The “it” I refer to is the fact that the project discussed in the article comes from the Royal College of Art.  Not agriculture.  Not livestock.  Art.  This is relevant because it throws into question whether or not the entire project was created as an earnest attempt to solve a problem, or as a commentary on modern animal husbandry practices.

I encourage you to read the article.  The images alone are quite impactful.  The jist of it is this: Most people understand that the factory farming methods applied to chickens are largely believed to be inhumane.  The birds have been bred over time to reach physical maturity in about six weeks.  This rapid growth cycle is often too much for the cardio-pulmonary systems of the birds to withstand and many of them die before they can be slaughtered.  On top of the questionable breeding they are housed in huge, windowless, poorly ventilated barns with little-to-no room for movement, standing on a bed of their own feces, and reduced to cannibalizing each other out of boredom.  Seriously, it’s pretty disturbing.

But more disturbing still is student André Ford’s proposed solution.

He suggests that if the demand for poultry is such that we must be able to produce it on a mass scale, then why continue to raise chickens when we could just grow them?  Yes.  Grow.  Like a crop.  It is (apparently…) the logical extension of Purdue University professor Paul Thompson’s belief that raising more tolerant blind chickens we could circumvent many of the animal welfare problems plaguing the egg and poultry industry today.  If they are blind they won’t object as much to the conditions in which they live.  So why not take it a step further, render them fully unconscious, and house them in the most economic conditions possible?  While the chicken isn’t technically headless, it is effectively brainless.  To quote Ford explanation of the project:

As long as their brain stem is intact, the homeostatic functions of the chicken will continue to operate. By removing the cerebral cortex of the chicken, its sensory perceptions are removed. It can be produced in a denser condition while remaining alive, and oblivious. The feet will also be removed so the body of the chicken can be packed together in a dense volume. Food, water and air are delivered via an arterial network and excreta is removed in the same manner.  Around 1000 chickens will be packed into each ‘leaf’, which forms part of a moving, productive system.

• A collection of posts related to my month-long vegetarian experiment in 2010:
  • Vegetarian Update: Enlightened, Not Enraged,
  • Vegetarian Update: Cultural Connotations
  • Vegetarian Update: The New Normal.
• On Roast Chicken and Moral Failings
• A Carnivore’s Conscience

Prompted by a meeting at the San Francisco Food Bank over the summer, chef Karl Wilder was inspired to pilot test the very budget that more than 45 million Americans must follow: food stamps.  Wilder determined that a family on food stamps can spend $1.33 per person per meal.  He then calculated that if he wanted to incorporate oil and salt into his cooking he would have to lower his per meal price to $1.22.  That meant he had a total of less than $4 per day for food.  It started as a week-long experiment, but grew into a two-month long project, which he blogged about on his site, Fusion on the Fly.

Wilder’s blog offers daily updates throughout the months of July and August, but it was his article for Huffington Post that tracked him through a week of his experiment that I found to be the most concise and captivating account of his project.  As I read through a week in the life of Karl Wilder I was struck by a number of things, but what I found most alarming was this: feeding yourself on this kind of a budget is an incredible amount of work.  This is a man who is a chef.  He knows how to buy what is in season.  He knows which independent merchants and which food markets offer the best value.  He knows how to effectively utilize ingredients that many people would find obscure.  And as best I could tell, for the duration of this experiment he had no other employment obligations.  Merely sticking to this budget was his whole job.

Consider that most people on food stamps are working multiple jobs for long hours under physically demanding conditions.  Cooking from scratch is likely the least appealing thing at the end of such a day.  Not to mention that most (would “all” be that big an exaggeration?) of them do not share with Wilder the benefit of a professional culinary education and likely don’t know how to make nearly as much of a food stamp budget as he does.

Wilder provides a great amount of detail about the foods he eats, their costs per serving, the tricks he uses to stretch ingredients, and the nutritional profile of his diet.  Having skimmed several of his posts I have learned that he offers little in the way of reflection, though.  As I glanced at the posts from the end of his experiment I was hungry for some key takeaway, some macro level epiphany about how we could help people on food stamps make more of what they have, or some insight into the food stamps existence in general.  He never offers one.  What he does offer, though, is a glimpse into what toll this kind of life has had on him.  He comments in his August 24th post that,

I admit to being bored by [this diet]. I am sick of many of the foods that work in this budget. I am ready for it to be over.

For many who live this way it may never be over. We have few jobs in the U.S. and the jobs we have often pay so little food is a luxury.

When I say I’ve walked a mile in my brother’s shoes I know that my shoes have custom insoles and by comparison are more comfortable.

While Wilder’s second paragraph is more telling when it comes to the nutritional epidemic that is going on amongst the poverty stricken in this country, it is the first paragraph that hits me the hardest.  I suspect that many poor people feel they are helpless to change the distribution of wealth in America (by and large they aren’t wrong about that) so the fact that there is a larger issue at hand isn’t what afflicts them on a daily basis.  What afflicts them on a daily basis is the fact that they are condemned to a diet that isn’t enjoyable.

For most of us food is a significant vehicle for pleasure.  It is what brings us together at the table with friends and family.  It is a means of relaxation and recreation and communion.  But for people on food stamps food is merely a source of fuel; a source of stress and effort and very little pleasure.

I don’t have a solution here.  I wrote this post not because I believe I have anything new to add to the conversation.  I wrote this post because it made me sad learning about Wilder’s experiment, how difficult it was even for him, and how futile it must be for the 45 million Americans who live it every day.  Maybe you were already aware of the complicated nature of this plight.  Maybe you were already familiar with Wilder’s project.  But maybe you weren’t.  Maybe I’ve exposed you to an issue that wasn’t known to you.  If that’s the case then I’ve broadened the general awareness around this issue, and I have to believe that can only be a good thing.

White Chicken Chili

Ingredients
½ C vegetable oil
1 C yellow onion, medium dice
2 cloves garlic, minced
3 jalapeño peppers, ribs and seeds removed, small dice
1/2 tsp. dry mustard
1 tsp. cumin
½ tsp. chili powder
¼ tsp. cayenne (or black pepper if you have a milder palate)
6 Tbs flour
1 whole chicken, roasted and cooled (or 1 store-bought rotisserie chicken)
3 cans low sodium chicken broth
2 cans white beans, such as Great Northern, drained and rinsed
Salt and pepper
1 bunch cilantro
1 cup sour cream

Procedure

1. In a large stock pot or Dutch oven over medium-high heat sauté onion in vegetable oil 3 to 4 minutes.  Reduce heat to medium and add garlic and peppers and sauté 5 minutes more.  Add spices and mix thoroughly. 
2. Add flour and stir into onion/pepper mixture.  Cook roux 3 to 4 minutes until it turns slightly golden.  Meanwhile heat the chicken broth in a separate saucepan over medium heat. 
3. Whisking constantly, add chicken broth to onion mixture.  Then add and beans.  Bring to a boil over high heat and then reduce heat to medium low and simmer.
4. While broth is simmering, remove skin from chickens and pull meat off the bones.  Chop the meat into small dice and reserve in a medium bowl. 
5. Add the chicken to the broth and beans and continue to simmer until it reaches your desired consistency – probably about 45 minutes.  It will start off at a runnier consistency than it should be, but will thicken as it simmers.  If it gets too thick, just add water back in, ½ cup at a time. 
6. Add salt and pepper and adjust seasonings as necessary.
7. Finely chop cilantro and stir into sour cream.  Serve alongside. 

Pump Cakes

These are a perfect autumnal snack.  A cross between a muffin and a a cupcake, they’re actually not that bad for you.  If you wanted to be really healthy, you could use raisins instead of chocolate chips (which my mother does…) but I think they’re much better with the chips. 

Ingredients
1 box spice cake mix
1 C canned pumpkin puree
2 eggs
1/3 C water
12 oz bag chocolate chips

Procedure

1.  Mix all ingredients together in a large bowl with a spatula or wooden spoon.
2.  Portion the batter into a greased muffin tin and bake according to cupcake directions on spice cake box.

Wednesday was the first official cooking day, and I’m already thrilled with it.  IEP was waiting for me at the back door when I got home from work (which is unusual), knocking and waving as I approached.  When I got inside he exploded into a chorus of, “MOMMY!! LOOK!  LOOK!  LOOK!!  MOMMY!! MOMMY!!”  He ran to the kitchen counter and pointed very proudly to a loaf of banana bread sitting on a cooling rack.  He requested a seat on the counter and immediately picked up the entire loaf, so that I could get a better look at his creation. 

IEP eagerly told me – replete with hand motions – about how he squished the bananas, cracked the eggs, dumped the flour, and made the mixer spin.  Per Nanny, when he awoke from his nap he couldn’t wait to see the final results and quickly declared, “Banana soup is toast!  Show Mommy!  Show Daddy!”  When GAP got home he was too excited showing off the banana bread to go through the explanations again, but he made it quite clear that he was pleased with the results by sinking his teeth right into the loaf without bothering to ask that we slice off a piece. 

I’ve written before about the benefits of having something to show for yourself, and IEP’s pride and excitement really resonated with me.  As someone who’s been cooking her whole life I know well the feeling of being tickled by the fruits of your labor.  I feel such satisfaction at seeing a cake on a platter, a slice of pie on a plate, a platter of chicken parmesan, or an especially colorful salad that I’ve made.  It’s probably been 25 years since I uttered the phrase “Mommy! Look!” after completing a dish, but a tiny remnant of that sentiment still lives in the back of my mind every time I put dinner on the table.

Cooking may not turn out to be IEP’s thing.  Perhaps he’ll move on to matchbox cars, or painting, or the construction of a treehouse.  But I hope he’ll always find a way in his life to create something tangible.  Seeing his face light up with pride on Wednesday filled me up in so many ways.  And yesterday morning at breakfast I was filled again, more literally though, with delicious banana bread made by my equally delicious son.

I enjoy cooking and I like to think I do a pretty good job of it.  I make dinner from scratch nearly every weeknight (although pregnancy has seen me slack off a bit more than usual) and I’ve developed some decent culinary skills in the past 10 years.  However, I’ve come to realize that I’m in a bit of a rut, and that rut has been enabled by weekly grocery trips.

Last week the Family P skipped town for a few days.  We’d been planning to escape the heat and enjoy a change of scenery.  So our usual Sunday grocery trip was significantly curtailed and only included a few basics that we needed to get us through Wednesday.  I took it upon myself to create dinners for Monday and Tuesday nights from things we already had on hand.

I’ve given myself this challenge before and it doesn’t always pan out so deliciously.  I’ve ended up eating cottage cheese, baked beans, and leftover biscuits.  Blech.  But last week I guess I was inspired.  On Monday night we had a pasta dish with broccoli, chicken and a white wine and mascarpone sauce.  On Tuesday we had BLTs on challah with homemade fried okra.  Both meals were both wonderful, and wonderful departures from our typical go-to menu rotation.

Wednesday evening as we left town I got to thinking about my culinary adventures from the prior nights.  They didn’t require any more time or skill than dishes I normally make.  They didn’t require that much more creativity.  But there was something about them – something about the challenge at hand – that made them more fun, both to prepare and to eat.

I’m not usually one for extrapolating broad meaning out of specific situations, but this one got me thinking about other ruts in my life.  I wonder if there are other aspects of my daily routine that I would find more rewarding if I broke out of my normal patterns.  What if I hopped on a rowing machine at the gym instead of the elliptical?  What if I took the back roads to work instead of the highways?  What if I turned on some music when I got home in the evenings?  Some of these changes might not delight me as my menu shake-up did, but others might.

The old maxim goes that necessity is the mother of invention.  Last week I experienced that very phenomenon.  However, I am very blessed and rarely find myself needing anything I don’t already have.  It isn’t often that I’m called up to invent.  But my kitchen adventures last week made me realize that perhaps I should force myself to invent more often.

I piped up and said, “I just don’t get what all the fuss is about brinner.”  My colleague responded, “But, it’s breakfast for dinner!!” as though that explained everything.  I told her that I understood that she was current with some sort of cultural heatwave around eating breakfast for dinner (after all, there was an entire episode of Scrubs dedicated to the fascination with brinner), but that I still didn’t understand why breakfast served in the evening was any more exciting than breakfast served in the morning.

Then it hit me.  I came up with my very own (probably genius!) theory regarding this otherwise inexplicable excitement over an egg served after 10:00am.  I posited that the excitement stems not from breakfast at supper time, but breakfast at all.  No matter how many nutritionists preach the value of starting the day off right – with a full breakfast – far too many people blow it off.  We stir protein powder into a glass of milk and call it a meal.  We eat a Nutrigrain bar in the car on the way to work and think it counts as breakfast.  Or we skip it altogether.  But very few people – or perhaps more accurately stated, very few young working people – eat an actual breakfast every day.

And that is why so many of my contemporaries are drooling over brinner.  If they don’t eat breakfast for dinner, they don’t eat it at all.  Breakfast foods are wonderful.  Eggs, biscuits, smoothies, pancakes, waffles, bacon, and so on are terrific foods.  Forsaking them all for the convenience of a granola bar is a shame.  But I think that may be what has happened here.

I may not eat bacon and eggs every morning, but I do eat a real breakfast every single day.  And if I ever stopped, well, I’d be very cranky for starters, but more importantly, I’d really miss eating breakfast.  Perhaps then the fascination with brinner would resonate with me too.

Because it’s Friday and I’m feeling lighthearted, let’s take a little poll.  Do you eat breakfast every day?  What is your most common breakfast?  I’ll go first. As I mentioned before, I’m a crank if I don’t eat breakfast, so I take it seriously. Most days I make a strawberry-banana smoothie and a piece of whole wheat toast with peanut butter.  This week it’s been toasted banana nut bread, an egg over easy, and a small bowl of strawberries.  In the winter I switch to oatmeal and hot chocolate.  Okay, your turn!

She was nervy and determined.  She was a bit of a bohemian.  She was an intrepid rookie with the French language.  She was a beloved misfit in a nation of prim and tiny women.  She was staggeringly in love with her husband.  She didn’t take herself too seriously. 

These are all both laudable and endearing in the same breath. 

But on pages 71-72 of her book she makes the following confession:

But I was bothered by my lack of emotional and intellectual development.  I was not as quick and confident and verbally adept as I aspired to be.  … Upon reflection I decided I had three main weaknesses: I was confused (evidenced by a lack of facts, an inability to coordinate my thoughts, and an inability to verbalize my ideas); I had a lack of confidence, which caused me to back down from forcefully stated positions; and I was overly emotional at the expense of careful “scientific” thought.  I was thirty-seven years old and still discovering who I was.

It is well-known that Julia Child didn’t discover her passion and talent for cooking until she was in her late thirties, and her famous cooking show “The French Chef” didn’t debut until she was 50.  But the quote above resonated with me even more than her late-blooming career.  For her struggles in this vein are highly similar to demons I’ve battled many times myself.

I am thirty-three now.  I am a wife, mother, and professional.  I have a graduate degree.  I should be able to defend any position I have, right?  I’m not so sure.  What I do know with certainty is that I continue to struggle with many of the same issues that our beloved Julia describes.  When challenged I sometimes become nervous and emotional, rather than confident and knowledgeable.  I have become comfortable with many of my beliefs without first really questioning why they are so.  And when situations arise that call for me to explain or defend myself I rarely find myself short of words, but often find myself short of well-formed thoughts.  When I am flummoxed I get quiet.  And for any of you who know me in person you know that “quiet” is a highly out-of-character state for me. 

But it seems I am in good company.  I’m learning from her memoir that Julia Child was a work in progress – an unfinished product – throughout most of her adult life.  I find this heartening on a number of levels.  First, it spares me the shame of not having it all worked out yet.  Second, it means that I have a lot of living yet to do.  (How sad and dull life would be if by the age of 33 there were no mental gymnastics left for me to attempt.)  And lastly, it reminds me that no matter how much of my world view I am able to articulate, there is always more to learn.

We are a nation of gluttons.  We read it every day.  We hear stories on food deserts.  There are “special reports” about our addictions to convenience foods.  There is a whole movement called Meatless Mondays sweeping health- and eco-conscious consumers who aim to reduce their carbon footprint and up their vegetable intake.  And yet, as a nation, we still fail.

I am no vegetable saint.  I get a decent amount of produce in my diet, but on many days I still don’t meet the federal guidelines.  (Like many people, I’m better with fruit.)  Nevertheless, I have some go-to vegetable recipes that keep me from turning into a French fry, and in an effort to serve the greater good (I’m so charitable!) I’m going to share them with you today.

My Favorite Salad Dressing
This is from Ina Garten’s Barefoot in Paris cookbook.  It is our regular salad dressing and is also quite good drizzled over steamed veggies.  It keeps in the fridge for 4 or 5 days, although you may need to stir it if the oil has begun to separate. 

1 egg yolk
½ tsp spicy brown mustard (Grey Poupon or similar)
½ tsp kosher salt
¼ tsp freshly ground black pepper
2-3 Tbs white wine vinegar (depending on how much zing you like)
½ C extra virgin olive oil

Whisk all ingredients except the oil in a small bowl.  Then, while whisking rapidly, add the olive oil in a slow, steady stream.  Adjust seasonings to taste.  (And don’t eat this if you’re pregnant.)

My Favorite Broccoli
Super easy and so much better than steamed broccoli.  It’s not a pretty dish, but trust me, the flavor is great and this is really cozy in the winter.  (You can also use this preparation for cauliflower, which actually is pretty when roasted.)

2 heads broccoli, cut into large florets
¼ to ½ C olive oil
Kosher salt and black pepper

Preheat oven to 400.  Spread broccoli florets onto a large baking sheet.  (I use a half-sheet pan.)  Drizzle with the olive oil and sprinkle with salt and pepper.  Using your hands, toss to coat.  Roast for 10 minutes.  Then pull the pan out and flip each floret over with tongs.  Put back in the oven for another 10 minutes.  Ta Da!  (To do sweet potatoes, cut them into thick slices and extend your roasting time to 15 minutes per side.)

My Favorite Brussels Sprouts
Deb Perelman over at Smitten Kitchen is frequently a genius.  This recipe is evidence of that.  I won’t re-type it here because if you go over to the SK site you’ll get all of Deb’s witty banter and stunning photos.  But I will sing its praises saying that the rich, deep flavor provided by the combination of the pancetta and balsamic vinegar is just to die for.  But, if you’re a vegetarian you can easily omit the pancetta and the dish won’t suffer too much.  Be forewarned, though, that if you don’t like the flavor of balsamic vinegar to begin with, this recipe isn’t for you!

My Favorite Sautéed Spinach
This is more of what my grandmother would have called “a procedure” so don’t get hung up on measurements.  It’s hard to mess this up.  The quantities below will make about two servings.

½ bag prewashed spinach
½ small yellow onion, cut into half moons
1 clove garlic, minced
olive oil
salt and pepper

Drizzle about 3 Tbs of olive oil into a large skillet or sauté pan over medium-high heat.  Add the onion and garlic and sauté until softened, about 2 minutes.  Add the spinach and turn it frequently with tongs so that it cooks evenly, about 2 minutes.  Season with salt and pepper to taste.  You could also top with some grated parmesan if you’re feeling fancy.

My Favorite Pumpkin Soup
This week I finally had to put on a fleece for my morning outing with our dogs.  That means soup weather is just around the corner.  Pumpkin is packed with beta carotene and other stuff which I’m told is good for me but I don’t really know why.  So I eat it.  It’s delicious in pies, but I actually like this soup better.  (I prefer to eat my autumnal pie calories in the pecan format.)

2 shallots, minced
2 Tbs unsalted butter
1 can pumpkin puree
1 can low sodium chicken broth
1 Tbs brown sugar
1 tsp kosher salt
½ tsp freshly ground black pepper
¼ tsp freshly grated nutmeg
¼ to ½ cup cream

Melt the butter in a medium saucepan over medium heat.  Sauté the shallots until soft and translucent, about 5 minutes.  Add pumpkin puree and sauté for about one minute before stirring in the chicken broth.  Bring to a gentle simmer and add brown sugar, salt, pepper, and nutmeg.  Simmer, uncovered for about 5 minutes until thickened slightly.  Add cream and adjust seasonings to taste.

Then I remembered this article that I read last week about the environmental drain of disposable wooden chopsticks.  Apparently China goes through about 45 billion (with a “b”) pairs of chopsticks annually, or 130 million pairs a day.  Less jaw-dropping but still troublesome is the export market for chopsticks which tallies at 18 billion pairs per year.  In terms of land usage that means 100 acres of trees (about 100 American football fields’ worth) need to be felled every day.    

This is one of those topics that catches me off guard.  I had never once considered the environmental implications of wooden chopsticks.  Frankly, I prefer them because they don’t slip between my fingers and I feel less clumsy using them.  But now it seems that with every spicy tuna roll I eat, I’m killing the earth just a little bit. 

Like most issues, this one has a flip side: the economic implications of the wooden chopstick industry.  Apparently it employs more than 100,000 people in more than 300 factories throughout China.  Those people would, presumably, be out of work if there were a blanket conversion to reusable chopsticks.

The final component of this conundrum (not for me, but for the Chinese government) is cost.  Apparently disposable chopsticks cost about a penny a piece, whereas sterilization of reusable ones can cost anywhere from 15 to 70 cents.  Restaurants are disinclined to absorb this cost, but consumer advocacy groups are staunchly opposed to it being passed on to consumers. 

This isn’t an issue I can solve.  If I’m being perfectly frank it isn’t even an issue about which I have strong feelings one way or the other.  (There seem to be merits to each side.)  The reason it caught my attention is because it pulled me out of my little Midwestern work-a-day life and reminded me that there is more to the world than the radius in which I orbit.  Sometimes it’s good to be reminded of these things.  There are problems other than my own, that I might never have imagined, but which are no less significant to the people they affect than mine are to me.  (Also, if I’m feeling particularly green, I might start taking my own chopsticks with me.)

A couple of weeks ago fellow blogger Jane reposted a piece she wrote last winter about a Random Act of Kindness.  The second time around WordPress picked it up and featured it, driving huge numbers of readers to Jane’s site and leaving their own RAOK stories.  It was really inspiring.

I wanted desperately to jump on this do-gooder bandwagon, but the deck seemed stacked against me.  I simply couldn’t find the right opportunity to inject my goodness into the world.  I saw an old woman walking home from the grocery store on an especially hot day and offered her a ride.  She gave me the sign of the cross and said, “Bless you” in heavily accented English, but turned me down.  I rarely go through drive-thru windows where I might pay for someone’s order.  I didn’t see elderly people needing help crossing the street.  I was striking out left and right.  I decided to stop obsessing.

Then last week my sister Anne wrote an impassioned post about how a simple coconut macaroon helped her through an especially difficult year of graduate school.  I was moved by her post and decided that I needed to make my own batch of macaroons.  Later that day I got an e-mail from Anne which was a forwarded message from my 90-year-old grandfather.  A reader of her blog, he thought her macaroons sounded delicious and asked for the recipe.  Having made them myself I recognized that this was slightly more complicated than your average cookie recipe and potentially out of the culinary reach of a man who has probably never cooked anything more complicated than a bowl of oatmeal.

And then it hit me!

The recipe made nearly 30 cookies.  GAP is not a coconut lover and had no interest in the macaroons.  I have no business eating 30 cookies by myself.  And I could only in good conscience allow IEP (who, it turns out, is a coconut lover) to eat little bites here and there.  The answer?  A care package.

I transferred several macaroons to a Ziplock bag, wrote an accompanying note, and went to the UPS Store.  A couple of days later a truck pulled up in front of Granddaddy’s house and handed him a box that he was not at all expecting. 

That evening I received an e-mail from my grandfather which said, in part, “I couldn’t imagine what it could be as it wasn’t Xmas or my birthday and I hadn’t ordered anything from Amazon.” (As an aside, I just love that my 90-year-old grandfather e-mails and shops online.) “Imagine my surprise to open it and find it was a macaroon package from my oldest grandchild.  I had one for dessert and it was delicious.  In fact I had to make a big decision whether to eat another or not – so they would last a little longer.  Thank you so much.  I think this is the nicest ‘unexpected’ present I have ever received.”

It wasn’t anonymous.  It wasn’t for a stranger.  It wasn’t even entirely random.  But I think it captured the spirit of the little movement that Jane started.  Thanks, Jane, for providing me with such inspiration.  And thanks, Anne, for speaking directly to my sweet tooth.  You were both unwitting accomplices in making an old man very happy.