Balance of Food

Slider Bites: MSNBC focuses on food waste

Food waste is as important as underreported. MSNBC took time this week to delve into this valuable topic on "Just Eat It: A Food Waste Story."

The news channel showed part of the documentary "Just Eat It." The documentary was introduced by celebrity chef Tom Colicchio, who is now MSNBC's food correspondent.

The documentary follows Jen Rustemeyer and Grant Baldwin as they attempt to go 6 months eating only the bounty of wasted food, though they could eat other food at friends and family.

When we don't hear from the couple, we get a lot about how grocery stores and restaurants want beautiful looking produce and perfectly good food is thrown out over vanity.

• What's Tempting: Ugly fruits and vegetables

Grant and Jen were concerned that they might not have enough food. They discovered that food abundance, especially in certain categories, was the issue.

After the documentary aired, Colcchio hosted a panel discussion (see video above). In the discussion, author Jonathan Bloom pointed out that Americans spend less on food than any other nation. If food were more expensive, we'd be less likely to waste it.

You can find more information about the special, click here. For more on the film itself, click here.

Hopefully, we will get more enlightening specials on food stories. Colicchio is a chef, not a journalist. We hope that between food and journalism, we will have more conversations on vital but underreported issues.

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We love the Daily Show's take on food and were glad to see Aasif Mandvi back doing a story on Simplot and GMOs.

We were simply puzzled by what aired. Mandvi found a guy who had some offbeat theories about GMOs. Those who are concerned about GMOs know there are some unconventional takes on anti-GMO theories.

The new GMO potato from Simplot was praised in the story. While the GM potato is different than the other GMOs, the paintbrush felt like GMOs were okay. We expect that from CNN, not the Daily Show.

Mandvi had a bad time with Simplot in an earlier story. Simplot would love this story.

Cornell University's Dr. Walter De Jong in the story plays an economist, saying the anti-GMO people have pushed regulation so that only large companies (e.g., Monsanto) can afford to do GMOs. He should stick to science.

The story wasn't particularly informative or funny.

The GMO potato might be okay. The issues with GMOs stem (pun intended) from use of insecticides, companies such as Monsanto, and a lack of independent information.

The Daily Show normally celebrates the idea of the more information, the better, and with humor. This story had none of those traits. If you watch and disagree, let us know in the comments section or on Twitter @balanceoffood.

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videos credit: MSNBC; Daily Show

Toronto gets an In-N-Out Burger for a day

The following article is courtesy of our sister blog, CanadianCrossing.com. It has been reproduced here with complete permissions.

In-N-Out Burger is legendary in the United States, but mostly because of its scarcity. In 2011, the chain expanded outside the U.S. southwest to Texas.

However, for one day, In-N-Out Burger comes to Canada.

Today from 11 am to 3 pm, the heralded burger chain will pop up at the Italian restaurant Ganzi Osteria at 504 Jarvis in Toronto.

At the pop-up version, you can get double-double burgers (two patties and two slices of cheese), animal-style burgers (mustard-grilled patty with lettuce, tomato, pickles, grilled onions and extra spread), and a protein-style version (served in a lettuce wrap instead of a bun).

As you can see from the Google map above, you can get off at the Wellesley station at Yonge Street. Or you can get off at the Sherbourne station on the Bloor-Danforth line. If you are strolling through St. Lawrence Market this morning, it's a decent walk north on Jarvis.

The 1-day popup can only do so much to embrace what makes the fast food chain special.

-- In-N-Out Burger treats their employees better than typical fast-food chains. For one day in Toronto, you can't see that in action.

-- You can order your In-N-Out Burger medium rare or rare in the United States. Can't do that legally in Canada.

-- We don't know about fries or milkshakes. If fries are an option, you can order them animal style. All part of the secret menu that is the charm of In-N-Out Burger.

-- In-N-Out Burger is normally a leisurely experience, but for 4 hours for a pop-up, the fine print notes "First come, first served. Limited quantities available" and there will be a huge line.

-- The only palm trees you will see in Toronto is on the wrappers and signage.

Toronto joins other major world cities that have hosted a In-N-Out Burger popup, including Shanghai, Tokyo, Sydney, Singapore, London, and Auckland.

We don't know why Toronto or Canada for In-N-Out Burger, but the timing is during the Toronto International Film Festival, so if you go, you might see a celebrity or two (or their assistants) in line with you. Movie stars come from Southern California and so does In-N-Out Burger … for a limited time.

map credit: Google/logo credit: In-N-Out Burger/photo credit: Twitter @shaortega

Farmland is propaganda, but Katie Couric doesn't help Fed Up credibility

The two most-buzzed about food documentaries this year are Farmland and Fed Up. One is propaganda and one isn't.

At least, that is one interpretation.

I first heard about Farmland via friends on Facebook. Fair enough. It seemed odd that I hadn't heard much about it otherwise.

With a modicum of digging, I figured out why Farmland hadn't crossed through: the movie was released by Big Food as propaganda. The reception I saw about Farmland on Facebook was generally positive. Not overwhelmingly positive, but positive.

Further reading proves why I'm glad I didn't waste my money and time. A lot of these documentaries flow together; I certainly didn't want to ruin my mind on a film that was trying to trick me.

Fed Up is not propaganda, though if you question the film's intent, you could easily conclude that the film is propaganda.

Companies that get rich off of high-fructose corn syrup and corn would think Fed Up is propaganda. Then again, some of those companies were involved in the propaganda that is Farmland.

If you look at the marketing of Fed Up, the corn people should be somewhat happy. After all, the marketing lumps corn sweeteners as "sugar." The film's Web site compares the addictive properties of sugar as "tobacco and alcohol." "The more sugar you eat, the more you need to satisfy your craving." Except that not all "sugar" is sugar.

We have a huge problem in this country with high-fructose corn syrup and artificial sweeteners. But the marketing of the film lumps everything together as "sugar." That doesn't help address the issue.

Marketing a film as "the film the food industry doesn't want you to see" sounds noble, but the motto inspires laughter more than anything else. The food industry won't care if you see Fed Up or Forks and Knives or King Corn.

Forks over Knives has good message, but presentation needs work

Forks and Knives and King Corn are other similar films are more straightforward, but their message is more general: eat better grown food.

Fed Up takes a simplistic position on a complex topic and takes a side, an obvious side. On some level, that is propaganda.

The difference might be whether you like the message in the film. The Farmland message is that farmers work hard so you shouldn't question how your food is grown or how animals are treated. We know that is propaganda because the people behind the film are being deceptive about the truth to further themselves.

Katie Couric is one of the major players involved in Fed Up — an executive producer and narrator. Couric's popularity has overshadowed her journalism sins.

Some might remember the plagiarism incident where Couric was reading first-person essays that didn't come from her experience. The sham was unveiled when a CBS News Web producer was fired for plagiarizing a Wall Street Journal column. Couric was never punished for her role.

Couric's worst journalism sin was "being deceptive about the truth to further themselves." In July 2008, Couric interviewed then GOP presidential candidate John McCain on the CBS Evening News. The answer McCain gave to a question was edited out of the interview and an answer to a different question was inserted into the interview.

The substitution was a direct violation of CBS News rules. The blame was shifted to an unnamed producer who edited the piece. Yet no one involved, especially Couric, were ever punished much less fired.

What Couric did was propaganda and passed it off as news. This isn't to say that Fed Up is propaganda, but you'll have to forgive me if I don't trust the journalism skills of Couric.

BalanceofFood.com film coverage

I didn't go see Farmland because I know from good sources that it is propaganda. I didn't go see Fed Up because of a major player in the film who has done propaganda. While I am not directly comparing the two situations, others will make different choices.

Propaganda is not always black and white. Elements of Farmland are true or relevant. Elements of Fed Up are true and relevant. While Fed Up has distinct advantages over Farmland in being true and relevant, to preach outside the converted, the voices have to be credible. There are a lot of voices in Fed Up that are absolutely credible: Katie Couric is not one of them.

What's Tempting: Celebrities going vegan

Going vegan is a challenge in itself, but made more difficult if you don't know anyone who had gone through the process. If you don't know people in your own lives who have made that switch, you can always live through celebrities. And since a lot of us feel like we know celebrities, well, that's "just as good."

Jay-Z and Beyonce are 10 days into their 22-day vegan challenge. Already the two music stars have an advantage, since Jay-Z knows someone going through the process (Beyonce) and Beyonce knows someone going through the process (Jay-Z). And they're both celebrities.

If Jay-Z and Beyonce aren't at your speed or you don't even know who they are, Al Gore is another recent convert to being vegan, joining former President Bill Clinton.

A brief check of celebrities who are vegans unveiled names such as Lea Michele, Jared Leto, Ellen and Portia, Natalie Portman, Russell Simmons, Sandra Oh, Alicia Silverstone, and Daryl Hannah. Silverstone even plays a vegan in her recent film, "Butter."

Jay-Z says the idea came from a vegan friend of his who "challenged me to embrace a 'plant-based breakfast' every day. So he had 2 things on his side: 1) someone who knew the landscape of being vegan, and 2) a direction to experiment with one meal in a day.

The first smart move is identifying this as "plant-based." In the rapper world, "vegan" might sound hippie-like, but "plant-based" might also sound like Snoop Dogg would be doing the challenge instead of Jay-Z.

Going 22 days as a vegan or eating a plant-based diet isn't a challenge to those who are vegetarian and lean vegan, or a well-established vegan. Doing so without having that much of a background, especially around holiday time, is a significant challenge.

Jay-Z announced this quest on his Life and Times blog. Jay-Z doesn't leave his followers in the cold on how to go vegan. The initial blog entry provides a link to a Web site conveniently entitled 22 days nutrition complete with 22 days of menus for vegan options.

Here is the menu from the first day:

Breakfast: Vanilla chia pudding with 1 cup fresh berries

Lunch: Crunchy red cabbage and green apple sesame slaw with 1 cup steamed, cubed sweet potato (or 1 small sweet potato, baked)

Afternoon snack: 1/4 cup hemp hummus with fresh vegetables (carrots, celery, romaine leaves, bell pepper, etc.)

Dinner: Black bean and quinoa salad with quick cumin dressing

Dessert: Dark chocolate

Celebrities, especially those who have to keep in good shape, have perks in their lives that average people don't get to enjoy. Fewer meals on the go, no commuting pressures — you can control more of your lifestyle.

The former vice president cited the impact of meat in climate change as a reasoning for going vegan. Gore's path has been quieter and a lot more subtle. Even when Gore knew how meat impact greenhouse gases, he still kept eating meat. Then again, Gore has been a vegan longer than 22 days.

If you, non-famous person that you are, chooses to go down the plant-based path to being a vegan, you can follow a more-publicized short-term path such as Jay-Z or a quieter, in for the long haul, journey such as Al Gore. Or you can dig to find out the backstory of other Hollywood vegans. Having a friend who is a vegan who will answer your questions is better than following a celebrity path.

No offense to Jay-Z and Beyonce, but a public spectacle over a 22-day period proves tempting to downplay any bumps in the road. If people are going to follow the path of celebrities, they would benefit from knowing about what to do in times of temptation or trouble. What about road trips? What about dinner parties? Was there a moment where you gave into temptation?

The 22-day method is designed to give a person time to change their ways. This shouldn't be about going 22 straight days without any animal products. The advantage to Gore's method is any slipup exists in real time; not about perfection, but finding a consistent path over a lifetime.

Often when talking to non-famous vegans on how they decided to go vegan, usually they were already vegetarian to start or a part-time vegan. Can't recall how many times I heard the phrase "I never really liked meat anyway." They weren't jumping from classic omnivore to strict vegan; even their path was an evolution, though a few of them seemingly had a head start down the path.

Jay-Z is trying to be realistic about going vegan full-time, not sure about the future. "I don't know what happens after Christmas. A semi-vegan, a full plant-based diet? Or just a spiritual and physical challenge? We'll see …"

Props to Jay-Z: no promises, no guarantees, giving a 24/7 plant-based diet a shot. Props to Beyonce, too. Good to have a loved one by your side in going down a difficult path.

What's Tempting: Meat as a flavor enhancer

We've seen the MyPlate where a ¼ of the plate is supposed to be the meat. In most households, the meat takes up more space on the plate, or rests inside a bun that takes up more than ½ of the plate.

But what if meat was there for taste without being the star of the show?

This would be like Neil Patrick Harris' role in "Harold and Kumar Go to White Castle."

For example, in my not-so-famous spaghetti breakfast, I sometimes will sprinkle a bit of pancetta or anchovies on top. The meal is vegetarian up to that point (vegan if I skip the cheese), unless I use bacon grease to sauté the mushrooms. But the extra salty nature from the pancetta or anchovies adds extra flavor without being the star of the dish.

Chili is the classic example where a little bit of meat goes a long way, especially with beans in the chili.

Previous coverage:

Bacon goes well on everything, even a veggie burger

Everything goes better with bacon, but if you used well-grown bacon, and used only a slice, you could accomplish a huge difference with just a little bit of meat.

If you cut your bacon strips in half before cooking, they cook faster. But you could also trick yourself into having two "slices" of bacon that in reality is a strip of bacon.

You might remember our look at bacon on top of a veggie burger, a way to add a little meat while the non-meat burger is the star.

The discussion is often about all or nothing: meat-eater or vegetarian. The reality can be different for meat-eaters where they still eat meat but use that meat more wisely in dishes.

An 8 oz. burger is fine, but 3 oz. crumbled beef in tacos, stir-fry, salad topping, chili, spaghetti, or half a dozen other ways could bring plenty of flavor with 62% less beef.

You don't even have to do this every night or every meal. If you went from 8 oz. to 3 oz. 3x a week, you would consume about 50 fewer pounds of beef in a year for such a small sacrifice. And you're still eating 8 oz. of meat a day for 3 other days if you eat meat 6 days a week.

If you are trying to eat better, but are freaking out over the potential loss of meat, this method will give you peace of mind while eating better. You're not losing meat, just cutting back a bit.

Buying well-grown meat with more flavorful taste is ideal when cutting back since you want as much flavor as you can with less meat. The added cost of well-grown meat is offset by using less of it per serving, and wanting to use less overall.

You still get meat and protein, just not as much. And you can add other foods that contain protein, such as beans, into the meal.

While this is about health and taste, using meat as a flavor enhancer also allows us to appreciate the wonder and glory of meat. Buried in a bun with a bunch of condiments, meat doesn't get a chance to shine in a meal. Using good stuff sparingly, but still there, allows the best of both worlds: eating meat, just less.

Slider Bites: China not the only problem with Smithfield Foods

You should be worried about the potential of a takeover of Smithfield Foods by a Chinese company. Then again, if that is your only worry, you should be paying more attention.

The primary worry last week was the impact that potentially lower standards would have on the U.S. food supply. But consumers should be even more concerned about how few U.S. companies control the vast majority of the meat supply.

Smithfield and the other companies that dominate the meat industry are, to coin a tired phrase, “too big to fail.” The cost of failure is even larger when our food supply is concerned.

The Chinese offer may be more about feeding those in China. Still, this offer gives us a chance to see if the United States “anything goes” policy includes a foreign takeover.

The United States food policy is no food policy. There is no long-term thinking or strategy for food production, health, and integrity. As much as some would like to bury their heads in the sand about how our food is grown, companies are in charge of growing most of our food. And those companies can be bought or sold with foreign or domestic buyers.

Even if the Chinese bid is not approved, we shouldn't breathe sighs of relief yet. But this should start the conversation about a national food policy.

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Internal pressure to come up with a sane food policy hasn't been terribly effective. However, outside pressure may be the answer to securing positive change. The U.S. may not care what its citizens eat, but the government cares about selling its food to other countries.

Japan halted a bid on 27,500 tons of Pacific Northwest wheat after a rogue genetically engineered strain was found on an Oregon farm. Other countries/organizations expressing concern include South Korea, the European Union, and Taiwan.

Other countries outside NAFTA want to make sure the food they are getting is GMO-free. Canada and Mexico would likely want their food to be GMO-free, but as we've seen with NAFTA, the dominant country sets the tone. And if those countries aren't sure about what they're getting, the U.S. can't ship as much food overseas as it wants.

Too bad California, Illinois, and Massachusetts can't set the same standards as Japan and South Korea.

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McDonald's came out and admitted what we suspected. No, not that. Not that. And definitely not that. No, the fast food chain admitted that their salads comprised a small percentage of sales.

We like to feel better about fast food places when they offer “healthier” choices. Then again, McD's tried really hard to cram unnecessary calories and fat (e.g., candied walnuts) into its salads, making them less desirable.

We don't ask Panera to make us a greasy burger and cold soggy fries. Sometimes, restaurants are just better off trying to be good (relatively speaking) at what they do, and not try at something where they are destined to fail.

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If I had a time machine and a functioning Flip camera, I would want to be Zachary Maxwell.

Maxwell made a film about how horrible his school lunches were. Maxwell also wanted to convince his parents that the school was not delivering on promised meals.

Maxwell almost lost a day's worth of footage after he got caught and was told he needed to delete the footage. Being a typical 4th grader, he convinced the teacher that he erased the footage, but he really didn't.

Maxwell is showing his film at the Manhattan Film Festival. I would have settled for a private screening for my parents to show them how horrible my school lunches really were. Bad school lunches that were reheated since the elementary school had no kitchen. At 10 years old, I would have loved the lunches Maxwell was rejecting. Sans proof, I couldn't convince my parents as to what I was getting. Maxwell doesn't have that problem.

Slider bites: Chris Christie's lap band surgery

Chris Christie announced that he did undergo lap-band surgery back in February to try and lose weight. This isn't news except that Christie is currently the governor of New Jersey and might be a presidential contender in 2016.

Now Christie might have been a presidential contender even without the surgery. After all, the country might have a backlash to a president who isn't as fit as Barack Obama.

The lap-band surgery isn't as extreme as other surgical options, so losing the weight slower, besides being healthier as a role, might look better in someone who could reasonably run for president in 2016.

Weight-loss surgeries aren't a guarantee. And Christie could lose some of his charm in being thinner. Or if he loses weight, but "not enough" for some, then the move could backfire politically.

Christie would be better off weighing less than he does now, and ideally, he can learn new ways to deal with food so the surgery will prove more effective.

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Ice cream is nice when you're hot and on vacation. Chances are ice cream isn't as nice when you pay 16 euros for the experience.

4 British tourists in Rome paid 64 euros for 4 ice creams at the Antica Roma bar and gelateria near the Spanish Steps.

The manager said the amount per person was more than 2 scoops. But even Italian ice cream isn't worth 16 euros.

There may have been some language issues, some places charge more if you stay and eat (they didn't), and they did leave with the cones and without their money.

I remember ordering 1 baguette in a bakery in Paris and the woman gave me two and charged me for two. That was a language issue. But if I really wanted one, I would have said so.

Yes, the gelateria overcharged. But you have to think a little even on vacation.

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The FDA is looking into possibly regulating caffeine. Yawn! Laudable that the FDA should look into this, but reality will prevent any difference making. One rule that would help is requiring any product that has caffeine to list how much caffeine is in that product.

The knowledge could backfire in that some people will find the most caffeine and consume those products. But knowledge is power and right now, most consumers are powerless.

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McDonald's decided to drop its Angus burger, and the implication was this was due to the "high" price of beef. When the vast majority of our cows is being fed GMO-corn subsidized by the government, one of the few problems with that beef is cost.

While Angus is more premium than regular beef, it doesn't stack up to grass-fed. With the unusual toppings on the Angus burger and McD's reluctant/refusal to market the burgers, no wonder that they will disappear from the menu almost as quietly as they appeared.

I mourned the loss of the McLean burger way back when. I never even thought to try the Angus burger.

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Alex Jamieson recently decided to stop being a vegan and once again eating meat. Jamieson is the long-time girlfriend of Morgan Spurlock that you might remember from "Super Size Me."

If life were a battle between eaters of animals and those who don't, this would be considered a victory for the animal eaters side.

In reality, she made a choice to go where her body said she wanted to go. In life, people will choose to be vegan or vegetarian, or go vegan before 6 (Mark Bittman), or only eat bacon for meat, or those who do weekend indulgences.

It's not like Jamieson turned into what Spurlock did in the film.

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Don't instantly trust studies, but liked this one that said teenagers were getting comparable calorie counts from ordering meals at McDonald's and Subway.

The average comparison was pretty close with 1,038 calories at McDonald's vs. 955 calories at Subway.

Subway notes that its meals have less fat, but people are getting plenty of calories and sodium from the "healthier" meals.

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With that spirit in mind, we will occasionally post notebooks, a non-fancy journalism term for thoughts about the beat in short, profound analysis between a tweet and an actual blog post. Fans of our sister blog, CanadianCrossing.com, know all about notebook columns.

Food Bites seemed cornier than normal, so I went with Slider Bites, because sliders are mockingly too small. A bite from a slider is hardly a bite at all.

A Place at the Table shows making hunger visible leads to solutions

Even food-related situations that are visible can get lost in the shuffle. But no food-related situation is as invisible as hunger.

A Place at the Table did its earnest to put a face on that place at the table. We got three concrete examples, though Rosie from Colorado stole the show. The film didn't spend as much time with Tremonica, the 2nd grade girl from Mississippi. Barbie's Philadelphia story was more about the hunger of her young kids, too young to really tell us what they were feeling. Rosie talked to us about how hunger impacted her school day and concentration. Even though Rosie's life has a lot of problems — she sleeps on the floor of the laundry room and shares that floor with her sister — she comes across as upbeat, further masking the ramifications of what hunger does to her life.

The teachers in the two stories involving school-age children are heroes in their own way. Rosie's teacher is tough with her on why she can't pay attention in class, but later we learn about her own childhood where she went hungry and watch her deliver food to her neighbors, including Rosie and her family. Her anguish as she delivers mostly starches to these families exemplifies the tragic irony of hunger: underfed and overweight.

Temptation of the Week: A Place at the Table

BalanceofFood.com film coverage

Tremonica's 2nd-grade teacher sees that world as she is diagnosed with Type 2 diabetes while Tremonica has asthma and is overweight. The simple act of teaching her students the art of appreciating honeydew melons is a beautiful, lasting lesson.

Pastor Bob in Colorado is also a hero. He develops an after-school day care where kids are fed. His food pantry has to grow to try and meet the ever-growing need for food.

Contrary to the inaccurate stereotype, these people are working. Rosie's mom is a waitress who makes $120 every two weeks, yet that is "too much" for food stamps. When Barbie does land a job, ironically helping others who are hungry to get help, she still can't afford to feed her kids well. Tremonica's mom has to drive 66 miles round trip because she can't find fresh vegetables in her Mississippi town.

Marion Nestle had an intriguing graph in the film, noting that the price of fresh fruit and vegetables has gone up 40% since 1980, yet the relative price for processed food has declined 40% over same time period. We all expect the former to happen; the latter takes some work and screwed up priorities.

The obesity issue in this country is visible in part because we can see it either in person on the street or as headless fat people in TV news stories on obesity. Obesity gets a lot more coverage than hunger, especially on TV. As A Place at the Table demonstrates, the two problems go hand in hand. We do need to talk a lot more about hunger. The best way to talk about hunger is to make that problem visible.

Mississippi to maintain #1 worst health state rating with 'anti-Bloomberg' law

When you're #1 in all the top categories, you want to ensure that you remain on top. Why do anything that might make you slip to #2?

You get the impression this is the motivation for Mississippi to pass the anti-Bloomberg bill, a local government can't pass any laws that would post calorie counts or cap portion sizes.

This was similar to Tennessee wanting to make laws banning any Sharia law. Chances of a city in Mississippi passing a "Bloomberg law" is about as much as Tennessee adopting Sharia law: none.

Mississippi hits the top of the charts in worst state from a health and economic standpoint. "A Place at the Table" documentary pointed out that the state is tops in food insecurity and highest obesity levels.

No one cares which state is #2, just #1. And the #1 state is Mississippi.

In "A Place at the Table," we meet Tremonica, a 2nd grade girl in Jonestown, Mississippi who suffers from asthma and obesity.

Jonestown has three grocery stores, but they don't fit in what most Americans would consider a full grocery store. You might find bananas as the only fresh fruit, but no fresh vegetables. Tremonica's mom drives 45 minutes to Clarksville or Batesville to find fresh vegetables. The movie pointed out that the 66-mile round trip cost her $10.68 in gas. That is well beyond a food desert.

For all the complaints of "nanny state" and "overreaching," Mississippi doesn't do enough to help the health of its citizens. The South is known for having a distrust in government, and leads the United States in obesity. There is not a direct correlation between the two. Individual responsibility is a cry when they think the government might get in the way, and clearly in Mississippi and other Southern states, individual responsibility isn't in vogue.

The state could pass economic incentives for a full-service grocery store to locate in Jonestown. The city could make things easier to set up a farmers market so the townspeople can easily buy fresh vegetables. Neither action should offend the anti-government sensibility.

The film shows us individual responsibility in motion. Tremonica's teacher, diagnosed with Type 2 diabetes, made time in her class to teach kids about different healthy foods so they would feel less intimidated. We see her showing honeydew melons to the kids.

This is individual responsibility that more people in Mississippi should adopt. Having a basic distrust in government is one issue; using that distrust as an excuse not to do anything is a cop-out. If you are "anti-government," then you have more responsibility, not less, to respond in a positive realm for yourself and your community.

Temptation of the Week: A Place at the Table

Daily Show Part I

Daily Show Part II

Food budgets are tricky: many people feel like they can save money on food and still eat pretty well. If we looked at the way the United States spends its food budget, we would find too much money spent on corn subsidies and direct and indirect payments to large conglomerate farms. We have matching issues of starvation and obesity.

A Place at the Table opens this weekend and helps us to visualize what it means to be hungry.

The statistics cited are startling: 50 million people in the United States, including 25% of children, don't know where they will get their next meal. So many wonder: where is the disconnect and why?

Since the economy is better than it was, society has less sympathy for those who struggle to find food. Then again, the invisibility increases because people are reluctant to admit that they are hungry.

Directors Kristi Jacobson and Lori Silverbush take us to Collbran, Colorado; Jonestown, Mississippi; and Philadelphia to give us three stories about the different ways people are hungry in this country.

"This is really solvable," Silverbush said on The Daily Show with Jon Stewart. "We know what causes hunger; we know how to fix it."

The film points out that hunger in the United States was pretty much solved by the late 1970s. The Hunger in America film that aired on CBS in 1968 is referred. Within two weeks, Congress passed bipartisan legislation. CBS followed up 10 years later to see that the hunger problem got better (yes in pre-cable news, TV journalists would follow up on complex topics).

Why did things change? "In a word, Reagan," Silverbush said to Stewart.

The directors pointed out that this country went from 200 food banks to 40,000 food pantries and banks, yet the hunger problem was "too big for those groups to handle," Jacobson said to Stewart.

They point out that 80% of people on SNAP are working poor. "Poor people need a better lobby," Stewart said.

The timing of the release of the film obviously wasn't scheduled as the same day of the sequestration, but the directors did point out that the government cuts means that 600,000 mothers and infants will lose formula.

The hope from the directors and everyone involved in the film is for as many people to see this film as possible. The underlying purpose is to get people involved in helping those who don't have enough to eat, and getting people with food to be able to afford better choices.

At a dinner table around the holidays, we always say that there is room for one more. Well, America has a table and 50 million in the United States are looking for a place at that table.

A Place at the Table opens today in theatres. If you don't live near one of the theatres, the film is available on iTunes and OnDemand.