Final Observations

I have learned a lot about the marketing of food and how people react to the marketing tactics that manufacturers employ. I have also learned a lot about how food ties people together and gives meaning to many other ordinary activities, like spending time with friends and family. This class was an opportunity for me to not only observe the eating practices of others from a distance, but talk about and discuss these eating practices face to face with my classmates. In some ways it actually showed me a brighter side of the American eating "epidemic." By reading other people's posts I had a broader spectrum of people's eating habits even from such a small sampling pool. Because of this class, I will be able to analyze better the eating habits of different people from different cultures, even people within my own culture.

Eater's Manifesto- Draft

Here is a quick experiment: If I say the word “food,” what are the first images that come to mind? You are probably imagining your favorite dish first of all, and beyond that probably a variety of dishes, complete meals like Thanksgiving or Christmas dinner, or maybe just a single food item, like an apple or piece of chicken. The most likely scenario is that when you read the word “food,” a rush of the things you have eaten in your life all came pouring out of nowhere and it took you a few instants to even pick out one item or dish in particular. Now, this is a bit of a stretch, but imagine you are a cow. Assuming there is some kind of bovine language that you could understand, another cow mentions that they are hungry and they want food. The first image that instantly comes to mind is grass. Grass and more grass. I know there are various kinds of grass and similar greens that cows can eat, but if you have to put one image to it, it is that of a short, green plant growing in clumps coming out of the ground. The comparison of these two points of view, that of a human and a cow, seem silly at first until you realize that nearly countless types of human food and grass for cows serve exactly the same purpose on their most basic level. That purpose (the main reason why) we eat is for sustenance, the homeostasis of the body’s cells to maintain life and function accordingly. Why then has the human appetite evolved and developed so much more than that of a cow so that we are constantly obsessing over our every bite?

            Robert Keeling put it more succinctly than in all likelihood I could have in his 2001 article: “the relationship between food and life is that direct, that simple: people die without it.” Food is just the gas in a car or the battery in a TV remote. But if there is one thing that I have learned over the past few month especially, not much beats food in the race to the forefront of peoples’ minds. We have looked at such a wide variety of examples where food has played an important role in peoples’ lives and their development and realization of who they are. I don’t think a cow feels any particular affinity to food beyond eating and digesting it. Our obsession with flavors and arbitrary determinations of quality have created a society of picky eaters, and food snobs. Some people travel for the sole purpose of eating at a restaurant they heard about in a magazine or even on TV, I’m not sure a cow would even turn its head any further to one direction to taste and see if one weed tasted better than the other.

            The point I am trying to make is a bit of a complicated one. While I recognize that food has a very important role in our lives and culture, and that it affects on levels beyond just taste and the good feeling it leaves in our stomach, I think that people get carried away in their eating to the point of idolizing food and giving it too high of a position in society. Looking at food from a sustenance-based perspective, food has a role to play, but not a hole to fill. The relationship between people and their food takes up a large part of the psychological field of study, and quite frequently it is found that food becomes either a cause of stress or a means of alleviating stress, neither of which ends well for the person suffering because of the food, physically or emotionally (Canetti et all). Hundreds and maybe thousands of studies have been conducted on the effects of food on the human psyche, ranging from how certain foods are eaten depending on whether or not someone is happy or sad, or if the physical process of eating can alleviate stress, or whether eating alone or in a group can contribute to obesity, or even whether snacking right before bed is more likely to cause nightmares (Canetti et al)! We can even see (though a lighthearted example) how the present company or romantic interest can subconsciously (or consciously) affect our eating decisions (Korb). While some might claim that these kinds of conditions only affect those with pre-existing mental conditions, I think that the mentality that Americans in particular have today has put food into the role of a crutch for people with emotional problems in the first place. With the cow as a sort of standard for the perception of food, I think people are just overthinking their eating habits.

            We have been eating as long as humans have been alive. This in and of itself is a redundant statement, but the way we have been eating and our thinking about that process has evolved even more over time than we have (Atkins). Atkins describes how bread, for example, has developed a bit over the last 200 years or so, but the way we eat it and buy it has changed far more than the lonely loaf itself. Bakers baked bread, and mothers baked bread. That bread was round, and usually small enough to be eaten whole or torn up with hands and passed around the table. Butter was somewhat rare unless you were wealthy or had some access to dairy animals (here is the cow again), so it was usually eaten plain. Nowadays, bread is full of chemicals and cooked in uniform rectangles that are sliced at the factory (not bakery) then sliced into yet more uniform sections. Sometime between the round loafs and now, someone decided that they could stick some other type of food in between two chunks of bread, and now in the 21^st century that is what we do with the majority of the bread we buy from the grocery in slim plastic bags (Atkins). Maybe if it is in the morning we slide some Margerine® over it was lightly cooked again (no cows harmed in this application).

            Possibly the most blatant manifestation of our obsession with food is what see in the media, in commercials and on billboards and on the packaging of the food itself. Commercials for fast food, beverages, and other food products make up a large portion of the advertising on TV and product placement in movies and TV shows (McBride). Up until about 100 years ago, it was good enough to see food in the storefront. Then someone came up with the idea that they could sell more food if the had people thinking about food when it was out of reach, longing for it so it tasted that much better the next time they saw it (Atkins). If they saw a tall bottle of soda on a billboard, the bottle of water in their hand that was actually the healthier option just wasn’t going to cut it anymore (McBride).

            Somewhat related to the subject of advertising, the actual makeup of food might tell us the most about its role in our lives as well. Like seeing the food in the storefront, we knew food by one or two things. Bread was cooked, and made of wheat and some other things. Meat obviously was from an animal (like a cow) but you couldn’t see anything else in it. Fruits and vegetables came from trees or out of the ground, and you knew they were good for you but not exactly sure why. When scientists started looking into the makeup of the food we ate, they were able to distinguish things like protein, carbohydrates, sugars, vitamins, fats et cetera. Eventually, further researched showed that some of these were good for you and some bad for you, which is valuable information to have when balancing them in a healthy diet (Atkins). Once the basics were established, though, it seemed as if scientists were constantly flip-flopping between what was good and what was bad, and the media was saying one thing and scientists were saying another and celebrities were supporting this or that diet and it all became one mess. The one thing that everyone seemed to forget or ignore is that there really are very few things that are truly bad for you in even the smallest amount; nearly everything that can be found in food has some purpose and positive effect on our bodies, they are good in small amounts relative to each other. The only problem is that our consumerist and gluttony driven appetites ignore the idea of small amounts so the smallest size people will consider is just enough to cause them harm over time.

            Perhaps I am not the best person to be making broad statements about how people are overvaluing food and spending their time idolizing food and eating far too much of it. I have never been a big eater, and doubt I will be in the future far or near. I can appreciate good food and have developed what I consider to be a good taste for it over my lifetime, but my meager-at-best appetite has kept me quite honestly behind everyone I eat with, particularly in quantity. My dad loves food (no doubt his Italian heritage plays a role in this) but my mother and her mother and family had a very “no-nonsense, eat healthy with no frills” approach to eating and food in general. As my mother was the primary cook during my childhood, I’m sure I got this from her, although my sister became much more of a passionate foodie like my father.

            I think there was one time period in particular that solidified my views on food as just a fuel for our bodies. When I was a sophomore in high school, I was diagnosed very suddenly with Leukemia, a cancer of the bone marrow. I am skipping over many details, but the treatments at one point made me lose as much as 30 pounds over a 2-week period, and if I were to lose just 3 more pounds I would be put on a feeding tube that went through my nose and all the way into my stomach. My diet would consist of a brown liquid from a bag, which even by my low standards for food was not particularly appetizing. My only other choice, then, was to summon all of my strength and with the help of my parents and a dietician, start an eating regimen that could pack on as much protein and carbohydrates without overwhelming my system as possible. Needless to say it was a lot of hard work, but I was slowly able to gain back the weight but did not reach a healthy weight until after my treatment was finished a few years later.

It may seem like it, but I don’t think this period quite ruined food or eating for me, but it made me realize how simple but necessary eating is to us as human beings. I still have my favorite foods, I love going out to eat, and there are certainly meals and restaurants that are filled with familiar associations and memories, but as we have seen time and time again, it is the people around us that are really making the memories, the food just provides a warm meal and something to do with our hands while we are laughing, sharing stories and learning about each other with our friends (Holaday). Food can indeed bring us together at a dining room table with our family or a dining hall table with new college friends (Keeling), but the food itself is just a medium for conversation.

I have compared our eating to the eating of cows probably far more than I should have, but here is one last thought though it deviates from the rest. Cows eat because they don’t have much else to do. Humans eat to allow us to do the many other things we enjoy doing. Let’s not get caught up in our eating, we have so much more to do! We are blessed to have limitless options with our food, but in the end it is still just energy for our bodies. Enjoy every bite; the cow seems to be, too.

Keeling, Richard. “Food: Sustenance and Symbol.” Journal of American College Health 49.4 (2001): 153-156. Web.

Santich, Barbara. “Food and Drink: The Sustenance of Life.” Issues 72 (2005): 4-5. Web.

Holaday, Susan. “More Than Sustenance.” Foodservice Director 22.7 (2009): 26-28. Web.

Atkins, Peter. “The Material Qualities of Food Quality And Composition.” Endeavour 35.2-3 (2001): 74-79. Web.

Korb, Scott. “Having What She’s Having.” Gastronomica: The Journal of Food And Culture 7.2 (2003): 83-89. Web.

Canetti, Laura, Eytan Bachar and Elliot Berry. “Food and Emotion.” Behavioral Processes 60.2 (2002): 157-164. Web.

McBride, Anne. “Food Porn.” Gastronomica: The Journal Of Food and Culture 10.1 (2010): 38-46. Web.

A Lot Of A Little Or A Little Of A Lot

The two articles by Pollan (“Unhappy Meals”) and Dupuis (“Angels and Vegetables: A Brief History of Food Advice In America”) both deal with the various influences in recent and not-so-recent history on American eating and the depth of investigations into the content and relative value of what we eat. As could be suspected, the overall consensus in the past is very similar to what is the consensus today. Many people have varying ideas of what is healthy and unhealthy beyond a first glance, and despite the deluge of peoples’ subjective ideas and very objectively conducted scientific studies, there is no “perfect diet” and no one can agree on whether to eat a little of everything, or a lot of just a few things.

Pollan’s article covered mostly what he called the formation and rise of “nutritionism.” Pollan defined nutritionism specifically as “an ideology”, one that breaks down food into its component parts and ingredients as opposed to viewing it as food itself. Speaking of food, that term itself doesn’t mean what it used to. Steak, potatoes, carrots, and fish are food. Candy, cereal, and even bread cannot be constituted themselves as food anymore because they are so processed now and the manufacturers have power-packed them with so many synthetic nutrients and vitamins that may or may not even be good for you. These kinds of changes came in a long line of developments following this fascination with the nutrients in food. Scientists discovered new vitamins, minerals and other nutrients in food, and tested them for their positive or negative effects on our health. Based on these findings, the government would give some kind of ruling on whether the now nutrients should be increased or decreased in our diets. To satisfy the market demands, food manufacturers would add or subtract these nutrients and advertise the life out of it. After a while, new findings might prove otherwise and the process starts all over. This cycle is undoubtedly a result of our overthinking food. Pollan posed the question, “So nutritionism is good for business. But is it good for us?” Ultimately, Pollan decides to, as he clearly states in the introductory sentence (no doubt somewhat satirically): “Eat food. Not too much. Mostly plants.”

The Dupuis article pertained a bit more to the history of our eating decisions beyond that of health, and provided a very interesting read. One of the first associations she makes is between eating and morality. Some religions have very specific guidelines about eating, particularly in eating meat, but for those of whom religion plays little part in their eating decision, they often rely on the views of scholars or popular figures. She observed that “because we have lost our faith in both religion and science as guides to eating, we rely on popular writers to steer us through a welter of confusing and contradictory information.” I personally noted that this is the case as much or even more today, although the celebrities touting the latest diets realistically bear very little weight compared to the scholars and moral figures of the past! Whether they knew it or not, most of the recorded views from figures such as Benjamin Rush, Charles Finney, Sylvester Graham, and the Shaker communities. Abstinence or sparing use of alcohol, minimal red meat, more roots and plants from the ground, and overall portion control were all recommended and have a solid base in recent findings. These all contributed not the tightening of their belts as our modern thinking would have us believe, but to improve their moral and social standing beyond just the function of their bodies.

These two articles look at different periods in more recent history where the food is viewed from two very different lights, but to serve the same ultimate purpose of deciding of what and how much to eat. For Pollan, it is because of the complexity and minutia of the innumerable ingredients in even the simplest foods that we eat. For Dupuis, it was because of the representations that certain foods had in society and the improvement or detraction of value they reflected on their consumer. Their findings consequentially were varied respective to their field. Oddly enough, however, Dupuis quite directly called out Pollan and the very article we read, saying that no matter what ingredients and nutrients are constantly argued over and removed from our diets, the same dietary diseases persist almost undiminished. I myself found myself confused by Pollan’s conclusion (and introductory sentence) as he went on and on about the inconsistency but then gave his own caveman-esque definitive statement to try and tie it all together. I think it is ridiculous how conflicted our national sentiment is on the value of the tiniest parts of our food, and the commercialization of not only the ingredients but also our overall mentality of what is the most important part of our dining experience. Maybe the drawn line really is portion control. Researchers and scientists have gotten portion sizes pretty well established, maybe just stick to those instead of giving into gluttony and we can eat how much we are told instead of worrying about a lot of a few foods or a tiny bit of dozens of different options.

Deciding What To Eat

My main influence in deciding what to eat is whatever is most readily available. From that point, I usually have some subconscious idea of what is healthiest from what I have available, and I try to start with the healthiest option and work my way down the health ladder (the food pyramid of whatever is in front of me, effectively) until I think I have had enough. I don't eat very much, so in this eating structure I usually end up eating pretty healthily. Obviously if there is not very much available I usually eat whatever I have as opposed to not eating at all, but in these cases I try to control the portions if it is something really unhealthy. After thinking about this prompt I realized that I do eat pretty healthily as far as I can tell.

SE5 Observations: Late Night Snacking

Hunger is one of the most fascinating components of our process of eating. We eat because we need food, but beyond the principle and process of consuming food it is hunger that really tells us that our body needs food and when. We all feel it at some point, but hunger is something that can be trained just like any muscle in the human body. Hunger is usually somewhat predictable, often associated with a certain amount of time between meals, but sometimes there is just a moment where the hunger hits you like a bomb and you have just got to eat something! More and more, we are seeing that this spur-of-the-moment hunger is happening late at night, and we are suffering for it.

Our culture is becoming more and more atypical in its sleeping patterns and activity within the 24-hour day. Before the advent of electricity, people went to bed when the sun went down for the most part. Then, electricity was still so expensive that people rarely used it unless it was absolutely necessary. Then, the TV came around and people watched it as long as programming was on, after which it automatically switched to blank white noise and everyone went to bed. Then came late night TV, then movies could be watched at anytime of the day, then the internet’s 24/7 availability became public, and eventually people were able to do almost anything in the middle of the night that they could do in the light of day. People have always worked the “graveyard shift” at factories and warehouses and such, but these used to be the exception. Now, kids, parents, anyone and everyone are staying up until they feel like going to bed. Not only are they now active and awake, but they are also getting hungry (D’Arrigo).

Now this doesn’t seem like it should be any different than snacking during the day, but there are several factors that are deep-set and subconsciously controlled in our bodies that make these late night snacks a no-no. The overarching control of our bodies’ involuntary actions during sleep is something called a circadian rhythm. Circadian rhythms are the regulators of how our body produces and expends energy, and control this ebb and flow depending on what we eat and the activity we conduct (“Northwestern”). Since we are sleeping, there is very little activity to burn off calories while we sleep. Digesting food takes time, and when we digest food while we are awake the extra activity burns off calories from the very food that is being digested and put back into your cells to power them. Digesting food while you are asleep, however, has no activity to burn up extra calories and more and more of it is stored in fat where it cannot burn off until activity is resumed. It is in this way that circadian rhythms can be much higher during higher activity during the day, but taper off and do a less efficient job of turning food to energy and storing excess during sleep (D’Arrigo).

The idea for the experiment conducted by Northwestern University came from the observation of “shift workers,” or those that work shifts from sundown to sunset (“Northwestern”). Within most sampling pools, the workers that worked late shifts were almost always more obese or heavier than their counterparts that worked the same job during the day. An experiment was then conducted on mice. Using a minimum sustenance baseline diet as a control, the researchers then gave the mice a fat-heavy diet during normal waking hours, and a 20% increase above baseline consumption was noted. The same fat-heavy diet was applied 12 hours off, during the most extreme cycle typically associated with sleeping. After this application, a 48% increase above baseline was noted despite using identical mice and identical diet (“Northwestern”).

Terry D’Arrigo uses the examples of Cliff Huxtable, Dagwood Bumstead, and Charlie Brown’s Snoopy to display the humor and affinity to late night snacking in our American pop culture: “The midnight snack seems to be an American institution,” he observed.  “Night-Eating Syndrome” is even a widely recognized condition by psychologists who defined it as night-snacking more than three times a week (D’Arrigo). It was found that those who have night-eating syndrome are more than 2.5 times as likely to have diabetes than those who do not.

So, it is not just as simple as X number of calories in, X number of calories out no matter how or when they are consumed. Just like our bodies tell us when we need sleep, they also tell us (and in a somewhat related way) that eating should happen in 3 or 4 regular times during the day, and sleeping time is recovery time, not food binging time!

D’Arrigo, Terry. “Snack Attack.” American Diabetes Association. 60.10 (2007): 20. Web.

Anon. “Northwestern University; That Late Night Snack: Worse Than You Think.” News RX Health and Science. NewsRX, 2009. Web.

Article from Food Journal Observations

I was curious about the association with late night snacking and its effect on appetite overnight but after reading a few articles, I am now curious about the relative affect on weight gain of late night snacking. It appears that eating off of your body's sleep cycle can make you gain weight faster, and there were many, many references to a Northwestern study about this very topic.

http://jc3th3db7e.search.serialssolutions.com/?ctx_ver=Z39.88-2004&ctx_enc=info%3Aofi%2Fenc%3AUTF-8&rfr_id=info:sid/summon.serialssolutions.com&rft_val_fmt=info:ofi/fmt:kev:mtx:journal&rft.genre=article&rft.atitle=That+late-night+snack%3A+Worse+than+you+think&rft.jtitle=NewsRx+Health+%26+Science&rft.date=2009-09-20&rft.pub=NewsRX&rft.issn=1944-2599&rft.eissn=1944-2602&rft.spage=70&rft.externalDBID=n%2Fa&rft.externalDocID=207610794

Daily Eating Log Observations

The main thing I noticed was that most of my classmates (and college students that I know in general) don't eat a usual breakfast. Sometimes this is counter-balanced by a late night snack, but I don't know if it is a substitute or just a secondary occurrence. I know that particular to DU there is a late-night dining option that many students, particularly freshman have taken advantage of on weeknights. I am curious as to whether or not this affects morning appetites and eliminates the need for breakfast, or if because of the students' schedules they would not have eaten breakfast regardless.