For The Love Of Food

For The Love of Food
Welcome to Friday’s For The Love of Food, Summer Tomato’s weekly link roundup.
Great reading this week, including an excellent piece by Michael Pollan about an unlikely ally in the political food fight, as well as Harvard’s answer to the USDA My Plate and a new website to help you find farm fresh produce in your area.
Want to see all my favorite links? Be sure to follow me on on Digg. I also share links on Twitter (@summertomato) and the Summer Tomato Facebook fan page. I’m very active on all these sites and would love to connect with you.
Links of the week
- How Change Is Going to Come in the Food System <<I had the privilege last night to have dinner with Michael Pollan as he explained some of these issues. How cool would it be to finally have a big lobby, specifically health insurance, to go up against Big Food in Washington? (The Nation)
- Harvard plate v. USDA MyPlate: an improvement? <<I think it is. I like the addition of oil and the removal of dairy. But it’s still not perfect. (Food Politics)
- Sugar vs. High Fructose Corn Syrup: Court Battle Begins <<BS of the week. This would be funny if it weren’t clogging up our legal system. Big Corn and Big Sugar fighting over the honor of being the most appealing type of poison. Yum! (LA Weekly)
- IS THE END OF SALMON NEAR? <<One of many reasons foodies should care about climate change. (Discovery News)
- Brazilian Hair Treatment Comes Under F.D.A. Fire <<Apparently this hair treatment is filled with toxic formaldehyde. Yikes. (New York Times)
- What’s Keeping Americans out of Their Kitchens? National Survey Reveals the Top Excuses for Not Cooking <<Turns out 28% of people who don’t cook at home claim it is because they don’t know how. Sounds like an easy problem to fix. (Market Watch)
- Ban on E. Coli in Ground Beef Is to Extend to 6 More Strains <<How many bugs do you want in your meat? Happy to see this. (New York Times)
- Farmigo: Tapping Into The Power Of The Web To Bring You Fresh Veggies <<This company launched at TechCrunch Disrupt this week. Seems to have a lot of potential, despite the awkward name. (TechCrunch)
- Vegetable Gardens Are Booming in a Fallow Economy <<This is specifically talking about rural America, and it’s pretty heartwarming. (New York Times)
- Learning to Love Okra <<I have a soft spot for tips to overcome picky eating. Enjoy okra season! (New York Times)
I was reading your comment on the Harvard Plate site. My first thought regarding half veggies and moving the fruit to a second bowl was to instead move the fruit and veggies to 2/3 of the plate reducing the grain and protien. Seems a better way to maintain portion control in the diagram. But maybe your intention of moving the fruit off the plate was to indicate it as being optional?
Exactly. Do we need fruit at every meal? I don’t think so. It’s a nice snack or healthy dessert alternative, but to say it belongs in an ideal meal is a bit excessive. I agree the grain/protein section is heavy handed by volume, considering how rich it is compared to veggies. My portions are much smaller.
Love the article by Micheal Pollan. I may be a bit biased, but my favorite line is “The most promising food activism is taking place at the grassroots.” Whenever I get discouraged by the lack of food and agriculture policy changes happening in Washington, all I have to do is look at all the changes I’m seeing at the personal level all over the country and I’m inspired again. And I know when you start changing individual opinions, that will eventually work its way up the ladder into government policy although a big push from the health care industry would indeed be welcome.