Let Them Eat Cake?

Calling for a food revolution, participants of the first-ever Slow Food Nation convention are convened in San Francisco this week.

The revolution centers on eating fresh, whole foods grown in a sustainable manner.

From a story in USAToday:

"People need to reprioritize food — much as they did in the 1940s before processed fast foods took over, says Slow Food Nation executive director Anya Fernald. 'This is an event to birth a more political food movement. We're operating in a context where it's become blatantly obvious that we're eating ourselves to death in America.'"

Some have criticized the group's platform as being elitist, but they argue that you can either pay more in upfront costs for healthier foods or you can pay more for later health care costs.

Michael Pollan's recent In Defense of Food: An Eater's Manifesto shares a similar thesis. His three rules of eating boil down to: 1. Eat Food, 2. Not too much, 3. Mostly plants.

I read it about a month ago and I haven't stopped talking it up since. Pollan's simple argument against the Western Diet — and its related diseases — was too persuasive (of course, right now as I type this, it's not even lunchtime yet and I'm eating a box of cherryheads, so take that how you will.)

The slow food convention organizers hope that other cities will host similar events. In the meantime, organizers plan to post convention seminars and lectures to YouTube in coming weeks.

Brussels Sprouts. If anyone cares, I roast mine with olive oil and kosher salt. When I'm not eating candy for dinner, that is.