Most people eat some combination of food that is good for them and food that tastes good. Finding the balance between the two is a lifelong journey. This is the story of that struggle.
Your humble narrator has a few quirks in the world of food. I have had a fear of funerals for more than just death. Casseroles. "Here, honey. Here are 10 casseroles to get you by so you don't have to cook during grief." Ugh.
Yet I was fascinated by the single pot or slow cooker type meal. You may have seen them in TikTok videos. Easy. Convenient.
Meat is involved. Chicken broth. Often, there is a small, bite sized pasta involved. The only debate in a lot of these recipes are whether there will be a whole block of cream cheese dropped into the dish. The answer most of the time is definitely "yes."
The recipes are centered around the 1-pot dish. Lots of pre-shredded cheese and raw ground beef.
Recipes in motion make for interesting videos. Watching cooking shows such as America's Test Kitchen can seem slow between the PBS and television aesthetics. Why wait 12 minutes when you can get the essence of a recipe in 3 minutes?
The recipe trend reminded your humble narrator of Ree Drummond, aka The Pioneer Woman, from the Food Network show of the same name. Very easy, simple to make, ingredients likely on hand. Drummond has 5 children and her hard-working, hungry husband, Ladd.
Is this cooking? Does it matter if this isn't cooking?
Recipes in motion is a good way to get a better sense of what a recipe looks like. Your humble narrator likes to do searches for recipes, such as a white clam sauce using canned clams. The words tell you the basics yet video proof is easier at times and gives you a better sense of the dish at hand.
There is a single caveat of note. These recipes are designed to feed a family or a few friends. Single people can make these dishes but there will be lots of leftovers.
The beauty of recipes, even the 1-pot kind, is that you can adapt. Maybe you make your own spaghetti sauce instead of pouring in a version from the grocery store. You could use sour cream for the proverbial cream cheese. Impossible or Beyond works just as easily as ground beef.
Perhaps you don't feel secure about "regular" cooking and these videos are a way to show your family or a prospective partner that you can do more than boil water.
We understand anxiety and how the effort behind cooking might be more difficult. The ease of dumping ingredients into a pot and having them cook together can save time and unneeded anxiety.
You might cook a fancier meal for Christmas Day but a 1-pot option for Boxing Day would be a time and energy saver.
If you are already "wasting" time scrolling on your phone, you might as well be looking for future dinner ideas.
While I am not a huge fan of casseroles, I could watch chicken pot pie recipes for 20-25 minutes at a time. Not all cooking has to be complicated.
video credit: What the Duck photo credit: TikTik/easydinnerideas
We have run across some food documentaries of late so we have reviews about the merits of these food documentaries. You might think seeing a food documentary means you don't have to watch others. True in some cases and not the complete truth with other films.
Food and Country
Ruth Reichl has a documentary about the state of the food system over the last 5 years and beyond. You might recognize Reichl from her work as The New York Times restaurant critic. Reichl takes us through the perils of COVID-19 on farmers and restaurants. One farm had geared its efforts to restaurants and had to pivot since eating out became a problem during the pandemic.
The backstory is presented, going back to Earl Butz in the Department of Agriculture under Richard Nixon. The film showcases the limited control of major production with Tyson, Cargill, and 2 Brazilian owned companies.
Food and Country points out notable solutions to improve the situation, such as getting more Black people to become farmers and the efforts of White Oak Pastures in Bluffton, GA with regenerative and organic farming.
Reichl throws in a bit of her story but is wise enough to limit that in the documentary. A good overview if you know little to nothing but a lot you may have seen before if you are clued into the food supply concerns.
AARP ran a free screening of Food and Country about a month ago. This should stream soon.
Common Ground
The primary focus of this food documentary is regenerative agriculture, the true opposite of monocultures. No-till policies help regenerate the soil. Using cattle to pollinate the grassland. This also puts carbon into the ground to help the climate crisis as well as improve the soil.
A number of celebrities are involved in the narration of Common Ground and are seen on-screen, including Laura Dern, Jason Momoa, Woody Harrelson, Donald Glover, Ian Somerhalder, and Rosario Dawson.
The tone is kind of "duh. of course we should be doing this." Normally, that can be annoying but this is obvious.
Common Ground is the follow-up film to Kiss the Ground. You can find out if there is a screening near you or to request one. Common Ground has run in select theatres and should be streaming in 2025.
Tea Creek
Jacob Beaton tells us that Indigenous food sovereignty used to be 100%. Beaton runs Tea Creek, an Indigenous food sovereignty training center in northern British Columbia in Canada. The documentary ties in with Indigenous populations having to move to less desirable farm land and the Indian Act restricting what Indigenous people could do in terms of farming.
The training center gives Indigenous people expertise and confidence to farm the land. Farm techniques also help the people take care of the land. The film talks about the importance of the 3 sisters: corn, beans, and squash. They also share the bounty with the Indigenous community, a trait of their people for hundreds of years.
The center does its best yet has run into financial difficulty.
These techniques and inspiration can also apply to non-Indigenous people so don't limit yourself in watching the documentary. This will be hard to find outside Canada yet is the most important documentary in this article.
Tea Creek is available in Canada in the Absolutely Canadian section of CBC Gem. Hopefully, there will be a U.S. deal.
The Michoacan File
On the surface, The Michoacan File is about the quest to get UNESCO certification for Mexican cuisine. That part of the documentary isn't that interesting. The telling of the story of Mexican food over centuries, the connection with the Philippines, the connection with France, the matriarchal angle of Mexican cooking, Baja California cuisine, Tex Mex, and so much more.
Milpas and the 3 sisters: corn, beans, and squash. The different names for chiles, depending on their state in the moment. This is a wonderful history of cooking that goes way beyond tacos and tostados.
The film centers on the Michoacan region as a gateway to get the UNESCO certification. They have to leave their comfort zone and cook in a foreign land where they are not wanted in the kitchen.
You can likely watch this film on demand at some point.
Crush: Message in a Bottle
We don't really cover wine, even if wine is made from food (grapes). People cook with wine so we should include this documentary. A nice overview of four seasons with the battles and challenges in the wine making process. This takes place in the Niagara region of southern Ontario, an up and coming wine-making area.
Singing Back The Buffalo is a documentary about bringing back buffalo populations to Canada and the United States. The film reinforces the regenerative agriculture argument of buffalo pollinating the grasslands. Buffalo are falsely seen in some circles as a threat to cows. Of course, buffalo is a nice alternative to cows in terms of grass-fed meat production with more Omega 3s and lower in fat.
Tasia Hubbard is a very good filmmaker and makes the buffalo a subject worthy of contemplating.
40 Acres is a feature film about Black and Indigenous farmers defending their farmland in a post-apocalyptic world. There is a bit too much killing yet tells a good story about how important farming is, especially when food is scarce.
Seeds is actually about seeds: how an Indigenous influencer gets tricked into endorsing a company that wants to patent seeds and steal her grandmother's seeds. This film also mentions the 3 sisters (corn, beans, and squash). A bit violent toward the end of the film yet an important message.
Both these films are in the film festival stage. They are both Canadian, which means they could end up on Crave within the next year and eventually on demand in the United States.
We know a lot of this content deals with Canada. These films played at a film festival in Canada and Canada does a lot of documentaries. Plus, Canada is similar to the United States in some ways.
photo credits: Tea Creek; Crush: Message in a Bottle; Singing Back The Buffalo video credits: Greenwich Entertainment; Common Ground Film; Windsor International Film Festival; Veneto International Film Festival
Your humble narrator isn't the biggest fan of ultra fancy dining. A fancy meal every so often allows you to grow as a dining human being. Fancy is fine but ultra fancy is more theatre and art than food, especially at those prices.
In Chicago high dining circles. Charlie Trotter and Grant Achatz were and are well-known names. If you want to be seen as being cool, then you would dive into this opportunity. "Hey, look. I got into this exclusive experience. You didn't. I am better than you."
Eng points out the cost for the tribute dinners (Trotter died in 2013) is $175-$235 per person. This does not count tax, tip, and drinks. From the article: "Wine pairings, starting with Champagne and ending with port, range from $135 to $345 for ultra reserve vintages. Non-alcoholic pairings cost $75." I suppose a Mexican Coca-Cola is out of the question.
Trotter and Achatz's restaurants (Achatz worked at Charlie Trotter's restaurant) are about pageantry and being seen more than the food itself. You pay through the nose for that luxury.
You get some fancy food, not much on any one plate:
"The meal starts with a ring of Osetra caviar, sea urchin, vodka créme fraiche and daikon that sings of the sea with a whisper of fruity sweetness. Other standout courses include:
Summer-kissed heirloom tomato soup with crunchy dried tomato bits and an avocado coriander sorbet.
A slice of rare venison over shredded oxtail infused with cherry juice and surrounded by a rich mole and cashew vinaigrette.
Buttery Peruvian sea bass over chanterelles and a veal reduction.
Puddingy banana bread, laced with warm chocolate ganache and topped with a coconut cookie, ripe bananas and malt ice cream that I still can't stop thinking about."
The article shows some pictures. Eng said in the article, "No, you will not still be hungry after this meal. If I was full, anyone would be full." She is likely correct, simply because there are a number of courses. The goal shouldn't be all you can eat at a family style restaurant. When you paying a lot for fancy food, the portions will be tiny. That is a key part of the panache.
One of the lures of the tribute dinners is to meet like-minded people who did Trotter's when that restaurant was still active. Perhaps you can't — or won't — put a price on that kind of experience.
That isn't what food should really be. Art and performance can be in that realm. Food should be reasonably approachable. You can go to museums and see some of the greatest art in the world. Of course, museums are financially subsidized.
The costs are ridiculous yet the money is only part of the issue. You can go to Chez Panisse in Berkeley (lunch in the photo at the top of this column) and pay a lot for a very good meal. Lunches upstairs are cheaper than dinner downstairs. You could go to Swan Oyster Depot on Polk Street in San Francisco, pay a lot of money (cash only) for some amazing seafood. The ambiance is way more casual so bragging rights aren't a big deal.
You could find a quality place and spend $100-$125 (per person) for a very nice meal with wine. A nice quiet meal with no publicity.
Theoretically, one could participate new in this process, dish out the money. If they even think in their head that they didn't get value for the money, one can't say it was so-so. You have to praise what you consumed, regardless of the reality. That doesn't sound encouraging.
The design of the Charlie Trotter original and tribute experiences is to be exclusive, not inclusive, even more than just fancy dining. They are considered great chefs not because of the way they cook or how the dishes turn out but by charging large sums of money for that exclusive experience.
If I am ever in Cetara, Italy on the Amalfi Coast south of Naples, I am headed for Al Convento, Pasquale Torrente’s place featured with Anthony Bourdain on No Reservations. I wouldn't care how much the bill would be. All of the dishes Bourdain ordered looked so good. Cetara is known for local anchovies.
A memorable meal with a beautiful ocean view. I would take pictures and show them on social media. No one around me would be bragging that they were there because of the company, just the food. I want to dine out for the food and not some fancy exclusivity.
"A two-hour meal of eight set courses introduced by servers explaining how the elements reflect Trotter's passion for jazz, Japanese cooking, game meat, seasonal produce and even Nancy Silverton's panna cotta."
Ultra fancy dining requires a level of trust of epic proportions. If you had a boatload of money AND a lot of trust in Charlie Trotter, you would likely salivate at the above description. You have to trust Achatz and the others who put together the tribute dinners maybe even more than Trotter.
I do struggle with trust, especially in food relationships. I trust Alice Waters now but there was a time when I didn't have that trust.
This is the difference between fancy dining and ultra fancy dining. I can trust fancy dining for an occasional treat. I struggle to trust ultra fancy dining, even if I had the money to justify an evening's meal.
Cooking shows are supposed to be accurate. They usually are, except for the constantly repeated mantra: "The alcohol will cook out." You can say it 3 times in a mirror but that doesn't make it true.
Most of us don't have an issue as to whether the alcohol cooks out. The concern is for those where alcohol is a concern and they are being told a dangerous lie.
You likely enjoyed when McDonald's cooked your French fries in beef tallow a couple of decades ago. The Indians who don't consume anything from cows as well as other vegans were upset to find out they had consumed beef tallow unknowingly.
Say "virtually." Journalists use "allegedly" or "police said." Like when dietitians and many others on the mainstream side of food say that sugar and high-fructose corn syrup are virtually the same. There is a wide difference between them. At least they aren't saying they are the same.
The alcohol is the reason why you put that into dishes. Alton Brown has noted that tomatoes are rich in alcohol-soluble compounds.
The world is now filled with fake cocktails for those who want the taste of alcohol. Your humble narrator has tried a ton of them and rejected all that taste like the alcohol in question.
Alcohol evaporates when it’s heated. So in theory, cooking will make it evaporate away. And, because the boiling point of ethanol (173 degrees) is lower than that of water (212 degrees), it seems like you should be able to cook off all the alcohol in a dish without cooking off all of its water.
In practice, it doesn’t work that way. When alcohol and water are combined, they dissolve into each other, forming a solution whose boiling point is neither 173° nor 212°, but variable, depending on the ratio of the ingredients.
The more you cook off alcohol from a dish, the lower the ratio of alcohol to water in the dish becomes, which means the alcohol cooks off more and more slowly. Finally, when the alcohol level reaches about 5 percent, it plateaus, and won't get any lower.
The story notes that a stew containing wine, simmered at 185° for 10 minutes, has as much as 60% of the initial alcohol while that same stew simmered at 185° for 2½ hours has about 6% of the initial alcohol.
This comes up for alcoholics as well as those on medicine where you aren't supposed to drink, such as antidepressants.
A trick I use is to buy small bottles of wine (as seen above) and use them for cooking. This can be helpful in situations where you are living with someone who might be tempted by a whole bottle. This example won't help every case but a great option where that is viable.
Your tomato dish or whatever you are cooking will be just fine without alcohol. Stock and white wine vinegar are good options but there isn't a limit on them. The America's Test Kitchen story notes that "fruit juice naturally contains alcohol" so keep that in mind.
Twitter capture: @altonbrown photo credit: manufacturer (not an endorsement of a specific company)
The stereotype is that a vice president has an important job yet usually doesn't do a whole lot. A U.S. vice president who spent time on food policy would be a great start.
Tim Walz is the governor of Minnesota and the vice presidential pick to run with Vice President Kamala Harris on the Democratic Party ticket. Walz has been praised for his work on getting school breakfasts and lunches to be free in Minnesota.
Eater.com pointed out Walz's understanding of the "connection between food and climate change."
Walz is from a Midwestern state where they understand food. Harris is from California, a state that understands about the growing of food.
Reducing the stigma of lunch debt. Knowing first hand having been a school teacher that kids learn better when their stomachs are full.
We feel confident that the Minnesota governor knows that turkey is meat. Turkey is a big deal in Minnesota. The fact that Walz's daughter Hope is vegetarian means he has a resource to understand that approach to food.
The reality is that the status quo, of which Vilsack is a champion, feels like everything is fine with the U.S. food approach. The days of drafting Michael Pollan as secretary of agriculture is beyond a pipe dream.
If Americans voted based on food policy, the Democratic Party would win every time. Then again, if they voted on food policy, voters would want the Green Party or a left of center party such as the New Democratic Party in Canada.
As we've seen in politics, the secretary of agriculture doesn't really tackle concerns over the food supply. When I covered U.S. politics, those who rooted for Tom Vilsack (former Iowa governor) were likely disappointed at his 8-year stint in that cabinet post. Those people were surprised that President Joe Biden brought back Vilsack for the same post. That said, Vilsack is miles ahead of Sonny Perdue in that capacity.
There is proposed legislation to establish the Federal Food Administration under the umbrella of food safety and promoting nutrition. Sen. Dick Durbin (D-IL.) and Rep. Rosa DeLauro (D-CT) introduced the legislation.
Food and Drug Administration (FDA). United States Department of Agriculture (USDA). Health and Human Services (HHS). All of these agencies sort of cover these topics yet the USDA is more about promoting food and the FDA is more about drugs.
Food safety would be helpful given e-coli spills from factory farms but we are concerned that "food safety" will be making sure we have more UHT milk.
Unfortunately the Federal Food Administration won't see the light of day as long as the Dems don't control the House of Representatives. The presidential race is crucial yet the lower ballot races also matter a lot.
We know some of the right-wing side of government don't want another federal agency. They don't complain about the Transportation Security Authority (TSA). They might want a better run food system.
Reverse the monoculture mentality of Earl Butz. Diversify farm ownership so farms aren't "too big to fail." Have a smarter immigration policy so more crops aren't wasted on farms. Stop making front and back labels on food being a shell game approach. Make declaring one's self organic a hell of a lot easier. Treat chickens, cows, and pigs with more dignity.
Create a food system that feeds more Americans without relying on bragging as much about food banks. Just some of the many ideas I would incorporate as a secretary of food safety and nutrition.
This may seem naive but I think there could be true bipartisan agreement on improving the food supply. Most Republicans aren't rich and many of them go to food banks. The corporate mentality toward the food system clouds people's thinking.
photo credit and video credits: I Am Grambling Twitter capture: @balanceoffood
I recall the Ant and the Grasshopper from my childhood. The Aesop fable shows an ant preparing food for the winter while the grasshopper dances away in the summer. Winter comes and the grasshopper is starving and asks the ant for food.
If you live in a space where winters can be terrible, going out and finding fresh fruit is problematic. Yes, there are individual quick frozen (IQF) options but they can be expensive.
Our solution involves being more ant than grasshopper. Buy up local fruit. My local farmer sells blueberries in 5 lb. boxes. Get the box home and put the blueberries into containers. Put the containers in the freezer. Wait for winter to come and then enjoy local summer fruit in winter.
"The fruit won't be as lovely as it is in late July." You are correct. Not as lovely yet very good in other ways. I make blueberry lemonade in the winter. I sometimes will pop a few straight out of the freezer. Pure blueberry goodness.
Alton Brown offers a way to frozen strawberries that sounds impressive. While we think strawberries are better than blueberries, we think frozen blueberries do better than frozen strawberries. Plus, I am not using dry ice in any form.
I also love the convenience of not adding fruit to my winter shopping list. I don't have to run out into a blizzard to chase down fruit. I don't have to succumb to buy a Driscoll box in the middle of winter.
Some will take fruit and can the fruit or make jams. Hats off to you if you have that energy, kitchen space, and patience. I have none of those things. My method may not win blue ribbons. I get local blueberries at the opposite time of the year.
I do take some of the blueberries to put them in a smaller container to thaw them in the refrigerator. That is a common question I get when I tell people about this way to get summer goodness in the middle of winter.
I do supplement the winter blueberries with seasonal apples at the winter farmers market. I just know that if the weather gets really bad, I don't have to worry about getting fruit and Vitamin C in a blizzard.
If you are the grasshopper and your friend is the ant, you have to decide about helping out the ant. Include a life lesson to prepare something for winter.
Let us know what you do for local fruit when winter comes. Being a grasshopper sounds more fun in the summer yet the ant wins out in winter.
For those of us who wished (wish?) to have the kind of life Anthony Bourdain enjoyed in the second half of his existence, reduced enthusiasm feels very unlikely. Travel more than 200 days each year, eat and drink well, and having amazing adventures.
If you are around the age, okay a bit younger than Bourdain was at the end of his life, your enthusiasm is not at the level where it used to be. Less energy, less focus. Generating that level of enthusiasm leads to thoughts of nostalgia to times when you had the adventures that shaped your youth.
Parts Unknown was less physical, less snarky, and less adventurous than No Reservations. The Anthony Bourdain speed wasn't in 5th gear, maybe more like 3rd gear.
Bourdain, who didn't have much good to say about Scandinavia, did a trip to Copenhagen for Parts Unknown. That episode was mostly about going to Noma.
Reduced enthusiasm is a reality for people of a certain age. The question is how to overcome that concern.
"You can't teach an old dog new tricks"
Your humble narrator is more a fan of No Reservations than Parts Unknown. Yet the reduced enthusiasm with a lot less sarcasm that Bourdain had on the latter series: well, we can learn from that as well.
Bourdain still ate well, having more intense and deeper conversations in Parts Unknown. He kicked up the maturity from his initial A Cook's Tour when he was in his 40s into No Reservations.
The incentive to experiment is enhanced if you have an audience to cook for in your domicile. This does not include a cat or dog who just want a sample of your food, and quite frankly, won't offer significant feedback (unless they won't eat it). Cooking for one with reduced enthusiasm can lead to … bowls of cereal for dinner.
— Friends of Anthony Bourdain (@bourdainpodcast) June 10, 2024
Honoring Anthony Bourdain is making a better than average meal when your body or mind doesn't want to do a whole lot. Honoring yourself in a way. After all, the best meals Bourdain had on television were always in someone's home.
Anthony Bourdain offered good advice on what not to do with food and travel, such as his advice to stay away from the breakfast buffet at hotels. Sometimes, knowing what you shouldn't do is almost as needed as what you should do.
Shopping at local markets, a mainstay of Bourdain adventures, is a great way to jumpstart new foods and, with a lot of foods at the markets, little to no cooking required.
If reduced enthusiasm is a concern, you don't need to have 3 exciting meals every day. Think about a Saturday night dinner where you have time to put some effort into a meal. I did this on Saturday nights during the pandemic with the bagna cauda spaghetti. Listening to a jazz show out of Canada gave me a cooking soundtrack.
Take pictures of the process and meal, even if you don't post them on social media. You might be the only one who sees the meal. You can feel better looking at the pictures, knowing you are capable of making a special meal.
You can also challenge yourself to make a meal better than a local restaurant for a lot less money.
Our American readers might be really interested in the idea of a grocery store boycott in response to rising grocery prices. The profits are growing as spending power is shrinking.
We are offering up a take on the current boycott against Loblaws and its many subsidiaries in Canada. Yes, we write about Canada a lot but this example is highly relevant. The boycott is for all of May so we can get some idea as to what is happening.
The Canadian company owns other food outlets, such as Atlantic Superstore, Dominion, Loblaws, Maxi, No Frills, Provigo Le Marché, Valu-Mart, Real Canadian Superstore, Wholesale Club, Your Independent Grocer, and Zehrs. While Shoppers Drug Mart is mostly a drug store, they sell groceries.
Loblaws and other grocery store companies got the Law & Order Toronto: Criminal Intent treatment this spring based on an actual price fixing scandal over bread.
For Americans who love to complain about grocery store prices, Canadians would say "hold my beer," which is better tasting beer.
Traditionally, we run the full story on BalanceofFood.com and link to the story on CanadianCrossing.com. This time, we invite you to read the story and learn about the ups and downs of a real, live grocery store boycott.
photo credit: @foodprofessor (where I found the photo but not knowing the original source)
Eating at a place from a celebrity chef? Not much enthusiasm from your humble narrator. I thought about this when on the tarmac at the airport in Las Vegas. The woman next to me went on and on about eating at Gordon Ramsey's place and Bobby Flay's place in Las Vegas.
I was detoured to the Las Vegas airport by Southwest when I should have been killing time in Denver. I was eating airline snacks that day and even the lure of a meal from Ramsay or Flay didn't make me salivate.
These celebrity chefs aren't cooking your personal dinner. They lend their approach and recipes and then jet off somewhere to be on food television.
As the woman switched topics to the excitement of gambling in Las Vegas, my mind wandered to a question I never thought I would ask myself: "Would I eat at a restaurant from a celebrity chef?"
I have eaten at a few places of somewhat famous people: Xoco from Rick Bayless (Chicago), Chez Panisse from Alice Waters (Berkeley, CA), and Garde Manger from Chuck Hughes (Montréal). I admit this with the idea of disclosure. Maybe they qualify as "celebrity chefs" but they are restaurateurs who happen to be moderately famous. If you view them as "celebrity chefs" on the level of Ramsay and Flay, then perhaps you think I am a hypocrite.
I am tempted by a José Andrés restaurant in my city, mostly because I think this might be more authentic Spanish food. I have not dined there.
I would order coq au vin at a theoretical Julia Child restaurant, provided the dish was made in the spirit of The French Chef, her TV show.
The lure of an old hen, French wine, and a solid cooking technique. A dish that is difficult to duplicate at home. Going to a Julia Child celebrity restaurant for a lovely plate of coq au vin would be nice on a Friday night or even an early dinner on a Tuesday.
Alton Brown did an episode on coq au vin. Even by his standards, this was a complicated dish. Brown fully admits in the episode that finding an old hen is rather difficult.
Does Julia Child, if she were alive, have to cook this dish herself? No. The staff would have Child's recipe and ideally the dedication to bring that to fruition, so the standards for her coq au vin would remain.
This is also why there never was a Julia Child celebrity restaurant. The standards would be too high, even if that would lead to an enjoyable meal.
I did order the lobster poutine at Garde Manger in Montréal, Chuck Hughes cooked that same dish on Iron Chef America in defeating Bobby Flay. I didn't see that episode until after I had the lobster poutine. I did smile a bit, knowing I actually had that dish.
I enjoyed the fact that Hughes beat Flay in that episode more than the coincidence of eating a dish served on Iron Chef America yet I enjoyed both within that episode.
The lure of a celebrity chef is that you love them on TV, feel like you can relate to them and their recipes, and feel comfortable in a celebrity chef type restaurant. Those people flock to Las Vegas and eat at a place because of that celebrity chef endorsement.
You should try a celebrity chef restaurant as long as you know the parameters involved. Just lower your expectations.
video credit and photo credit: The French Chef/PBS
Despite what dietitians, good dietitians say, getting helpful, practical advice on eating and diet (in the general sense of the word) is difficult. We have noted that for years.
Back in the day when I hung out with dietitians, most of them were trapped in PR firms, justifying corporate food decisions. Few of them actually did what you think dietitians would do: help guide people to making smarter food decisions.
Besides being invisible, dietitians are generally quiet. The Washington Post and The Examination, a new nonprofit newsroom specializing in global public health, recently wrote a story about "anti-diet" dietitians on social media. Not all of the dietitians involved acknowledge their links to corporate food companies. Even those whose posts are listed as sponsored should be seen with a critical eye.
The "anti-diet" concept sounds intriguing if taken with a sincere lens in navigating the food scene but is mostly used to justify consuming big company breakfast cereal and other such food.
Social media and influencers are not the best sources of food information, sponsored or otherwise. I can rationally say that and mean it. Doesn't mean that millions of girls and young women aren't vulnerable to that influence.
So who do dietitians attack for such information being released? The dietitians? Social media? The misleading information? Nope. If you said the media, you would be correct. You can find such examples here and here.
Dietitians know about nutrition and specialize in communication to get that message out to people. Blaming the media is not as constructive as talking about the good work of dietitians and scolding bad behavior.
I am not a dietitian. I don't get sponsorships because I am not selling anything or my ethical standards. I do know how to communicate.
When Alton Brown did his "diet" episode, Brown talked about the general use of the word diet. In this sense, we are all on a diet. In this sense, we shouldn't be on a diet in the mainstream definition.
Dietitians run into this madness with the mantra of "there is no good or bad food." There are some very good foods and very bad foods. There are: sorry, dietitians. Most countries don't deal with high-fructose corn syrup. Most countries have a sense of banning food dyes and ingredients that should be outside of the norm. The United States and Canada (to some extent) use the "nothing can hurt you" rule where food safety is concerned. Processed food can have a place but using an anti-diet cloak to justify processed food to serve corporate food overlords is exactly what dietitians should fight to prevent that happening.
Foods can be utilized in smaller quantities. Theoretically, breakfast cereal can serve some purpose: in lieu of a dessert, measure out a cup with a cup of the milk of your choice, a splurge when feeling down.
The story points out how General Mills specifically promoted the anti-diet message at the Food & Nutrition Conference & Expo (FNCE) convention in Denver last fall. Be entertained by the temptation but don't follow through.
The social media influencers make a louder sound because the hard-working dietitians who are helping people are quiet. March was National Nutrition Month and we do hear more from dietitians during that time. Not so much from April to February.
20 years ago this month, I was that person who needed help. My doctor turned me over to a certified diabetes educator who was helpful on the basics. I did a lot of research in the coming weeks. I shook a lot of bad habits and added some good habits.
I hit a plateau and figured out to ask, "how do I get out of a plateau." I changed some things and I was moving in a good education.
My anxiety and depression make eating these days a struggle. I know what to do but I struggle to do them properly.
I know enough to know if I was being scammed or sold a false bill of goods. The food system, especially in the United States, is a raging river and most people don't even have a raft. The bad people speak up because the good people don't, until someone in the media writes about it, and then they whine about the media.
The Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics (the new name for the old American Dietetic Association) has a Code of Ethics (really!). Here is Part 2a:
Nutrition and dietetics practitioners shall: Disclose any conflicts of interest, including any financial interests in products or services that are recommended. Refrain from accepting gifts or services which potentially influence or which may give the appearance of influencing professional judgment.
If you are a dietitian, ask yourself if you follow these guidelines. Also ask if you should care if dietitians violate the letter and spirit of the Code of Ethics. We should care.
Some of the dietitians' angst toward The Washington Post centers around this story from last fall on similar concerns.
Dietitians truly have it rough because they get all this education and then there are financial pressures to sell out to corporate interests so you can put your own food on your table, whatever food choices you make. Society benefits from dietitians free of conflicts. Try to find a dietitian who seems ethical and ideally doesn't have a ton of sponsorships, revealed or otherwise.
There is no right way to finding the balance of food, just your way. My typical breakfast is whole wheat spaghetti with homemade sauce, sautéed mushrooms, and a naturally low-fat Italian cheese sprinkled on top. Works for me.
