Frozen Food

The FOOD JUSTICE movement that we identify with is a backlash to the fast foods, TV dinners, and unhealthy eating habits that many of us grew up with and has caused a huge obesity problem in America.  I often find myself wondering how these habits developed.  I've heard the usual explanations: Americans got lazy, there is less time as people commute longer distances to work, and that priorities have shifted away from home cooked meals.  A recent LA Times article, Clarence Birdseye: A Fresh-Frozen Foodie's Paradise, offered up a new explanation of the shift to frozen foods as a drive towards a wider food experience, freeing "the consumer from the small local farm".  It argues the ability to freeze foods and ship them around the world should not only be a food lover's dream but also increase food access for all people.  The flash freeze process defeats Mother Nature and allows you to use vegetables grown at different times of year in the same dish, making the sky the limit for any type of food combination or experience any time of year--even the harshest of winters.

Regardless of if you see frozen food as a force of good that enables exotic flavor combinations or bad and prefer to eat locally and seasonally, the article's point is that neither approach is feeding everyone. 

 

America still has a hunger problem and poor access to affordable food is paramount in causing this.  However, I don't find that the article gave enough credit to the local food movement.  Instead of seeing the capacity of Americans to embrace a new style of eating just as many have embraced the frozen food movement, the article pushes to the side a system fully devoted to local foods as inefficiencies and high costs are touted.  I however wish to hold on to my hope that local farms and backyard gardens can solve obesity issues as well as increase community access to food while making inroads on America's hunger problem.

 

A few other resources commenting on the state of food in America:

-HBO's The Weight of the Nation

-"American Grown" by Michelle Obama (look for a review soon!)

-Jamie Oliver's Food Revolution Day, TV Show, and TED Talk