we just keep getting fatter.

Centers for Disease Control released preliminary results of the 2008 National Health Interview Survey. I got this from the great Marion Nestle’s site “Food Politics.” We just keep getting fatter here in the great US of A.

What is organic? Your guess is as good as the USDAs

“USDA Organic products must contain at least 95 percent organic ingredients. The five percent non-organic ingredients could include additives or synthetics if they are on an approved list. The label must contain a list that identifies the organic, as well as the non-organic, ingredients in the product, and the name of the organic certifier.”

Its a good thing that Obama wants to double the budget of the USDA’s National Organic program with the growing number of “organic” foods coming onto the market, and the growing number of organic and local devotees…

A Post report of the USDA’s National Organic program put into question the integrity of the USDA organic food label. With “relaxed” federal standards, or the fact they they have never issue rigorous standards on what is organic and what gets a label or not, basically leaves the consumer guessing if a food is truly organic, or made with organic ingredients. The article mainly talks about the standards and the arbitrary assignment of what is or is not organic by the few working in the program at the USDA, but it doesn’t even get into the regulation of those semi-adhoc standards to ensure farmers and producers are truly adhering. Scary times for consumers if you ask me.

kristof is plugging Food Inc too…

The new documentary Food Inc is getting lots of press, and Kristof just gave it a plug. Would love to know people’s thoughts on this movie. From the outset, and I dont think the makers would object, the movie is slanted and I will write more this week on why i think so. The movie contains important information for the general consumer, but when it comes time to science, the environment and nutrition, we need to start digging deeper. We are talking about global food systems in all their complexity. Equating things to food miles, organic and grow your own food (!) are simple answers that dont address the need to feed 7 billion people in a sustainable and pro-nutritious manner.

Kristof’s op ed on hidden hunger. this needs more press.

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/05/24/opinion/24kristof.html

fetish markets of bamako mali. My favorite, monkey heads

While visiting the food and artisan markets of Bamako, we ran across the “fetish” market where all things voodoo permeate. There were cheetah fur, monkey, rat and warthog heads, whole rotting birds, shells, bones, skins, teeth, and i shall not go on. Much of these come from Benin, the origin of voodoo. Supposedly, monkey heads hold power, and some of the fetishes are used for ‘medicine’ and ‘good luck’. Check out this photo 5cense snapped.

fetish market in bamako mali

Slow food? Slow eat.

Check out this graph from the O’Reilly Radar. Of course, Mexico and US are way up there. And then there is the French. Eat and smoke their way through decadence and remain stick thin. god dammit. One thing not really accounted for, as there are many confounders in this, is soda consumption…

This was done byCatherine Rampell of Economix.

Time spent eating versus obesity rate

two scary words: swine flu

and if you are wondering why i would post this on my blog and what this has to do with food, think again…

Our pill-popping ways. but its a recession!

There was an article in the NY Times describing how vitamin sales are up with the economic downturn. With unemployment creeping up and health costs following, people are taking their health into their own hands. So why not herbs and vitamins even though people in general have no idea what they are taking and why they are taking them? One consumer “has pared back on fresh fruits and vegetables and stocked up instead on fish oil capsules and antioxidant supplements.” Now that makes a lot of sense.

What this says to me is that people don’t understand nutrition and it is not their fault. It also tells me that we are a pill-popping, self-medicating society grasping at straws. And the recession is a good excuse. That could be their fault. Why do we think that if we take a supplement every day, we will be saved from having to see the big bad doctor? And when does it become a replacement for food?

Some say organic foods and fresh foods are expensive and at times, this is true. But at times, it is actually not. Pills are not cheap – and that is why the supplement industry rakes in over 20 billion a year and there is a GNC store on every corner in America. Popping back your Centrum every day and washing it down with coca cola adds up too, and not just in the cost of your groceries but your health. Now that the economics are out of the way, my best educated guess is that a multimineral/vitamin and Echinacea will not save you from obesity, cancer, heart disease and the common flu. At least the miracle cure for these debilitating circumstances has not been found as of yet. And getting rid of fresh foods, will not save you either.

If you have to make a choice, I would choose the fresh food. And this is why. A fresh stalk of spinach, although rich in Vitamin C, has lots of other nutritive components, particularly when cooked in healthy oils. We don’t know the vast amount of benefits consuming spinach in its whole form provides, but we do know that isolating the vitamin C into a tablet form, has not proven to be a life saver either, at least not beyond the Recommended Dietary Allowance (Unless you a pirate or sailor stuck on a boat without much in the way of fresh foods, and are experiencing scurvy). I don’t think most of us have to worry about that. My question for you is: How has the human race evolved and survived these thousands of years? Much of it is hinged on food, not pills.

So if you want to stay healthy during the ‘recession’, there are some rules of nutrition and health that I don’t think anyone can argue with.

1. Exercise every day. That means rigorously.
2. Eat fruits and vegetables that are green, orange and yellow in color in the whole form every day.
3. Don’t drink soda.
4. Drink water.
5. Avoid sugar, candy bars, gummi bears, candy corn, and other strangely dyed, colorful mushy sickly sweet treats. Just don’t eat them.
6. To add on to number 5, eat food as close to its natural source as possible. Meaning, eat a steak instead of SPAM, eat whole grain bread instead of WONDER bread, eat an orange instead of gulping down an ORANGE JULIUS, drink black coffee or an espresso instead of a FRAPPUCCINO, eat a dark green leafy salad instead of GREEN BEAN CASSEROLE.
7. Consume some sort of protein every day. Beans and nuts are a good choice.
8. Enjoy your food. Think slow food. Take time to eat without checking your blackberry or glued to a TV. Everyone can take time out to just enjoy a meal. You aren’t that important and American Idol is lame.
9. Wash your hands regularly. And wash your food well.
10. Take care of your skin, teeth, and eyes. And that is easier when you are eating fresh foods…

Snacks and Glints

Forging a Hot Link to the Farmer Who Grows the Food – cool article in the Times

Raj Patel wants you to Buy Japanese or at least, live in Japan

Teenagers near fast food = obesity. And Marion Nestle has some ideas on it. And she was in the NY times last week. Go Marion.

The new Food Inc movie. Can’t see it here in Nairobi but see it if it comes to a theater near you…

And another film called “Food Fight”. It is hard to keep up these days…

Best Trattoria in Rome? Let the Debate Begin. God, how I would die to be eating this food every night. Taking slow food to the profound letter. But hell, this the origin of slowness in all its beauty.

a vegetable garden on the south lawn

The new administration has broken ground for a vegetable garden of local, organic foods on the White House lawn. This idea, advocated by First Lady Michelle, should be credited to Slow Food USA’s president Josh Viertel and organic chef Alice Waters who have been pushing for our government to take notice and make changes how America’s food is produced and consumed. High time we have a government who is thinking about nutrition. A true seed of change indeed.

NY Times published a map of what will be planted. No beets for Barack but plenty of the fixings for Mexican food. Sounds like my kind of people.

There are some accompanying articles on organic food and its movement in the Times. And I must add that the vegetable garden article was the most viewed for three days in a row.