As my stomach grumbles, I turn to Carissa and propose we create a meal of our own! We hop into the car and travel to the nearest store to gather our supplies, much similar to the ways of the hunter gatherers from whom we descended. After much debate and torturous deciding, due to the endless choices before us, we have settled upon a mixed lettuce salad with vegetables, baked chicken, green beans and mashed potatoes, and a blueberry cheesecake to finish our meal. After purchasing the various ingredients required for creating our meal we put it all together, serve, and enjoy!
By completing all of these things together, Carissa and I have thoroughly considered the nutritional value of our meal along with the social aspect. Michael Pollan suggests that the ‘Americanized’ diet, referring to highly processed foods and overall unhealthy choices, has consumed all of the American citizens. Taken as a whole, chapter one, section seven of Michael Pollan’s book In Defense of Food generalizes the entirety of the American population to elude to the fact that all of the food chosen for consumption is bad. By ‘chewing 100 times before swallowing’, all flavor is supposedly lost but the nutritional value is higher. If the American citizen chooses a meal that is nutritionally sound initially, these problems won’t arise.
"How a people eats is one of the most powerful ways they have to express, and preserve, their cultural identity, which is exactly what you don't want in a society dedicated to the ideal of "Americanization".
America is the melting pot where the entire whole world has influenced food intake and creations. Food of all cultures has blended together and traditions have remained strong throughout the ages. If America is the melting pot, the ‘ingredients’ for the cuisine must originate in another culture, first. Are said cultures and places of origin unhealthy and influencing America to lean toward that type of consumption culture? Does individual choice factor into this generalization at all?
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