An expatriate’s take on American food
I just spent a week in New York. I had that familiar feeling every time I re-enter the United States. The food shouts at you. Well, not the food itself of course, but the packaging and presentation. Everything is filtered through a mass of words that urge, persuade, shame, incite and lecture. Choices are not about satisfying hunger and pleasing the palate but about the life and death of the individual and the planet.
From a Mexican perspective I always find it a bit strange that the likes of Marion Nestle and Michael Pollan can sell books with common sense about shopping for food. Once I get back to the States it makes sense.
For the first few days, I find the barrage very wearying. Then I begin to block it out especially as I learn where to go from the whole milk, the plain flour, the unseasoned oil, and the fruits and vegetables. Even so, I am glad to get back to Mexico where the markets have no labelling and even the supermarkets are not so full of spurious minor options presented as life and death issues.
Amen.
I live part time in NY, and the other part in Italy and I’ve taken to calling it “denial packaging”. No fat, no omega something or other, no this, no that….if the package is so busy telling me what’s not inside, I worry about what is inside!
Somehow the US culture has gotten away from recognizing pleasure and satisfaction, and eating has become a search for health benefits and diet reinforcing. Where did we lose track of the benefits of being satiated, and of understanding moderation?