Read this book. In some ways, it’s a bit depressing, but it’s also wonderful to have the info that she presents.

But back to Francesca’s original point, this is definitely part of our larger need to recognize that our focus should be health and giving our bodies what they need. To me, my kitchen is an almost spiritual place, because my body is constantly rebuilding itself, constantly (in a way) being reborn, and it’s my job to give it the building blocks it needs to do that. Not only that, the process of cooking, of devoting time and energy to nourish myself and others, is an act of love that improves the way I view and care about myself, as well as an act of art that both soothes and stimulates all my senses. Diets have always made food an enemy, putting us artificially at odds with something we need for survival. It’s as absurd as if someone started demonizing air and water. It’s encouraging that trends indicate we may be starting to move past that obsession and into a place of health, although it is less encouraging that to the media that has helped to fuel and expand those obsessions seems so surprised to hear that they are false. Tell yourself a lie enough times…

Although admittedly, I’m not feeling in a place to do much criticism of the Times today, as I dramatically improved the quality of my weekend by making the no knead bread recipe they published some months ago. If you haven’t tried it, do.

I was not aware that the stores mark the healthier items up in the less economically well-off neighborhoods as compared to the wealthier ones, but I have long been pointing out that the poor – and the working poor in particular – are generally forced into making those “bad” food choices – not because they’re stupid and don’t know any better (which some of them probably don’t, but it’s probably just as likely that some higher income people don’t know any better, either), but because they just can’t do otherwise.

You might know that the boneless, skinless chicken breast is better for your family to eat than the hot dogs, but if you’ve only got 50 dollars to feed your family of four for the week, do you get that 8 dollar a pound chicken or do you get the 99 cent package of hot dogs?

If you get the chicken, what are you going to feed them for the rest of the week?

I live in an impoverished rural area with a lot of farm land around – which means a lot of produce stands on the side of the road in the warmer months. I like to stop at them to get fresh fruits & veggies that were locally grown, because they taste better, I know where they came from, and they used to be less expensive than going into a grocery store to pick up the same thing that was trucked here from California or whatever.

Sadly, this year, the prices have all been jacked up, making those items more expensive to buy now than going to get the irradiated, GM, tasteless junk in the stores. I’m fortunate in that I have a job that is not dependent on the area I live in (I work over the ‘net), but most people around here are not that lucky and unemployment is seriously high.

But if the store produce was too expensive to begin with, and the better alternative is now also too expensive, what do those people with low incomes do? They eat the hot dogs.

And don’t even get me started on school lunches.

There is definitely a lot of effort being put into creating the idea of fat people as dumb and poor. That’s the sin arrangement: it’s bad to be “dumb”; it’s much worse if you’re poor, and it’s absolutely the worst if you’re “dumb, poor, and fat”–all sins that are contemptible because they’re always portrayed as voluntary. People are dumb because they want to be ignorant; they’re poor because they choose to be; they’re fat because they choose to be too lazy.

How much better would the world be if the media actually challenged big food corporations to fix this? Imagine what would happen if the media shamed Whole Foods to fund and supply a breakfast and lunch program in a couple of poor school districts? Or forced a fast talking politician to find usable arable land in these neighbourhoods where people could grow their own fresh veggies, every year, to ensure fresh produce is available and affordable?

I guess it is far more easy (not to mention lucrative) to foster and promote the prejudice instead. That way articles which deserve a “great big DUH” response look like an occasional breakthrough in journalism.

Yet the quality of foods provided in school free and reduced lunch programs were some of the first things to get cut…