An Evening with Michael Pollan

by Genesis Valdes

Going to the grocery store can be quite a challenge. You have so many products to choose from and they all  have these claims of less fat, no GMOs, organic, etc. The real question is what should I eat? For food journalist, author, and activist, Michael Pollan, the answer is quite clear: eat real food. Yes, of course, that is exactly what we do, or at least that’s what we think. This past Thursday night at the Paramount Theatre, Michael Pollan explained the difference between real food and “edible food-like substances”, better known as processed foods. He said, “If it has more than five ingredients, it is not natural.” He also explained that if it comes with health claims, it is better not to buy it because the company selling it has the money to advertise, process, and mass produce, which means it is more likely that they’re selling “edible food-like substances” and not real food. Instead, it is the quiet packaging, where the producers have less money to advertise, where you will really find more natural products. We do live in a fast pace world, but he said investing more time in the food we consume can help improve the taste and the quality. He also emphasized how important it is to cook at home. When we are able to cook our meals at home, we can start to better understand the diversity of flavors and quality of ingredients. This is not something only moms or chefs should think about, but everyone, including our young ones.

 

 

Although Michael majored English and only took a few science classes in college, he is teaching people new ways to eat healthier food. That fact impressed me so much, because we think of food as just being an everyday thing that we don’t have to worry about, or as something that only nutritionists should take the time to scrutinize. But the truth is that food is part of our culture. It is a way to socialize and find pleasure. It can be easy to forget sometimes that it is not only about the nutrients. He highlighted the fact that there is no one diet that is going to lead to a healthy life. Instead, we just have to go back to eating real food. Michael Pollan is a great story-teller and an amazing advocate of sustainable foods. He has the experience of gardening and raising his own chickens. His effort to inform and educate people about the food industry had a huge impact on me last night and I am anxious to learn more as I start reading In Defense of Food. I encourage everyone to go out and learn where their food comes from and if possible, start your own garden to support better and healthier food.

Genesis is a junior majoring in nutrition.

Investing in Our Children, Investing in Our Future

This summer, I had the awesome opportunity to travel to Israel and the Middle East. While there, I was able to observe many cultures and religions. I saw all their differences: family, food, entertainment, values, priorities, etc. However, in the midst of all these differences, I noticed one constant in the Human Spirit: Every people group has an innate love for children. This would make sense, of course, because it is biologically necessary for a species to survive. More so, who doesn’t love a snotty nosed child running around, giggling his little head off at absolutely nothing?  It’s hilarious and I am jealous of their ignorance. The biggest thing they care about is the fun they are having now.

However, we “adults” need to focus on their future for them, and what better way to do so, than to start with giving them the best bodies they can have. Our focus should be on equipping our children, our future, with the healthiest bodies they can possibly have. One can only be as good as their body will allow. The healthier the body, the healthier the person’s thoughts and actions.

America is a big melting pot of all the world’s different people groups, cultures, and religions. So, if we could get it right (or as close to right as possible) in America, then to me that says the world could do it as well (a little ambitious, but hey, it’s my blog). Sadly, we don’t have it anywhere near right. According to the American Heart Association, ”about one in three American kids and teens is either overweight or obese”. Not only does obesity give way to high blood pressure, Type-2 diabetes, high levels of cholesterol, and severely increased chances of obesity related problems at an older age, but it also hurts a person psychologically, causing low self-esteem, poor body image and depression. Yet, the scariest idea for me is that we are doing something way worse than killing our own children: we are putting them through Hell and then killing them. A lot of people would say that is a little extreme, but that is only because we don’t see the repercussions immediately after feeding them.

“Because of the increasing rates of obesity, unhealthy eating habits and physical inactivity, we may see the first generation that will be less healthy and have a shorter life expectancy than their parents.”

- Richard Carmona, former General Surgeon

Now, what can we do to alleviate this epidemic? It’s quite simple really: Think globally, Act locally. None of us (college students) have kids (at least more than likely), but we do have hungry stomachs at least three times a day. Since we have to eat, why not eat the tastiest food out there, which is of course the healthiest, most natural… naturally. Now, I am no expert on this yet, but I would guess that something along the lines of eating healthy for the sake of your own body, supporting locally grown foods and helping raise awareness in the community. When it comes time to have children, you will be healthy, thus your child will begin this world with a firm foundation atop a mighty springboard, and someday, with the right decisions and a little motivation, he too can do something great that will change a child’s world.

Soy: Not Fit for a Boy?

Much of my food-related writing is pretty light-hearted and very sarcastic, but be warned that this article is going to be pretty weighty and personal. Enjoy! No pictures, unfortunately.

It is a treat that you get to learn about what a “foodie” eats when not on the job, so I am providing a little snippet about my eating style when I’m not eating out, and I eat out a lot. I actually binge-eat—not in the sense of overeating outrageous amounts of food—but in the sense of eating a whole lot of the same item. I have had binges of sweet potatoes, corn, popcorn, whole wheat crackers, chips… not at the same time, mind you. One item that I had a bout of binging stopped me dead in my tracks. In my freshman year of college, I was daily eating handfuls of dried soybeans a day, edamame pods (“fresh” soybeans”), and chunks of tofu in dining hall salads. This was by no means all of my nutrition, but essentially, soy filled the gaps for a lot of my meals and snacks. I figured it was healthy, and heck, it tasted good.

We often find ourselves taking what we learn in academia, specifically in the science field, for granted. It is hard to understand many concepts such as hormones or physiological maladies until they become tangible. For me, that is exactly how I felt about my nutrition and anatomy curricula. Then, in the winter of 2010, everything learned in my science courses became all too personal and real.

Just in my sophomore year of college, I felt that there was seriously something wrong in my body. I was constantly feeling cold, I would fall asleep randomly due to fatigue, and my skin was developing a yellow tint. At one point, I fell asleep during a DUB-STEP concert! My emotions were in a constant state of instability.

Sure of my own knowledge of the endocrine (hormone) system, I diagnosed myself with low thyroid. The thyroid gland produces thyroid hormone, which stimulates metabolism, energy production, and pretty anything that keep your motor running. I was certain that I was deficient in this hormone. Worst case scenario would be to remove my gland and take life-long supplements. After finals concluded for the semester, I went home to see my friend’s mother, who is a nurse practitioner with her own practice. She ran some blood tests and called me back with wonderful news: my thyroid hormones were within normal levels. Then came the life-changing news: my testosterone levels were abysmally low, far lower than any healthy males’ levels, regardless of age.

Kitchen Pimpin’ Obesity

The Lonestar State has the highest percentage of overweight adult males at 75.5%, only second to Alabama’s 75.9%. There are plenty of attempts to educate the population on how to eat — nutritional charts and dietary recommendations, for instance — but these are not solutions. The majority of us know that we need to consume more vegetables, but we are less compliant to do so because we don’t enjoy being told what to eat (maybe more so what NOT to eat). Our diet is really a personal relationship with food. We need personalized methods to improve our individual ways of eating. Instead of a massive health campaign telling people to eat healthier and exercise more, a more impacting solution would be to create a healthier environment that empowers people to learn and care for themselves. In other words: get cookin’. In particular, get young males like myself into kitchens to cook for our family and friends.
I got the idea from Coolio’s recent (and amazing) cookbook, Cookin’ with Coolio: 5 Star Meals at a 1 Star Price. The former multi-platinum rapper grew up poor with little knowledge about food, stating that he had the skill of making something out of nothing. He learned how to cook, probably something unique amongst the male youth of his childhood community. What is cool about Cookin’ with Coolio, is that it empowers young men to build confidence, take control of their health, and potentially prevent obesity by learning how to successfully cook real food at home on a tight budget. By presenting his personal story as a living example, Coolio shares his recipes and cooking techniques so that people in lower-income situations can utilize their resources to become successful “Kitchen Pimps”. Taken at face value, this cookbook might seem like a comical sales gimmick, but Cookin’ with Coolio is a masterpiece for public health and could benefit thousands suffering from malnutrition and obesity.

Click the photo to check out his cooking show!

How does Kitchen Pimpin’ prevent obesity?
Cookin’ with Coolio helped me realize that home cooking is more than a luxury; it is an approach to solving the obesity epidemic. There are many people that are too reliant on fake industrial foods, and “[Coolio] want[s] people to know that just because you’re poor, you don’t have to eat fast food every day.” Eating healthy food is more complicated when you are in a difficult economic situation. Some people insist that we need to eat only vegetables grown locally and spend a lot more for our food. Coolio argues that is not necessary for most: “Whole Foods and Gelson’s have a lot of great stuff, but [normal grocery stores] have everything you need to make haute cuisine at home.” Kitchen Pimpin’ and learning the art of “The Ghetto Gourmet” brings awareness to the more realistic problem and solution in our national obesity epidemic that people need to learn more about food and how to cook at home. Instead of focusing all of our attention on paying more for ethical foods (which isn’t necessarily a bad thing), we should educate the population about food and create the environments and resources needed to get people cooking.

Welcome to the Food Studies Project

Hello, I’m Asiago, lead organizer for The Food Studies Project. My last name is “Heron” named in honor of the Great Blue Heron. I am told by people during my time at UT Austin that I have an inspiring personal story to tell. I would like to share an abridged version of my story, give thanks for the education I have received, and invite you all to come fly with me this winter. I have always had an interest in food, probably because I was pulled out of elementary school when I was seven years old, and spent most of life at home eating and watching the Food Network. Sadly though, I did not learn much about food or cooking sitting in front of the television. I just ended up eating more. It got to the point that I had to eat something every time I sat down to watch TV. By the time I was 13, I was already an obese teen who spent his days playing games, only pausing to go steal cigarettes and food, which I called “Game Fuel”, at my neighborhood market. My life was wasting away because I never left the nest, never built the courage to take that first leap. I started learning how to fly when I decided to go back to school at the age of 20. I started a new life thanks to junior college. At the time, I could not imagine that taking a Spanish class would not only guide me to UT Austin but also teach me how to fly around the world.

source: wikipedia.org

Education helped me think differently about food, and it naturally changed my unhealthy ways. Studying foreign cultures and languages brought me awareness about the importance and meaning of food. Meanwhile, my concern grew for the future of food throughout the world. My first couple of years at UT, I did not know I had this food focus in my studies. It wasn’t until I came upon Dr. Rebecca Torres’ course “Farming, Food, and Global Hunger” that I realized I had always had great interests and concerns with food in all of my classes.

My Garden, Our Garden

My Garden, Our Garden: my first vegetable garden with my host family in Brazil

I decided to try my hand at growing a vegetable garden. The project was initially for myself, to learn and connect more with my food studies. Yet, I quickly realized that there is a lot more to gardening than just biology and manual labor. Every time I stepped foot into my garden, tons of metaphors came to mind. The most important was learning that nature is life. We have to treat it like a relationship and not an obstacle. It needs to be loved, fed, and wanted or it will die. If it dies, we will die. Maybe not instantly but we will decay eventually from inside out.

In my food studies, I always hear this statistic that only 4% of the population of the United States grows all of the country’s food. I assume that there are not many Americans who want to do the physical labor or devote the time required to grow real food, nor understand the complexed science and biological relationships between nature and food. But, I feel that we have to challenge ourselves to learn about food. Just like any field of study that we might get into, we must learn the basics, the history, the traditional ways and thoughts to achieve something different, great, and truly innovative. I always remember the example that Rocket Scientist, Wernher von Braun; it is said that he didn’t like mathematics and physics but his fascinations with space travel inspired him to study the subjects he needed to achieve his dream. So I thought, if I want to bring food sovereignty to the world, then I need to understand what is food. Hence the garden.

Hunger

I enjoy food. Everyday I respect it more and I want to share my food studies with others. Currently, I am interested in hunger. Hunger can mean a lot of different things, but for the shake of this post I going to focus on the traditional understanding: hunger is the lack of food intake. I want to know what it is like to be hungry. So, I have started experimenting with my eating patterns. I quickly learned that it is hard to starve yourself.

Highlights and Lowlights of my Mindful Eating Week

For one week, I ate mindfully, keeping notes of the economics, time, and psychology of my weekday meals. As a result, I raised my awareness about the relationship I have with food. Located some potential dangers such as overeating before bed, a habit turned to routine, which I believe I do to help me relax and get tired to hit the sack. I learned that over eating does not only make you feel grossly heavy but it is a major time killer, and time is one of the most important things that students deal with in college.