Involvement

In The Omnivore's Dilemma by Michael Pollan – a great book for anyone, foodie or non-foodie alike –the author sets out to make a meal out of food he has had a direct connection with. I'm not talking about picking out the nicest squash or carrots at the supermarket. I mean true involvement: blood, sweat and tears – slightly exaggerated. Pollan gathers fungi in the forest, and hunts wilds boars in the mountains. He cooks a meal, invites some friends over, and later reflects. The meal showed him a what it is like to know where your food comes from and to have had at least some kind of role in the harvesting, raising, catching, or gathering of it.

What I took away from The Omnivore's Dilemma was the concept of being involved with what you are eating. That involvement can be as simple as knowing if those grapes came from Chile or California, or as deep as raising a bed of strawberries: planting, training, weeding, protecting, watering, picking, cleaning, and finally eating what may be only a bowlful of strawberries. But, how truly involved can you be with food, and how much is enough?

It’s not a simple question, especially for us modern, mostly city dwelling humans. We don’t always have access to prime hunting and gathering spots, and it’s not always possible to be involved with our food. We live in a society of convenience. Everyday tasks need to be simple, otherwise we may not have enough ambition to actually do them. For most people, myself included, convenience still rules; therefore, we have let a lot of convenient foods into our lives: boxed and canned foods, frozen meals, pre-washed vegetables, sliced up chicken. One could argue that all food sold in a grocery store is convenient food, since it is all in one place with little work involved to “harvest” it. But so what? It's easier, it's faster, and it's fairly healthy – largely depending on what you are eating. But, how do convenient foods change our involvement with what we are eating?

I think that we have to use a little personal judgment to really understand how involved or uninvolved we are with our diets. Even the act of picking our food from a grocery store is in a way affecting our diet. We can choose what we want, and that at least in some way, is a small way to be involved. I don’t know how realistic it is for many people to go hunt a deer every time they need some meat or to go harvest berries in the woods for dessert, but definitely go for it if you can do it. The rest of us need to watch from our windows.