The Power of Food

Eating right is important. But figuring how to eat right is hard. So while we need to be gentle with ourselves for eating for fun, we also need to recognize that small changes can have large aggregate effects.

The problem with plant based diets is always how to feel sated. Proteins, and especially animal proteins, keep us sated longer, and able to function without wanting to eat again.

Dried Beans are some of the cheapest food in the world, even factoring in the “real” cost, which of course includes environmental costs. Costs you pay ultimately in insurance and disaster relief. These are real costs, and we all pay them.

I don’t know if this is the past of Latin America. I only know what I know from having a mother who grew up in Brazil. From having a mother who was undeniably as Brazilian as I am American: undeniably, and yet somehow alien.

Maybe a secret wisdom is fading, about how beans do a great job of providing baseline nourishment, in much the way as eating, say, chicken regularly might. Not tofu, not whole grains, not anything plant based can provide the sustenance that beans can.

I’m not here to convince anyone to be vegetarian or vegan. Most of the recipes on this site contain some small amount of meat or dairy, even if it’s just butter for taste. As mammals, we are creatures of milk. It’s in our DNA.

Emissions from livestock, poultry, and dairy farms can be minimized, and still maintained. Everyone would need to purchase their eggs, milk and meat in a cooperative model, and price controls would need to be set.

“Price Controls” is a scary term. I for one think of dystopian movies about oppressive socialist dictatorships, where one naked emperor just responds to market pressures with price edicts, which destroy the very markets they were meant to save.

The Cooperative model on a national (and global!) scale feels like such a complex thing that only strong-arming could ever implement it. But is that really true? Algorithms and data analytics are routinely employed to control processes. Would a weekly egg or milk delivery be that hard?

In any case, it’s clear that we should

Emissions, Health, Society. Food is political, food is love, food is family, food is survival.