Wednesday, June 17, 2009

A Photo, A Poem, A Request.


Ladies and Gentle-Readers, I would like to share with you a "poem" or "thought" from Wendell Berry, which I read in Michael Pollan's "In Defense Of Food."

"Eating with the fullest pleasure - pleasure, that is,
that does not depend on ignorance - is perhaps the
profoundest enactment of our connection with the
world. In this pleasure we experience and celebrate
our dependence and our gratitude, for we are living
from mystery, from creatures we did not make and
powers we cannot comprehend."

With the emphasis on a connection with the world, I would like to ask you about your experiences and efforts, thoughts and feelings in regards to eating locally. Have you tried it? What did you think? Do you want to make a change? Etc. I would feel more purpose and connection knowing where my readers are in regards to the idea incorporating local food. Please feel free to email me or comment. It would be lovely, and very much appreciated.

4 comments:

MYDell83 said...

Well recently my teeth have started to go bad and I realized it was because of the food i've been eating. I was a very busy student until recently and I just thought that i'll eat the crap now and deal with it later. A couple of times i've gotten very sick and I knew it was because of what I was eating but I took some vitamins, got better and kept doing what I was doing. This was until I was faced with the prospect of losing my teeth. When you started this blog Annie, I realized that eating better and healthier and changing the way I treated my body was really easy. I just need a little boost :). Some pointers please.

A.Kelley said...

Mensha, you WILL recover from your root canal, but before you recover and forget, could you share with us all exactly what type of food you were eating before your "teeth went bad" ? Considering I know you are a vegan, but others may not, explain, please: what were you possibly eating wrong you poor dear?

Patty said...

Hi,

Well, I may have told you before, but we have a big organic garden, mostly maintained by my Dad. We order meat from Nature's Harmony now. And we cook most of our meals ourselves (my Mom, my husband and me). We sometimes eat out, but not MacDonald's. Ray and I were vegetarians for about 10 years until our baby got old enough to speak up. She was a real carnivore until she suddenly went vegetarian before she started college. I have lots of good vegetarian cookbooks. Ray and I would probably not eat much meat, but my 80 year old parents came to live with us two years ago and we try to plan meals that we will all enjoy, something of a challenge. I used to be reluctant to spend the extra money for organic food and I still buy most of my "outside" groceries at Kroger.

We like to bake and almost always have homemade cookies around, so we don't buy much processed food at all. I sometimes make my own yogurt and bread, but not always. I do some cooking ahead and freezing, thanks to OAMC websites. We have a big freezer for produce and bread and casseroles. My parents make pickles and jams too.

Gardening changes how you cook. I have to figure out how to use as much of what's available as possible. We had good lettuce this year, so I took green salads to every potluck dinner I went to. Lettuce doesn't freeze too well and we gave a lot away too. Now we have green and yellow beans in the freezer for next winter, and eat them fresh two or three times a week. Cabbage and Chinese cabbage don't freeze too well and are ready to be eaten up--cole slaw and stir fries on the menu!

A.Kelley said...

Patty -

Thank you for such an insightful - and interesting - response. I am so curious as to what people are doing and it is always fascinating to me.

I used to be reluctant to spend extra money on organic too. Getting veggies outside of the grocery store has helped me see and smell and taste the difference, because at grocery stores, everything looked the same, I thought I was paying for an extra word (organic) on an extra label. It sounds like you know how to do a lot of things I would love to learn (canning, pickling, freezing (properly, of course) etc.) I have yet to learn how to make yogurt, though I hear it is very easy. There is so much I want to learn how to do.

And I would love to see your farm. You aren't too far from Athens are you? It would be great to meet you sometime :)

I know a great cabbage recipe if/when you get tired of cole slaw! Thanks for your response!

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