Think About Food

I am sometimes accused of asking too much of people. Today, for World Food Day, I want to make a simple request. I want you to think about food. I'm not going to tell you to boycott certain companies or certain ingredients. I'm not going to tell you how much to eat or what to eat. I'm not going to tell you what to feed your children or what not to feed them. I'm not going to tell you to donate money or who to donate it to.

I think we too often buy in a hurry, cook in a hurry (if we're cooking at all), and eat in a hurry. I'd like you to consider slowing down. Take the time to think about what you are going to buy and why, take time to think about where you are going to shop and why, take the time to think about what to cook and how, and take the time to slowly savor and digest your food.

I think that the more we think, the more likely we are to make responsible and healthy decisions that consider our health, our finances, and the sustainability of our planet. So please think.

If you do want to do more than think or if you want some resources and inspiration for your thinking, here are some links to my archive and to other content that might help.

• Save the Children - World Food Day Page: Learn the good news about child hunger rates, test your knowledge about child hunger and watch a recent Save the Children video from Mozambique.

• Hungry Planet: What the World Eats: I would highly recommend buying the book version of this photo exhibit that my friend Barbara and I saw with our kids last year. If you are a teacher, look into curriculum options for using the photos and information with your class.

• Food, Inc.: Join me in watching Food, Inc soon. I've been wanting to watch it for a while and just haven't gotten around to it yet. It is on my priority to-do list.

• Fresh: Another movie on my list. Instead of looking at the problems with our food system, Fresh looks at the solutions. Watch this movie or arrange for a screening of it near you to learn about the options to the industrial food system.

• Put Food in the Budget: A website that aims to teach people about the challenges of trying to buy healthy food when you are living on social assistance and that asks the government of Ontario to increase social assistance by $100 per month so that people can afford more healthy food.

• 10 ways to feed your family without killing the planet: My tips for being more socially concious in your food purchases and consumption.

• Are You Socially Conscientious About Your Food Shopping (Very Bored in Catalunya): Get some tips to help you be more socially conscious as you do your daily or weekly food shopping.

• If you won't listen to me, listen to him: Listen to a smart kid talking about the problems with our food system.

• Why I Protest Nestle's Unethical Business Practices: Learn about Nestle's unethical business practices and find out which brands the company owns (it is probably more than you think!).

• The high-fructose corn syrup bloggers: A symptom of a larger problem? What happens when bloggers accept gift cards to promote unhealthy food products without doing their research first?

• North America can do processed foods better: Processed foods doesn't have to be as big of a problem as it is.

• Are these your kids heroes? Olympians, sponsorship, McDonald's and more: Think about how it impacts your children's food choices when their heroes are hawking junk.

• Should you donate Kraft Dinner to the food bank? People who can afford to buy food, think of Kraft Dinner as comfort food. How do the people who can't afford food think of it?

• Affordability of Healthy Foods: People should eat better. But is it easy to do so? What happens when junk is so much more affordable than real food.

• Organic on the Cheap: Get some tips on how you can include more organic foods in your budget without breaking the bank.

Did you write something for World Food Day? If so, feel free to leave your link in the comments.

Don't forget: THINK ABOUT FOOD

Comments

[Loralee]

I LOVE this. I am so guilty of rush, rush, rushing even though I love food. I love GOOD food. Despite the fact that Diet Coke is my BFF and I am not ridgid about HFCS ;), we've been uber picky about what Baby Butterlump consumes, and I've noticed we're slowly taking better care with ourselves as well...organic when we can (it's a bit tricky where we live, farm eggs, we're buying half of a grass fed cow next month from a local farm (and we're tip toeing towards raw milk).

It's one of the things I am most excited about regarding homeschooling my 6th grader-I need to teach him about cooking, baking, food...I'm finding I am SO excited to HAVE to stop and smell the roses, so to speak. xo

[Sunday Surf | Breastfeeding Mo]

[...] would have written something had I known. But instead, I give you Annie at PhD in Parenting’s Think About Food, which just came to my rescue. Since thinking about your food is all I ever want for people myself, [...]

[cartside]

I didn't know it was World Food Day but I happen by chance to have written something about a scheme that tries to bring people together, reduce food miles and encourage local production of food (which in so many ways reduces the energy/oil input into food production, and is important for creating a sustainable provision of food for the future.
http://mummydothat.blogspot.com/2010/10/food-choices.html

[Caroline]

I once heard that in any situation, you get two of the following three things: good quality, inexpensive, and fast. With food, I find this is especially true. Where I live, we can have local produce delivered to our homes weekly, but it's expensive. Basically, we have to decide if fast is so important to us that we are either willing to eat unhealthy food or pay up the nose for the good stuff. It's always a balance between conflicting priorities. Thank you for the reminder that good quality impacts not only us as individuals but the health of the planet.

[karinya @ Unlikely Origins]

I just wanted to let you know that I linked to this post in my recent blog post!

http://unlikelyorigins.blogspot.com/2010/10/did-you-know-that-last-saturday-october.html

[Healthy Processed Foods (they]

[...] who want to better understand what is going into their food. Reading labels is part of my pledge to think about food and I hope you’ll consider making it part of yours too. [...]

[Dear Daughter | PhD in Parenti]

[...] the things I want to teach my children about sex, love, tolerance, religion, death, war, history, food, consumerism, feminism, empathy and more. So often it seems they are so busy being kids that they [...]