Philosophy
Last night, after watering the garden, I laid down in the hammock for a few minutes and then wandered down to the mulberry trees for a little dessert. We're in peak mulberry season and we have four trees that produce copiously. One, in particular, has the tastiest berries of them all and I worked my way up one delightful branch. It is the perfect blend of sweet and tang, just the most delicious berry I've ever tasted -- I loves me all kinds of berries.
The thing is that you'll never buy them in a store. We have friends who have an organic farm about 25 minutes away and every year we help them harvest their blueberries. After a long day of picking we get a percentage for our freezer, which we save for frostier times of year when fresh berries are usually just an unsatisfied longing.
Last year, as we're picking and chatting about varietals and watering and what grows well where, TheWife asked why we don't see mulberries for sale given how wonderful they are. Our hosts just laughed. A few years back, they had a student working an internship on their farm to learn about organic growing practices and when he found a mulberry tree along their long, dirt driveway, he too fell in love with the fruit. He decided that he would pick and sell them at the farmers' market in DC where our friends sell their produce on weekends.
He tried. He failed. The berries just won't last off the tree long enough to get to market. They got mushy and lost their tang. It made me realize how thin of a slice of what grows that we get because our choices are dictated by that market. Fruit is apples, oranges, and bananas; maybe a peach and a plum occasionally. But how much are we missing?
I'd tried carambola before, I thought it tasted like a bland cross between a grape and an apple. Then I tried one at a little fruit stand outside of Everglades National Park ('Robert Is Here' if you are ever in south Florida). Mind blown. Again, what a shame it is that we experience food so badly.
When you think about what school cafeterias did to vegetables or even what comes out of cans, is it any wonder children won't eat them. To be honest, I wouldn't either. The only flavors Americans will tolerate are bland and sweet. It is not only sad, but a big part of the reason we have the obesity epidemic (here's an amazing animated map from the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation showing how obesity levels have changes across the country since 1985).
What can we do to change the way we experience what we eat?
- The Meanings Of Food
Doing the dishes last night, it struck me how differently different people see food. To TheWife, for example, food is medicine. The purpose of eating is to change the body's chemistry and cooking is an apothecary's art, preparing something to...
- Artificial Flavors
TheWife and I worked hard to keep the kids eating real food as long as we can before the larger cultural influences started exerting their unhealthy pressures. The less short of the short people had a class camping trip and on it, she tried soda. Come...
- Politics, Science, And Medical Marijuana
An interesting piece this morning on Morning Edition about medical marijuana. Thoughtful, but left a few things that I think need to be said. The opponent of medical marijuana interviewed argued that (1) medical marijuana is a first step down a slippery...
- Parasitic Plant Used For Kissing...mistletoe
"Why do we kiss under the mistletoe?" December 24th, 2013 Guardian News Because it remains green year round, this parasitic plant has long been associated with fertility. To the best of my knowledge, I never saw live mistletoe until after relocating...
- Apples...public Enemy Number One
Don't blame him; blame the growers. This problem has been known for years and it's not just pesticides but a planned effort to make the fruit last longer and look good. Pity...apples are great. "Apples top most pesticide-contaminated list" by...
Philosophy
In Praise of Mulberries
Last night, after watering the garden, I laid down in the hammock for a few minutes and then wandered down to the mulberry trees for a little dessert. We're in peak mulberry season and we have four trees that produce copiously. One, in particular, has the tastiest berries of them all and I worked my way up one delightful branch. It is the perfect blend of sweet and tang, just the most delicious berry I've ever tasted -- I loves me all kinds of berries.
The thing is that you'll never buy them in a store. We have friends who have an organic farm about 25 minutes away and every year we help them harvest their blueberries. After a long day of picking we get a percentage for our freezer, which we save for frostier times of year when fresh berries are usually just an unsatisfied longing.
Last year, as we're picking and chatting about varietals and watering and what grows well where, TheWife asked why we don't see mulberries for sale given how wonderful they are. Our hosts just laughed. A few years back, they had a student working an internship on their farm to learn about organic growing practices and when he found a mulberry tree along their long, dirt driveway, he too fell in love with the fruit. He decided that he would pick and sell them at the farmers' market in DC where our friends sell their produce on weekends.
He tried. He failed. The berries just won't last off the tree long enough to get to market. They got mushy and lost their tang. It made me realize how thin of a slice of what grows that we get because our choices are dictated by that market. Fruit is apples, oranges, and bananas; maybe a peach and a plum occasionally. But how much are we missing?
I'd tried carambola before, I thought it tasted like a bland cross between a grape and an apple. Then I tried one at a little fruit stand outside of Everglades National Park ('Robert Is Here' if you are ever in south Florida). Mind blown. Again, what a shame it is that we experience food so badly.
When you think about what school cafeterias did to vegetables or even what comes out of cans, is it any wonder children won't eat them. To be honest, I wouldn't either. The only flavors Americans will tolerate are bland and sweet. It is not only sad, but a big part of the reason we have the obesity epidemic (here's an amazing animated map from the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation showing how obesity levels have changes across the country since 1985).
What can we do to change the way we experience what we eat?
- The Meanings Of Food
Doing the dishes last night, it struck me how differently different people see food. To TheWife, for example, food is medicine. The purpose of eating is to change the body's chemistry and cooking is an apothecary's art, preparing something to...
- Artificial Flavors
TheWife and I worked hard to keep the kids eating real food as long as we can before the larger cultural influences started exerting their unhealthy pressures. The less short of the short people had a class camping trip and on it, she tried soda. Come...
- Politics, Science, And Medical Marijuana
An interesting piece this morning on Morning Edition about medical marijuana. Thoughtful, but left a few things that I think need to be said. The opponent of medical marijuana interviewed argued that (1) medical marijuana is a first step down a slippery...
- Parasitic Plant Used For Kissing...mistletoe
"Why do we kiss under the mistletoe?" December 24th, 2013 Guardian News Because it remains green year round, this parasitic plant has long been associated with fertility. To the best of my knowledge, I never saw live mistletoe until after relocating...
- Apples...public Enemy Number One
Don't blame him; blame the growers. This problem has been known for years and it's not just pesticides but a planned effort to make the fruit last longer and look good. Pity...apples are great. "Apples top most pesticide-contaminated list" by...