This Isn't Progress

I remember worrying about babies who only ate macaroni and cheese and corn. Now many of them eat pre processed fibers with artificial flavorings and fat added for taste, shaped to look like whatever food it is masquerading as. The elderly are probably one of the few groups who still remember plain old food and if they live in institutions the food they are served often makes them think their taste buds have gone ahead and died ahead of them. Imagine pureed vitamins and carbs molded to look like a pork chop.

The art of cooking is dying and since most of us cannot afford to take our families to good restaurants night after night, fast food has replaced pot roast, green beans and potatoes. We don't want to eat too much meat, or too many carbs, or too much salt and we don't really know how to jump in there and throw something together that is healthy like they do on tv. Most of us don't just happen to have little bags of fresh herbs lying around, or jars of exotic little things to "throw together." Mothers come home from work tired. Fathers come in exhausted and after everyone is driven to their gyms and sports events they opt out for the dollar menu at fast food places where even the salads are loaded with things no human being should ever eat.

I have gone to the sandwich shops that advertise only real food and it is lunch meat. I know no one wants to say that, but it is not meat cut off a roast, or left over chops and the salad greens are way too green for way too long. We have just lowered the bar. I remember meat. It is not slick and slimy. It has texture and taste other than salt and fat.
I am guilty too. It is cheaper to eat white bread and processed cheese than whole wheat and real cheese and even eggs are becoming obscenely expensive. Organic, free range eggs actually do look and taste much better than the cheaper ones, but if it comes down to eggs or no eggs, I will eat the others. Organic, free range, that means the chickens live like they used to when I was a child and Aunt Chloe threw them feed from her apron.

This isn't progress folks. People are at the stores using credit cards for consumable products just to feed their families. I notice Wic allows people to get cheese product and maybe it is fine. Certainly it is better than letting people go hungry, but I wonder how far we are from the Chinese melamine days.

My brother cares for a family of four on about $1200 and they manage to eat decently, but it requires my sister-in-law being very careful and very picky about what she buys. So what does a mother of one living on $550 feed her child? We aren't as far from the starving masses as Americans might like to think. I went to an elementary school and saw their feed a child breakfast and lunches. They were processed cereals, lunchmeat and frozen pizza and they were not very good versions of any of these.

My new year resolution is going to be directed towards trying to eat healthier. I am lucky. I have the time to cook. I don't have any extra money, but I can make it work better than I did last year.