At the center of the photograph is a single drop of maple syrup. It dangles from the square corner of a pumpkin ginger waffle that is nothing short of what chef Alton Brown calls “golden brown and delicious” or GBD for short. A fork is whisking away that syrup-drenched waffle corner as the rest of the waffles await consumption below. The image is nothing short of breathtaking, and it is the work of the author of the Always with Butter food blog. Always with Butter is one of thousands of food blogs found on the internet, but what sets it apart from the others is the photography. Always with Butter has found a specialty in food blogging that makes it unique.
Food blogging is a somewhat new realm of the so-called blogosphere in which writers delve into some specific part of the food world and write about it to anyone who will read. Always with Butter, for example, focuses on homemade recipes and high-quality food photography, sometimes known as food porn. However, the focus of the blog depends entirely upon the interests of the blogger. These blogs include personal stories, links to news stories, how-to videos, images, and anything else that can be posted online. They are most often read by foodies, a group of people who seek a wide range of experiences of food; however, they can be read by anyone who is even a tiny bit curious about the processes of cooking and eating. In fact, one of the most famous food blogs was when a food blogger attempted to make all of famous chef Julia Child’s recipes in a year. The blog was turned into a popular film, Julie and Julia, which starred Amy Adams as the blogger and Meryl Streep as Child. Whatever the focus, the subject of a food blog could be anything from grilling to vegan recipes, local eats...
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...wickedly funny and highly inappropriate. In an older review, Marvo once compared a prime rib sandwich from Quizno’s to two “hobos getting it on.”
While some may find it pointless to read about food, the depth of the potential topics for food blogs seems to cover every corner of the world. Even the pickiest eater with the smallest of budgets and appetites might be able to find an appealing blog about financially strapped but particular, bird-like eaters. If the blogger loves food enough, often it becomes the center of widely appreciated writing. From The Impulsive Buy’s intensely wrong comparisons to Always with Butter’s striking photography, from cupcakes to Zombie Burgers, or from the strictest of vegans who only shop at Whole Foods to the hardcore bacon lover who eats a Baconator every day, there is no shortage of topics about food and a food blog to cover it.
The editors of Gourmet Magazine were able to reel in the much sought after author David Foster Wallace to chronicle the events of the Maine Lobster Festival. The editors were expecting an essay about the summer festival that would provoke mouthwatering reactions from the readers of the magazine. Instead, Wallace saturates his essay with sarcasm while, to please his editors, still being able to build a shell around a subliminally satirical message. While using a sarcastic and satirical tone, David Foster Wallace is able to construct on argument that America is ignoring morals as they dine.
In the narrative “Food Is Good” author Anthony Bourdain humorously details the beginning of his journey with food. Bourdain uses lively dialogue with an acerbic style that sets his writing apart from the norm. His story began during his childhood and told of the memories that reverberated into his adulthood, and consequently changed his life forever.
“Hungry for Change” is an eye opening documentary made to explore the role that food plays in peoples’ lives. The experts, ranging from authors to medical doctors, address a variety of claims through testimonials, experiments, and statistical evidence. They not only state the flaws in this generation’s diet but also logically explain the reasons behind the downfall in peoples’ diet and offer better ways to approach our health.
In the book published in 2006, the Omnivore’s Dilemma: A Natural history of Four Meals, by Michael Pollan, is a non-fiction book about American eating habits and the food dilemma that many Americans are facing today. Pollan begins the book by discussing the dilemma of the omnivore like ourselves, a creature with many choices of food. Pollan decides to learn the root to the food dilemma by examining the three primary food chains: industrial food chain, the organic food chain, and the hunter-gathering food chain. His journey begins by first exploring the industrialized food industry. Pollan examines the industry by following both corn and cow from the beginning through the industrialized process. The work on the corn fields of George Naylor shows him that the industrial system has made corn appears nearly in all products in the supermarket (Pollan 33-37). Pollen then decides to purchase a steer which allows him to see the industrialized monoculture of beef production and how mass production produces food to serve the society. Following his journey, Pollan and his family eat a meal at McDonald's restaurant. Pollan realizes that he and very few people actually understand how such a meal is created. By examining the different food paths available to modern man and by analyzing those paths, Pollan argues that there is a basic relation between nature and the human. The food choice and what we eat represents a connection with our natural world. The industrial food ruins that ecological connections. In fact, the modern agribusiness has lost touch with the natural cycles of farming. Pollan presents the book with a question in the beginning: "What should we have for dinner?" (Pollan 1) This question posed a combination of p...
The article highlights and includes the documentary Food, Inc. which exposes the inability of the profit system to provide safe and healthy food for the vast majority of the population. Eric Schlosser investigating journalist quotes, “The way we eat has changed more in the last 50 years than in the previous 10,000…now our food is coming from enormous assembly lines where animals and the workers are being abused, and the food has become much more dangerous in ways that are deliberately hidden from us”. Schlosser also quotes, “Birds are now raised and slaughtered in half the time they were 50 years ago, but now they’re twice as big”. He believes they not only changed the chicken, but they changed the farmer implying that capitalism has taken the place for the need of small scale farming. In addition, Michael Pollan also a journalist believes that the vast array of choices which appears in everyday supermarkets is nothing but an “illusion of diversity”. The advancement of technology and how consumers react to products has been further developed and continues to be in this generation. Food scientists are now genetically modifying and engineering products to satisfy and manipulate consumers to desire more of these unhealthy product choices. The biggest advance in recent years has
She was able to evoke emotions by her choice of negatively charged words towards the other author, Stephen Budiansky, and his work, Math Lessons for Locavores. By the end of the article, the reader developed strong negative views concerning the other article solely on Trueman’s diction and her tone. By writing, “Throw in a bunch of dubious and/or irrelevant statistics that appear to be truly locally sourced-i.e., pulled out of your own behind,” and “What’s so maddening about sloppy op-eds like this is that they give fodder to folks who hate the very notion that their food choices have any consequences beyond their own waistlines and bank balances”, Trueman expresses her dislike of Budiansky’s thoughst on the topic. She describes his article in such a dismissive way that her audiences adopts the same views as her. As a whole, her way of writing creates an overall negative tone towards the article being criticized. While doing this, she also points out flaws in his argument and exposes his faults in reasoning. As a result, his argument becomes invalid in the eyes of the readers and they are left with a clear winning perspective on the issue of the Local Food Movement. Kerry Truman's use of pathos in her critical analysis of Budiansky’s Math Lessons for Locavores was successful in the aspect that she evokes emotions in her
In February 2010, a remarkable chef and speaker, Jamie Oliver, presented himself to a TED (Technology, Education, Design) audience as ruthlessly real and charismatic. In his speech, “Teach Every Child about Food” he shares powerful stories of his anti-obesity project and makes the case for an all-out assault on our ignorance of food. Jaime Oliver’s speech aims to alter the perspective of Americans and their decisions about food and its effects. Since then, Oliver’s TED talk has been viewed across the nation and brought a reality to the issue with food education. Jamie Oliver successfully utilizes ethos, logos, and pathos to portray his belief that without the use of food education, America and its children will fall under the weight of its own obesity.
“What should we have for dinner?” (Pollan 1). Michael Pollan, in his book The Omnivore’s Dilemma: A Natural History of Four Meals shows how omnivores, humans, are faced with a wide variety of food choices, therefore resulting in a dilemma. Pollan shows how with new technology and food advancement the choice has become harder because all these foods are available at all times of the year. Pollan portrays to his audience this problem by following food from the food chain, to industrial food, organic food, and food we forage ourselves; from the source to a final meal and, lastly he critiques the American way of eating. Non-fiction books should meet certain criterions in order to be successful. In his book The Omnivore’s Dilemma: A Natural History of Four Meals, Michael Pollan is able to craft an ineffective piece of non-argumentative non-fiction due to a lack of a clear purpose stated at the outset of the book, as well as an inability to engage the reader in the book due to the over-excessive use of technical jargon as well as bombarding the reader with facts.
Michael Twitty is a food writer and culinary historian best known for preparing, preserving and promoting African American food ways and its origins in Africa. He emphasizes how African food culture has made a great impact on the American South. His cooking helped him to learn about his identity and culture. He describes “identity cooking” a way to better understand him and his culture as a Jewish-African American. A project he developed called “The Cooking Gene” is what he explains as a means of “exploring my family history through food, from Africa to America, from slavery to freedom.” Race, food and ethnicity all have a more complex and cultural meaning especially when fused together. Different
In the article “The End of Food,” Lizzie Widdicombe describes an advancement of our food culture through a new product developed by three young men living in San Francisco’s Tenderloin district. After failing to produce new inexpensive cellphone towers on a hundred seventy thousand dollar investment, the three men went on to try and develop software with their remaining funding. While trying to maximize their funding’s longevity, they realized that their biggest budget impediment was food. In fact, it reached the point where their diet comprised of mostly fast food, and eventually they despised the fact that they had to spend so much time and money on eating. Due to this hardship, Rob Rhinehart, one of the entrepreneurs, came up with the
Unlike similar documentaries published, Michael Pollan’s “In Defense of Food” effectively shows how the American diet has failed to produce good eating habits. As members of this modern culture we are exposed to all the wrong eating approaches. Michael pollan successfully convinces the viewer it can be simple. He conclusively defends food as it is intended to be eaten, and exhorts the viewer to “Eat food. Not too much. Mostly
Pollan states that food is not just a necessity to survive, it has a greater meaning to life. Pollan explains how food can cause us happiness and health by connecting us to our family and culture. Warren Belasco, in “Why Study Food”, supports Pollan’s idea that food is something social and cultural. In Belasco’s description of a positive social encounter food is included, whether it involves a coffee date with a colleague or a dinner date with a loved one. Belasco states that food forms our identity and brings our society together.
“Don’t Blame the Eater” is an article by David Zinczenko that explains to Americans, specifically overweight young Americans, about the risks eating at fast food restaurants and its cause of affecting one’s health. In his article, he tries to address the issue about America’s food industries by using literal devices such as tone, logos, ethos, diction, and organization in order to spread his message. He begins his article by addressing the topic and as he continues writing, he supports his topic by writing about personal experience and moves onto the reasons why his topic in a serious issue. Although he shows an overall clear progress, he does tend to have a few problems with his writing that could be improved.
Eating behaviour is a complex behaviour that involves a vast array of factors which has a great impact on the way we choose our meals. Food choice, like an other behaviour, is influenced by several interrelated factors. While hunger seems to drive our ways of food consumption, there are things outside of our own bodies that influence our food choices and the way in which we eat. The way we eat is controlled by and is a reflection of our society and cultures. I explore this idea through a food diary I created over a few weeks and the observations made by several anthropologists that I have studied.
In her book Semiotics and Communication: Signs, Codes, Cultures, Wendy Leeds-Hurwitz describes the wide use of food as signs, and also as social codes. The reason foods are so useful as signs and social codes is because they are separable, easily adaptive to new environments, and it is not difficult to cook, or eat for that matter. Food is a major part of our daily lives, Not only for survival, but it plays a substantial social role in our lives. We will look deeper into the semiotics of food, how food is used as identity markers, and also the role that foods play in social change in our lives. First let us start with the semiotics of food.