entree: Witnter Vegetables over couscous or Roasted Vegetable Kabobs
Derrert; A very generous portion of Michigan apple crisp with organic oats, walnuts and vanilla icecream
(And it was only $14!)

This was a fantastic evening full of great food, great music and most importantly great company. It just reinforced in my mind the meaning of sharing a meal together. A meal is more than food it can be an experience. It was just heart warming and inspiring to eat an entire meal from food that was grown with care and prepared in a great way that used the flavors in their best way instead of overseasoning, and masking the natural beauty of the food. Being surrounded by people that care enough to come to a dinner devoted to thinking global but eating local was just amazing. I couldn't stop smiling and thanking my friends for coming out with me and making the night so special. It was great to feel that excited about something, I haven't felt that great and hopeful for the world in a long time.

The owner of the resturant liked this night so much that he wants to have more groups involved in a monthly evening like this. Meghan who is in the food science club with me jumped on the chance to host the next one. Hopefully it will be just as successful.

New Semester

2007-01-16T22:54:00.000-05:00

I am pursuing my undergraduate at MSU in Food Science Technology. I am so happy for this new semester. It seems like I am finally going to be getting my hands dirty with real food science stuff. My previous semesters were filled with general prerequisites such as chemistry, organic chemistry, calc, biochemistry, and others. So this semester I am taking the following:

Intro to food Engineering
Microbiology
Microbiology Lab
Food Sensory
Cereals Processing
And for fun Jazz and society which is part of the required social classes

Other good news is that I am HACCP certified! I passed my food safety class and got a good enough grade on the project that I can be certified. I am so happy that all of my hard work paid off for that. The project came up right before finals and was very tedious, but in the end I guess well worth the efforts.

So far I am really looking forward to everything. Although with 16 credit hours, work and other extracurricular activities I really need to use my time wisely and I'm a little worried that I won't be able to put as much time into everything as I should. I am also trying to find a summer internship. Luckily internships in the food science field are paid! And paid well! But because of that they are obviously very competitive. Some of the internships are also longer than the summer, which would put graduation back a bit....but depending on the opportunity might be very well worth it.
I have been a little discouraged with finding an internship. Last semester I interviewed with 3 companies and didn't get any of them. But in reality that isn't bad, and many people were interviewed as well.

Getting to the food aspect of this blog. Today I prepared a little spin on a chicken Waldorf salad. I used poached and shredded chicken, green grapes, carrots, and pomegranates. I had this in a pita for dinner, I don't really know where the inspiration for this came from but it was very satisfying. I have been looking for creative, tasty, healthy meals that I can prep early in the week to have for later. Some days I am just not able to have lunch, or only have about 10 minutes to eat it. Last week I made some homemade chewy granola bars that I hope to experiment with a little more. The binder is peanut butter, honey and brown sugar- I added odds and ends of nuts, cereal, and dried fruit that I had left over from making a type of trail mix. They turned out pretty well but I would like to change it up a bit and maybe get some different flavors in there.

I realize this post is a little schizophrenic in a way, with lots of direction and not a lot of substance. However that is the kind of life I'm living at the moment. Hopefully things will slow down soon so my head can stop spinning but that's unlikely. I know I don't have a lot of readers (if any at all), and really that is fine for me because my blog is young, I'm doing this for myself, and I feel I haven't developed a writing style yet. I just felt I needed to get a post up before it is too long in-between posts and I get out of the swing of things even further. I hope that as I am able to actually cook more and post more the writing will improve and I will gain a better style of sharing my thoughts, concerns, and passions.

The Night After Christmas

2006-12-30T14:09:00.000-05:00

The Night After Christmas

'Twas the night after Christmas and all through the kitchen, little creatures were stirring up potions bewitching.
Salmonellae were working in gravy and soup, in the hopes they could turn it to poisonous goop!
Clostridia were nestled all snug in the ham,
While Hepatitis A viruses danced in the yam.
Little John with his Gobots and Mary in her cap,
Had just settled down for a long overdue nap.
When down in their guts there arose such a clatter
They sprang from their beds to see what was the matter.
They ran to the bathroom, threw open the door
Too late! Now their mother is cleaning the floor.
Wash your hands before cooking! Put your food away quick!
Or that jolly old food germ we know as Saint Sick
With his eight tiny microbes will ruin the feast
As they make their toxins. He calls out to each beast:
"Now Hepatitis! Now Staph and Perfringens;
We'll punish those humans for holiday binges!
On Botulinum! E. Coli! Shigella!
Go get 'em Amoeba! Work fast, Salmonella!
If those humans can't learn to handle food right,
A Merry Christmas they'll have, then a long, sleepless night!"

Connection

2006-11-29T08:20:00.001-05:00

I have come to understand that some of the joys of eating lies in the act of personally creating the food, and in sharing it with the ones we love.

The routine of stirring homemade gooey oatmeal on the weekend at the cottage for you and your family helps you to realize that it is the weekend and a long relaxed morning is going to ensue. During the busy week, coming home and going through the act of boiling water for tea can bring comfort and instant relaxation after a hard day. Not only does this connection with our food allow us to think about what we are putting into our bodies the matter in which we share and eat food can actually make it taste better to you. What tastes better than the apple cobbler you remember eating at your grandparents cottage after a long day of fishing and playing outside? Why are holiday foods so special? We have those special dishes that may not seem so special to anyone else, but the holiday just wouldn't be right without that pie, or cranberry relish. The dishes become special with the memories connected to the food, whether it be the routine of doing it every day, or the memories connected from prolonged holiday tradition.

My love for my family is showed through the food that I make them. I take the time to make my dad his favorite pie, or dinner for my mom on mothers day. It is care and devotion that I put into my food to share with people that I love. I believe that food should be created with love and shared with love. This is part of the message that I want to share with people about food.

What is your personal definition of Creativity?

2006-11-16T09:13:00.000-05:00

This Was my Answer:

Creativity is a stream of unrestrained thoughts and ideas. Allowing youself to think outside, inside, behind, in front of, under, and on top of "the box". Creativity is Making/Saying/Doing, anything that allows feeling and emotion to get out of your body and into the world. Creativity inspires people to think in new ways and explore their own selves. Creativity is more than being artistic, it is bringing your soul/being/feelings/thoughts into the world to share with others, even if it may not be socially acceptable/tollerable.

Playin with our food

2006-11-05T12:25:00.000-05:00

On Friday night I helped out one of my good friends N with a little homework assignment. Of course it involved food. She was to try new friuts and take photos and write about it. Well we ended up having a lot of fun playing with the scraps.

This was our selection of fruit to try/play with.

Too bad this one didn't taste all that great.

This was our first go.....

..... and then we made a friend.....

And because the first one was so much fun to make we made this little guy as his friend.

Food Relevation

2006-11-05T01:09:00.000-05:00

It seems to me that many people don’t realize how important food is. Food along with air, water, and shelter is the basis of life. We get grouchy if we don't eat. We are in better moods if we are well fed. And we are healthy if we eat correctly. We bake cookies for people to show we care; we break bread and bond over food. We go out to restaurants to have an experience, a girl’s night out, or a romantic dinner. And yes if you think about it eating is not the most attractive of things but still food is necessary. We bring food into our home, into our bodies, into our families and friends' bodies. That brings food to be one of the most intimate things in this world to us. If people mess with our food we get upset think GHB, irradiation, bovine growth hormone, GMO's, the organic craze, fortifying of foods and the list goes on. So food is necessary, food is intimate and lately in today's society food has been ABUSED, especially in America.
Wake up KFC, McDonalds, Burger King, Red Robins and Processed packaged reheat able meals ugh. A processed breaded chicken patty loaded with preservatives and salt is not a meal! ICKY! We have let food become impersonal, ripping open lasagna in a box and reheating it, buying pre-prepared healthy choice dinners, buying salad in a bag, meal replacement bars etc. Not only have we allowed food to become impersonal we have allowed the system of growing and buying food become impersonal and industrialized. Fruits, vegetables and meat are shipped many hundreds of miles from where they are produced, to be sold in large supermarkets. I am not completely innocent in helping these trends continue; I shop at Meijer and lord knows where that food comes from and how many miles it has traveled to get there. I've made the mistake of buying out of season foods and have paid the price. Hard tasteless pears, bruised avocados, sour grapes. I am in this situation too but I am unhappy about it and want to change it for myself and for others.
The problem is A) mindset on life and B) the system and infrastructure of what our food system is.
A) So we are busy on the go Americans. We want it all and we want it all NOW. This leaves little time for family let alone preparing a meal ourselves and having a family dinner together around a table (not a TV). Women came into the work force mostly during the war to help America and support their kids. Well they've stayed in the workforce to increase home income. Why do we want large incomes? It used to be so we all could go on family vacations and have nice things when we relax. But now work takes us away from the things that we were once striving to have. It seems we just want more and more money for the sake of having money, not for having quality family time. In lieu of these changing lifestyles fast food restaurants have popped up creating unhealthy eating habits for many people. Many food companies are responding to the demand for quick and easy meals by making easy to heat dinners, lunches and even breakfasts. This would be fantastic in my mind if only people actually ate them together.

B) Our food system is based on large farms that ship food across the country. If one of these farms has health issues people across the nation pay the price. We have turned to mono cropping and irrigating the desert to grow food enough for the country. Due to this system, huge amounts of nonrenewable fossil fuels are used to grow the crops with the aid of fertilizers and plowing. Then there comes the waste in shipping a crop (which is harvested not at the peak of flavor) to local groceries and convenience stores around the globe so Americans can have flavorless grainy tomatoes in the middle of winter.

Wouldn't it be nice to know the person that puts in hard labor to grow the food that you eat for dinner? To have a personal relationship with other families that buy from this person? To not have to worry if the lettuce you got from the supermarket is the same as the lettuce being recalled for E. coli? To know that the food you eat is organically grown and picked when it will taste the best and is at it's most nutritious? That fossil fuels were not wasted in shipping you carrots all the way from California? How come it is now a privilege for a four star restaurant to buy local produce? To have relationships with farmers down the road or even have a farm for the restaurant? How did that become a novelty practice? With the distance we have put between ourselves in cities and the areas where our food comes from, we have increased our impersonal relationship with food. Children do not know that carrots are roots and grow in the ground, and who knew that a prune is a dried plum?
Yes, "new" practices people have been “creating” such as organic, naturally grazed life stock, and polycropping have been “developed” to enhance our efficiency and the safety of the food we eat. Maybe eating local would cut down on the trucking industry in some areas, but it would be for the best. There are still going to be specialty items at stores that need to be shipped: chocolate bars, cookies, and soda. Trucking will not be eliminated due to a local food revolution but it will help to cut back on the use of fossil fuels.

How is it that we came to view food as a nuisance rather than a focal point of our lives? How is it that we have come to rip food apart and then place it back together while destroying the nutrients and increasing the fat content all in the name of preservation and convenience?
If we continue our systems the way they are now we have no hope for health in the future.

Motivated

2006-11-03T11:21:00.000-05:00

This fall semester has been very intense for me on many different levels. Lately I have been interviewing for internships with companies like Kellogs, Pepsico, and maybe Dominoes. I am so lucky to be in a field where internships are paid and give great experience. I must admit that I am intimidated by all of it but I am getting better and better in interviews (I hope).
I have been very bad with posting and hopefully I'll get myself into gear and post more and with that hopefully it will become easier for me to navigate around this blogging world. I have many exciting thoughts running through my head lately. Much of it is due to a wonderful program I am involved in called The Bailey Scholars. I call it Bailey for short. Bailey has helped me figure myself out a lot and it has also turned me back to this blog that I started for too many reasons to name.
Due to the fact that I should be studying at the moment I am going to post some pictures of my wonderful study abroad that hopefully I'll post about in a more indepth post later on.

Study Abroad

2006-04-27T17:03:00.000-04:00

In ten days I will have finished my sohomore year of college and will be traveling with a wonderful group of people on a study abroad. This is more of a trip in my eyes but I can get credit for it. This is titled International Food Laws and Regulations. I am so very excited for this. I get to go to many different places and get to see some very exciting things. This is the main reason for me starting this blog. I hope to be able to share a pleffera of information about my study abraod that centered around what else but FOOD! I am such a food person.

We had a meeting regarding the study abroad and the instructors included this piece of information.

The exercise was to place our names by the specific area we felt we belonged to. Well to start off with there were many that appealed to me. I kind of happened upon food science by flipping through different colleges and looking at the different majors they had. My mom actually found food science and was like Ashlee this is it! See I have always liked everything about food; cooking it, eating it, talking about it. And so I appeal to many of the culture and traditions around food. I am also interested in how food plays an important part of our lives. We have meetings over dinner and lunches, we have food at all of our important events. Our lives are simply based around food even if we do not realize it. However the new food movements with all the new products are about meals on the go, meals that are quick and easy so you can get on with you lives. Well I am totally against that! Meals are supposed to be enjoyed and meals are meant to be had with others. It is a time to enjoy life and catch up with people. If we weren't meant to enjoy food, the thing that sustains us in life, we would make our own food like flowers and trees. But humans were meant to eat and enjoy eating. We are not meant to be eating power bars and new fat free foods that taste like nothing.
Then there is the scientist in me. Science has been one of my stronger sides. I was told once
"Stick with science girl you ask great questions!" by one of my science teachers. I will admit that I was almost a straight A student all throughout highschool ( with the first exception being Honors English and the second being Honors Pre Calc). But College is a whole different ballpark for me. But I am still pursuing my science career. And I do recgonize the importance of understanding International food laws and regulations especially if I will end up working in industry and trying to come up with international products.

So I will not post for about a month due to being out of country. But I do intend to take lots of photos and share many stories when I get back.

DC and the Lumix

2006-03-28T11:13:00.001-05:00

Well I got my camera on Friday, the day before I left for DC. So I had to experiment with it while I was on the trip. My advice to anyone is to make sure that you know how to use your camera before taking it on vacation. I know I really had no other choice but it became really frustrating for me on the trip. I did encounter a major problem however. This camera does not have a view finder. This isn't such a big deal for a digital because I hardly ever used a viewfinder with my old elf. However the lcd screen has glass over it and is very shiny. While some days on the trip were overcast I still had problems sometimes trying to see what was in the viewfinder.

However I did find a remedy for this. It is a little polarized piece of plastic that fits right on top of the screen. It doesn't seem like another clear plastic thing would help much to reduce glare, but this is a must have for the camera. The camera has tons of features and there isn't a camera this size with a 6x zoom. It is the ultimate package whith this one flaw. But I have remedyed this and now I am ready to start taking lots more pictures.

IMG_0656 on Flickr - Photo Sharing!

2006-03-15T08:20:00.003-05:00

The question of all questions: If you could do anything with your life what would you do?

This is a question that takes a lot of meditation. Firstly I would pick something that never goes out of style. Meaning that there are always new advances and ways to keep up with global trends. Secondly it would need to involve something that I could be passionate about. Passion isn't a common word any more, espically when it comes to people's careers. But then you hear these fabilous stories about lawyers and business people quitting their jobs to pursue their passion of baking, or what have you, and making lots of money doing it. So the question is how do you pin point your passion and seek it out within a career ?
Is seems that now mostly people go to school and think oh you never know where you will end up.....and that is true; you may start off in one major switch and then just apply for a job and get that. But there are ways to make sure that your dream comes true. By sharing your passion and getting to know those people in the world that have the same passion integrated into what they are doing for a living. One way is to network yourself to the right destination...and blogging has opened a vast window of people and of different areas of interest .....now I need to narrow down my interests and see where I have opportunities....

This might take a while, but anything worthwhile takes awhile to accomplish. Right?

Cursed With Electronics

2006-03-02T09:12:00.000-05:00

It seems that no matter what I always have some electronic that is broken. I believe the downfall of my relationship with electronics started last year when my microwave quit on me. My hunt for a new one was something else. I finally found one with a browning feature that I thought would benefit me because I live in a dorm, well when I plugged that baby in she started smoking! We took that one right back to the store. And now (knock on wood) I've had the one I have now for about 4 months and she is holding up well.

Next to go was my printer. I had an Epson scanner printer thing and I loved it. I never treated it badly and it's not like it ever got banged up or dropped. But all of a sudden it stopped printing with the new ink cartrages I'd put in it. I wasted soo much paper and ink on head cleaning it , it was rediculious. Well my wonderful parents replaced it for me, with a different brand mind you. But last night I came to find that I wasn't the only one who had this problem. I was talking with my Dad (he has two of these printers one at work and one at home) and he askes me "guess what blew up at work today?" His printer at work crapped out just like mine! Well that makes me feel slightly better and they know that I really didn't do anything to my printer.

But let me tell you about my experience with cameras. Now first I should let you all know that my father taught me well, and I take care of my things especially the expensive things that I want to have for awhile. But accidents do happen don't they? In high school I went on a wonderful trip with my french class to Canada. Well when we got back one of my rolls of film got stuck in my camera, it was advantix film and I had some shed tears about losing that roll. Next we have my first digital camera. I got a little cannon elf, I believe it was an sd 100. Well this puppy lasted me up until this year. Oh we had some good times with her. But she took a little tumble out of my pocket and seemed fine until the lense woudn't retract in an error 1 or something. So for Christmas I got my new Hp. Well here's the story. I want this little one to get me through Europe this summer. However some icy sidewalk had other plans for my camera. I have to park my car a little ways away from my apartment so I tend to ride my bike over to the parkinglot. Well that sometimes is a hard ride especally when the wind is blowing and it is 20 degrees out. Well I almost got back to my apartment this night and realize that I've left my dome light on. Can't drain the battery now can we? So I turn around and it is freezing out and I get to the part of the sidewalk where it curves and is full of ice. Well I have thought to myself before that I will one day fall on it and that one day had finally come. My front tire slipped and my handlebars turned and boom! I went down flat on my back, my purse flew out of my hands and I even hit my head ( thank goodness it wasn't hard). Stressed out I got up and walked my bike across the rest of the ice and proceeded to my car. The light was on and I was thankful that I had remembered I left it on.
So a few days later I decide to charge my camera so I can take some family pictures. It charges right up and I turn it on.....the screen is white! with all these dark spots in it! OMG I BROKE MY BRAND NEW $200 CAMERA! The screen had shattered. I could still take pictures but there is no way to change the modes or see the pictures.
Well despite all of this I'm hoping that the third time is the charm and I have ordered ( and am paying for it myslf) a little panasonic DMC-LZ2 Lumix.

She is currently in the mail and I can't wait to see her. I have read some mixed reviews but have good feelings that this camera will be perfect for me. And I will be taking particular good care of her. Hopefully I will be able to take some great shots for this site. I am a bit sad that I won't have it for my trip to DC but hey that's the way things go and I didn't have the extra $30 to shell out for overnight delivery. But she should be here when I get back from my trip. How Exciting!

Away for a little while

2006-03-02T09:03:00.001-05:00

Well this blog isn't going to be much about food but generally what is going on with me.
About three years ago I had had the best grandpa in the world. He taught me, my sister and my cousins soo much. The most important thing he taught me was how to fish and how to filet them. Then about three years ago he started to change. He wasn't himself. My grandma actually moved out after he told her that he didn't love her and never should have married her, mind you after more than 50 years. They had met when she was 16....she's well into her seventies now. Well recently about two weeks ago he complained about pains in his side. He continued to go to doctors and get opinions. Turns out he had cancer and it had spread to his lungs as well. So they operated on a Wednesday. My parents flew down on Thursday (he's in florida). He didn't do so well in the operation and they almost lost him. After a few days they said that it had spread more and that he was going to go into hospice care. Then on Monday morning his body gave up.
Heartwrenching as that is for me....I know that he is at peace now. After three years of not being himself, not being the grandpa that I knew and loved dearly. The man that taught me to fish, how to catch minnows, that had me fry him hotdogs and the man that used to put mustard on EVERYTHING had been fading for three years and now there is no chance of getting him back. I always thought that he'd be at my wedding.....
So throughout all of the MRI's and cat scans the doctors found a spot on his brain that show the signs of an old stroke. So that possibly explains the entire attitude change.

It has been very hard for me to accept how I have acted through the entire ordeal. I was hurt and confused and far away from the entire situation. What do you do when someone you have known for all your life suddenly changes? How do you cope with that? Now there is no way for me to tell him that I am sorry and that I still love him.

So it is remembering the good times we used to have. It is remembering the last time I spent with him in Disney before his change. It is remembering that he was touched by the support I tried to give him when he and my grandma separated.

I will be traveling down to Florida with my sister for the funeral. I don't think I could ever forgive myself if I don't go. I hope that somehow there will be closure, but this will be a tough trip.

Lessons

2006-02-07T16:11:00.000-05:00

Well when something doesn't turn out the way you want it to....there is a lesson to be learned.
I love dark chocolate. I prefer semisweet over milk. When M&Ms came out with the dark chocolate ones I didn't mearly eat them I devoured. So I decided to buy Hersey's dark cocoa for stocking up the new kitchen. I then decided to make some brownies for a dinner I was going to attend. Well let me just say lesson learned. From here on out I will buy regualar cocoa.

As explained in Dessert First's wonderful post called Crash Cource in Cocoa, dark cocoa powder is pressed with alkali which reduces the acidity of the chocolate therefore mellowing the flavor. This is not exactly what I wanted to have on hand....a mellow chocolate. I never knew about this, I have heard of buying dutched cocoa and thought that it would be a deeper chocolatier flavor. But I had never used it, partly because my mom always did the shopping and kept regular cocoa powder. In a way the fact that I didn'thave the knoledge eats away at me because on some level I feel like I should have known. But I guess it is better to learn first hand than to just assume. There are many many many things I do not know about baking and cooking so I guess I had better get used to it. Therefore, this is my first little lesson learned in my first little kitchen. I am pretty sure it won't be the last.

Stuck Pig

2006-02-05T17:20:00.000-05:00

Last wednedsay for my food science lab we got the pleasure of waking up for a 6 am hog slaughter. I think one of my two new least favorite words are slaughter and carcass.

I have never seen an animal becides a fish actually be killed and made ready for eating. It is quite an experience as one of my classmates said,"This is intense." He was right it was in fact very intense. But there were only a few parts that I didn't enjoy, the squealing of the pigs before they were stunned, the flipping around of the hair removal process, and the cutting off of the head. Once the pig didn't have resemblance to a pig it was easier to watch. It is a rather clean process once the pig is bled out.
During a slaughter the animal is first stunned and rendered unconcious by either a bolt or electric shock. This puts the animal into a state of eplictic seisures. I was not prepared for the first pig as it thrashed around uncontrollably. This part is extremely dangerous for the workers, as the pig is unpredictable in it's movements. The pig is then "stuck" meaning that a knife is inserted and cuts the main artery for the exanguination to begin. A shackle is placed around a hind leg and it is lifted into the air for it to continue bleeding. The pig is then moved over to a water bath where it is scalded for around 2 minutes. It is then places onto the hair remover. This has paddles on one side that rotate to remove the loosened hair from the pig. What I was not prepared for is that it flips the pig over and over in circles, quite disturbing when first seen. It is not a delicate procedure as hair and some blood fly all over the place. But they practice a CAYGo system Clean as you go. Then the workers torch and polish the animal to get rid of the rest of the hair that the paddles missed. The animal is then evicerated and decapitated. The head removal was done by knife in front of us but in large facilites they have these sharp clamps that cut right into the neck to remove it. There was a USDA inspector there to make sure that all processes are done properly and he also inspected some parts of the animal, like the lymph nodes to ensure that the animal was in fact healthy. After the head is removed inspected and the entrails are also inspected the body is split down the middle with a power saw. This saw cuts right through the middle of the spinal cord to ensure that no meat is lost.
And that is where our tour ended. In pigs the skin is not removed and the carcass will be further inspected, washed with hot water and then taken into the cooler. They had priviously done lambs that day and they had removed the hide and washed the carcass to then be chilled.

This was all done at our meat lab. It is a very small facility and they were in total only slaughtering 4 pigs that day. I was impressed with how clean most of the process was. But I can see how quickly things could get out of hand, espically on a larger scale where they are doing 10,000 a day. That is something not so comforting to think about.
Next week for lab we will be making sausage. Can't wait.

No More Dorm!

2006-01-29T10:06:00.000-05:00

I am sitting here drinking my first cup of coffee in my new place. I am excited, liberated, and a bit nervous about all of the new responsibilites that an apartment comes with. But no more do I feel like a hampster living in a little box. No, in the words of pinocio "I'm a real boy". I feel like a real person again.
My wonderful friend H helped me and S ( my roomate) move everything over on Friday. Then on Saturday my wonderful parents came and brought us a bunch of kitchen supplies and some end tables. My birthday cameith early. I got my own set of T-Fal pots and pans ( as my sister refused to share her's with me) and a new set of dishes that are white and shades of blue. Today we are going shopping for our first stock up on food and other household items that we are in need of. I am very nervous about how much that is going to rack up to. But then again some of it like flour, sugar, and baking powder are things that we aren't going to have to buy every trip to the store.
This shall be an exciting adventure and hopefully I will also be able to further develop my blog. To summerize my current life ; in about one and a half months I will turn 20, living on a campus apartment, and writing in my spare time on a food blog. I am not sure if there is anyone else under this situation. Many of my friends I am sure would not understand the way of a developing foodie ( as my palate is not yet refined). However the roomate S understands a little, she likes to linger over gossip blogs.
Here's to a new chapter of my life as a budding food science major, with her own pad to experiment with.

2006-01-23T15:22:00.000-05:00

Well I don't have much to write about because I do not regurlary cook my own food. Living in the dorms I eat things that I would rather not, but my alternative is to go broke or hungry. So I just tend to complain about it with my roomate. But then again she has a lot more to complain about as she can eat only about 1/4 of what I can (celiac- no gluten).
I also can't really give any good resturant reviews... unless people want to know about Big Ten Buritto. Or the occasional thing I microwave.
But change might be in the air. I don't want to curse myself, but I might soon be living somewhere with a kitchen! How wonderful!

A Short Piece of Advice

2006-01-13T17:57:00.003-05:00

Americans are so rushed and busy these days that many people find the easiest things to eat on the go. I would just like to ask everyone to slow down and enjoy the process of sitting down to a meal. Good food should never be rushed. We have disconnected ourselves not only from where our food comes from, how it is made, but now we have disconnected ourselves from each other by eating our meals alone, in our cars, and sometimes in front of computer screens.

So I ask that at least once a day you sit down with others and enjoy a meal slowly. Then reflect upon if you enjoyed the meal more, connected more with the person you are eating with, and perhaps you may discover that you have slowed down to choose a better for you meal and have possibly eaten less because you are actually concentrating on what you are putting into your body.

Mr. Eight O'Clock Coffee

2005-12-07T13:20:00.000-05:00

Oh Mr. Eight O'Clock Coffee how I do love thee.

We all have things that we have grown up on and nothing else tastes quite right but that specific brand. Well for me and coffee it is Eight O'Clock Coffee. The perfect blend of Columbian grown coffee that does not have that acid taste that I despise in coffees. Even some specality coffees have that acid flavor that upsets my tastebuds.

Fair Trade.

With the release of the movie Hotel Rwanda the genocide that occurred in Rwanda has been exposed to many that never knew about it. This horrible occurance killed many many people and devestated the economy. Rwanda was not a huge exporter to begin with but did grow coffee. However it was not a huge market for them. In wanting to help build Rwanda's economy back up a Michigan State university and a Texas A&M professor started project PEAERL. Their solution was to help revamp the coffee farms and start selling specality coffee.
There are now about 13 co ops around Rwanda that are selling this specality coffee. They have supplied it all around East Lansing and to other countries such as England. I love this project but I'm not much on the actual product. I guess my palate isn't mature enougnh and I will stay with the eight o clock brand...and then again I don't like much wine either. But we won't go there because I'm not legal.

Thanksgiving

2005-12-02T16:08:00.000-05:00

Here is the group left to right: My older sister Holly, My roomate Sarah, Me, Mom and Dad

Here is a picture of the bird. You will have to excuse the photo. I am still working on my food photography. Hopefully it shall improve as I progress. I also know that this post is rather late. But I have been busy/ lazy. School just happens to get in the way of the blogging. I would like to get into the habit of blogging more, however I don't really have much to blog about my personal cooking as I do not cook for myself I eat in the dorms and I really don't like the relive the horror that is every meal in the cafiteria.
So the Turkey Day Menu was:
Turkey
Honey Baked Ham
Sweet potatoes topped with golden marshmallows
Mashed potatoes
Gravy
Green Bean Casserole
Ambrosia Salad
Cranberries from a can ( A tradition and I wouldn't have them any other way)
And a Crustless pecan Pie ( For S)
And a pumpkin pie as well

Not much of a start

2005-11-17T16:54:00.000-05:00

Currently nothing much is going on. Thanksgiving is in a week and I couldn't be happier! A few days away from the dorm room will be so welcomed. Hopefully I will come back refreshed with a harder work ethic to finish off the semester. Somehow I doubt it.

So a little about my life as a college student ( it is still weird to say that!) I am a food science major living with an awesome roomate S. She is wonderful and she has also shed new light on my food view. She has ciliac disease, meaning she can eat no form of gluten whatsoever because it will cause her cilia in her intensine to die and that is not a good thing. She will become ill if she eats anything containing any wheat, barley, or gluten containing starches. Luckily she is not the only one around the US or the world for that matter to have this disease and there are many speciality made cereals and cookies ect to cater to her unique situation. So in this respect she has impressed upon me the importance of those foods that cater to those with special needs.

Another influence to my view on food is a program called the bailey scholars program. This unique group has brought sustainability to mind as well as free trade. I am also interested in the course that biotechnology is taking with our food system.

So with that my food blog Food Attitude will include such things as going out to eat, new products, biotechnology, free trade, sustainability and anything else that has to do with food. My life not only revolves around food in the normal sense but I also hope to make a career out of it. Remember we all have to eat.