Final Essay Number 2

Barker 1!
Aarica Barker
Professor Gardner
English 100
19 February 2015

Quality Vs. Taste
Food, food, food. What would us humans do without food? Everyone eats food in one way or another, whether its a plate of earthy greens or a double-double and sone fries, we all eat.
There are two types of consumers when it comes to food. Some people just look at all food and being food, and just enjoy it. They enjoy it no matter how its made, therefore if it taste good in their mouth thats all that matters. The other type of consumer tends to be more anal and knit picky with whats on their plate. These consumers care very much how their food is made,where its coming from, how many miles it had to travel to get to the grocery store, and of course, the nutrition facts. In Wendell Berry’s article, ‘’The Pleasures of Eating’’ and Michael Idov’s article
‘’ When did young people…’’, both articles share the common interest of food consumption.
They both share some common values of food, but they mainly go head to head in a food battle while using elements of the food culture to argue why their idea of food consumption is the right way. In Wendell Berry’s article, his idea of food consumption is ‘’eating responsibly’’. Berry lets us know the ‘’eating is an agricultural act’’(64). What Berry means by this is, a consumer is never going to escape the connection that him or her has with the food they are eating. No matter

Barker 2! how hard someone will try to look past where their food came from or how it was made, in
Berry’s opinion its good to know everything about the food you consume. Berry also explains to us how urban shoppers are completely uneducated about the produce at their local grocery store.
Of course shoppers all know that the produce comes from a farm, but he notes that they lack the
‘’knowledge or skills that are involved in farming’’ (65). Berry lets us know that farms are full of animals in over crowded pens. The animals are shot up with growth hormones and lots of other chemical getting them ready for long travels and consumption. Berry compares the food industry to the sex industry. He says ‘’like sex industrial, industrial eating has become a degraded, poor, and paltry thing’’ (66). With that he explains how basically our kitchens and eating places have just became more hotel like. People in the 20th century are very busy with work, school, and personal life, and he say cooption is now ‘’ a fast pace part of life’’(67).
Food consumption is the matter of discussion fro both articles, but Michael Idov’s takes a different approach explaining a different type of food movement. In his article , he talks about his co-worker Diane Chang. Before Idov and Chang met, Chang already had a long list of new food places she want to go to in New York City. Chang loves different types of food cuisines and restaurants, but she preferred to stay away from chain restaurants and places that were too hype.
In the article Chang’s grandmother was brought to our attention. Her ‘’ China-born grandmother’’ tough her traditional dishes. Diane tells the reader how she didn't really eat anything but Chinese food growing up, yet when she did eat something different ‘’ we had sizzler’’, she says out of disgust ( 102). Diane has a if-it-looks-good-eat-it type of attitude. She enjoys hole-in-the-wall type of food spots, If the restaurant got to hype she would stop going to it. Idov

Barker 3! explains how Chang hates the label Foodie, just like how how hipsters don't like being called hipsters. Social Media was another big topic for both authors. Berry talks bout how the media is somewhat of a trap. Berry says ‘’The trap is the ideal of industrialism: walled city by values that let merchandise in but no consciousness out’; (67). What Berry means by the quote is once someone falls and gives in to the media/food industries trap, it will be hard for them to escape and escaping is only a voluntary action. Also in Berry’s article he compares the food industry to
Cosmeticians. He simply states that ‘’ Food wears as much makeup as the actors’’(65). The
‘’makeup’’ on the food is what helps the industry make their food look more presentable and tasteful. The beautified ‘’full face’’ food looks so attractive. The makeup in Berry opinion covers up what really is in the food and they do this by, processing, dying, breading, saucing, gravying, grounding, pulping, straining, blending, prettifying, and sanitizing the pre-made meals (66). The food makes the buyer forget where and how that certain food is made and more focused on getting it in there mouth. This type of eater is called the Passive Consumer. Berry describes the passive consumer as someone who was uneducated about the food industry, never thought about where in the heck their food came from, basically the victim. Chang thinks of Social Media in a total different level as Berry. In a way, the media shapes her social life. Diane has a food blog, where she shares her recent food discoveries and pairs them with other meals. As we all know smart phone play a big role in the food culture and social media. Chang photographs each of her meals and post them on Instagram. Word of mouth is what Chang prefers as a food review, rather than food critics, who Chang does not trust. Change will only use Yelp to to check out the pictures. Chang tries so hard not to full under the label as a Foodie, but the way she describes what a

Barker 4!
Foodie is,’’someone who frequents food related social media’’, she basically is describing herself
(107). Idov compares food as a sport and says ’’whose central motivation is to simply hunt down and enjoy the next devious meal’’ (104). To Idov people have as far as making food a hobby or a full time job, mostly for the bragging right among their peers.
The actual pleasure of food was another discussion from the articles. For Berry, as I mentioned the pleasure in food to him was knowing where your food origins are. A personal connection with your plate was important to Berry before you eat your food. Non-factory made food is a pleasure to him. Berry explains how before he eats fruits or vegetables, it brings him pleasure know that plant had a ‘’happy and healthy life, in good soil, not the product of a huge chemical farm’’(69). He also mentions with pleasure comes comfort and states ‘’ The knowledge of the good healthy garden relieves, frees, and comforts the eater’’(69). By this statement he means, again by simply having more knowledge about your food you will state to live more freely. In
Idov’s article Diane pleasure for food is a complete 180* from Berry’s point of view. Diane could really careless about the foods origin. If it looked good, taste good, not from a chain restaurant, or a place that was too hype, Diane enjoyed food period.
In order to eat you need money. Some people like Diane, will blow most of their paychecks on a single meal. Berry’s concern is ‘’not quality and health, but volume and price’’(67).
He talks about how focused the farms and feedlots are on the volume. Their primary concern is just making capital. therefore they can really careless less about the consumers health. The healthier ways of farming and producing food tends to be very costly and take a lot more time.
Farmers rather take the shortcuts to get the job done faster and its cheaper. Diane did most of her produce shopping at farmers markets. Farmers markets tend to be on the pricy side since the

Barker 5! farmers can choose their own price. The money is not an issue to Diane though. She rather get her food at farmers markets than grocery stores. Money is not the issue to Diane until she realized after two $20 organic chickens were too expensive, she starts heading back to the local grocery store from the poultry she needed.
Food is one of the biggest aspects of the human life. Everyone is not the same when it comes to their judgment on what ‘’good food’’ is. Most of us with busy lives tend to look past those nutritional facts and could careless about how processed the meat on our hamburger is.
Others, the more anal consumers, crave the knowledge of knowing the details about the food they are consuming. These consumers do not agree with the food industry and how they use
‘’makeup’’ to lure the uneducated people to eat their food and destroy their health. The food industries do such a great job with luring us consumers to their foods, but Berry has a point. Its unfair that we are left without the answers to whats really in our food. Like Berry said we need to all step up and educate ourselves about food and not give in to the food industry like Diane
Chang.

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Works Cited

Berry, Wendell. "The Pleasures of Eating." Food Matters. Boston: Leasa Burton,
1970. 64-70. Print.

Idov, Michael. "When Did Young People Start Spending 75% of Their Paychecks on Pickled Lamb's Tongues?" Food Matters. Boston: Leasa Burton, 1970.
101-07. Print.