The Honest Plate

Local is everywhere.

There's a mathematical function called the "s-curve" (or sigmoid curve); it looks like this:

Economists, sociologists and business-types use it to describe trends.  Typically the vertical axis will represent units of product or number of users, and the horizontal axis represents time.  Right in the middle of the graph is the inflection point, where the trend changes sign -- it's still growing, but the rate of growth begins to slow down.  But in the lower left-hand portion of the graph is where the growth sharply accelerates, giving the curve a "hockey stick" shape.  This is sometimes referred to as the tipping point -- when a previously rare or niche product suddenly and rapidly becomes common. 

I think the Summer of 2008 might be remembered as the point when local food tipped. Marian Burros has a feature on the front page of the New York Times food section on the growth of local food -- "Supermarket Chains Narrow Their Sights".  Loads of sound bites in her article, such as Wal-Mart announcing that it will spend $400 million this year on locally grown produce, and Wegman's Food Markets seeing a 20% increase in sales of local produce this past year.  Sure, it may be tempting to view some of this with a suspicious eye (Wal-Mart?).  But on the whole, that major chain retailers are shifting their focus toward local food systems is a very good thing. 

HFCS and other four-letter words.

According to the FDA, High Fructose Corn Syrup (HFCS) is a "natural" ingredient, just like honey or refined table sugar.  The ruling, issued last week by the FDA's Center for Food Safety and Applied Nutrition, states that the government (with their clearer understanding of the HFCS manufacturing process -- shout-out to the Corn Refiners Association and Archer Daniels Midland!), is now comfortable with this ingredient bearing an "all natural" label.  Click here to see the FDA's letter to the Corn Refiners Association.

Doesn't this make your blood boil?  Over at the excellent Ethicurian blog, Bonnie really unleashes on this topic.   

Yet the more I dug into this, it strikes me that the term "natural" is untenable.  When we hear "natural", we presume that it comes from nature.  That an ordinary person could go outside, obtain the ingredient, process it in their barn or kitchen, and presto -- natural ingredient.  HFCS, for all the hair-splitting with the FDA's definition, doesn't meet our intuitive understanding of the concept.  How could something that requires such specialized equipment to manufacture (grinders, pumps, centrifuges, catalyzers, etc), be natural?

The problem is that technically, everything on earth is natural.  If you fight the Corn Refiners Association's argument hard enough, then the counter-punch might be that lots of things we think of (and label) today as natural -- table sugar, for example -- aren't necessarily any more un-natural than corn syrup.  Consider the extensive refining that sugar cane must go through to become white sugar.  Or how about chocolate? 

What I think we mean is that HFCS is not traditional.  We can't make a rough facsimile of it by hand; our grandparents and great-grandparents wouldn't recognize it; it has no history in any traditional cultures or societies.  Couple this with the the evidence that, while safe, corn syrup may not be good for us, and I think we're justified in being wary of it.  My family avoids it entirely.

What we really need is a new, impartial institution (or set of institutions) to create smarter, perhaps stricter definitions for our food.  Perhaps an institution that can accommodate producers of all sizes (rather than just the very big), and tailored to producers who want to bring us organic, ethical, sustainable, local and traditional foods (rather than inexpensive, value-added convenience foods).  Such an institution would have no place for obscenities like "all-natural HFCS" -- that's for the FDA to handle.

Eating less meat: a how-to.

One of my favorite contributors to the New York Times' Wednesday Food Section is Mark Bittman.  A few weeks ago, he wrote a great feature on eating less meat.  The recipes in the article aren't particularly special, but his ideas on meat's place or priority in cooking are worth the price of admission.  For example, he points out:

"Remember that most traditional styles of cooking use meat as a condiment or a treat...meat is seen as a treasure, not as something to be gobbled up as if it were air." 

Since reading the article, we've been using the meat-as-condiment "lens" for nearly every meal we've made at home.  What's so interesting are the places to which this perspective leads you -- the ingredients are the same/familiar, but he ratios have shifted or are upside-down. 

Shopping the farmers markets, we've been picking swiss chard, bitter greens, zucchini and beans as the center of the plate, and we've built up from there.  Early summer vegtables like these are transformed with small (teeny!) amounts bacon, prosciutto, lamb, or grass-fed beef.  Citrus, nuts, raisins, and aromatics (onion, mint, garlic, cilantro) have also been playing a role.  Pino Luongo's Simply Tuscan has been huge source of flavor ideas and techniques.

The perspective that Mark Bittman outlines seems big; it's almost as if the forces that could drive a genuine shift in meat consumption -- price inflation, short and long term health risks, environmental concerns, ethical issues -- are gathering, forming a perfect storm.  His article is a sign that its edging its way into the mainstream...or at least a sub-stream. 

This will be interesting to watch.