Thoughts about food

Considering everything that I know about the impact the food system has on the environment, I wish I could say that the first thing that I consider when I eat is the ecological effect of my choices. In general, though, hunger wins out as the more pressing problem that needs to be taken care of at meal time. Before I select a meal, either in a restaurant or at home, the first think that goes through my head is , "What do I like or feel like eating?" This is very reflective of the fact that in today's market, we have access to every sort of food product that we could possibly want at any time of the year. The second thing I think about is the nutritional value of my meal - although most likely not in the traditional sense of nutrition. I grew up as a very active kid running from school to track to ballet. As a result, my diet had to take a very unusual form in order to keep me moving. Even today, now that I only exercise moderately, I have not broken the habit of asking myself how I can get the most calories, most protein and highest levels of iron out of a meal. This means that most of my meals consist of meat, grains and fruits, and then I really make an effort to squeeze in those green leafy vegetables which I hate so much but apparently have a lot of iron in them. I really do think about where my food comes from and if I don't like the answer, try to make changes. I try to avoid fast food and I get my produce from farmers markets when I can, but it is difficult to eat locally even most of the time, let alone all of the time. Over all, I can say that environmental issues do cross my mind pretty frequently when I think about food. I think about how far the food may have traveled to get to me and how much oil was used in production. The problem is that I don't really change these thoughts into actions.

Thinking about what I ate this week, I recognize that there is definitely not a huge amount of variety in my meals. Breakfast is something that I can eat on the go: bagel, toast or maybe cereal if I got up early enough to spare ten minutes before I leave. I pack my lunches and always have a sandwich, some sort of fruit and then snacks throughout the day. Dinner has been the one meal that I have really had to adjust to in college because it involves real cooking---something I'm not super skilled at. I have started to make casseroles at the beginning of the week, freeze them in portions and then put them in the microwave so that I do not have to cook every night and worry about leftovers spoiling quickly. I suppose the one thing I can say about this is that it eliminates a lot of waste. Food used to go bad before I had a chance to eat it. At the same time, my dinner tonight probably had the largest impact on the environment. This particular casserole had pasta, melted cheese, canned peas and ground beef mixed together and baked. Honestly, I don't know where the pasta, cheese and canned peas were before they hit the grocery store shelf but I can imagine it took a lot of industrial effort to get there. I do know that the beef came from Omaha and I can at least be glad to know that it was shipped from inside the U.S. instead of overseas.