Reading about Food.

Lately, I've run across some resources for clean/organic/local/better eating and after our CSA experience last year, I've kept my eyes peeled for different ways of eating. Because, truly, something has to change. 

Fast Food Nation by Eric Schlosser provided an in-depth look into the "dark side" of American fast food from its history to its modern day practices. Overall an informative (and yucky) read on fast food - something that I wasn't overly interested in eating in the first place.

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Many, many of these types of books are very negative toward food, corporations, mass production, etc and understandably so! There is some junk going on in the industry that is controlled by only a very few and will probably not change. However, in presenting the same information, Barbara Kingsolver shared her family's year long eating experience in Animal, Vegetable, Miracle and put a completely positive spin on it. I loved that! It was a long read, but well worth it.

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Finally, The Omnivore's Dilemma by Michael Pollan was also a very long but informative read about the author's journey through attaining four (very different) meals in the USA. First, fast food, then a supermarket organic meal, a completely local meal from Polyface Farm and finally a hunted and gathered meal. I have to admit that he pretty much lost my interest at the end with the hunting/gathering so I didn't actually read the last section of the book, however I read what I wanted to. This opened my eyes to the corporate organic companies and takeovers and solidified that local is probably the best. Currently, we're looking for the best organic/local/grassfed meat options for our limited budget (eatwild.com). I'll let you know who we find!

I'm looking forward to reading Pollan's follow up called In Defense of Food.

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We're watching documentaries including Food, Inc., Tapped, Fresh and King Corn.

And I just came across another web resource for Clean Eating (Thanks Jess!). While I was disappointed at the misnomer ("clean" really only means less processed foods rather than truly organic foods) it was a great resource for substitutes and less processed food items in every day places. A great first step for people trying to eat better.