Why we eat what we eat?

The transformation that food has undergone in the past few years is phenomenal. We have with us today after decades of transformation: lost knowledge, lost nutrients and lost essence of living.

Have you wondered why french fries are so addictive by nature? It’s because Salt, fat and sugar are layered together. With these three ingredients, it is very easy to get addicted to certain foods because they release sparks of dopamine in your brain and you start craving it more and more. A general sexiness is attached to the junk food that I thoroughly detest. Celebrating something? Why not grab a burger and a coke? Hanging out with friends- Why not order pizza? You see what years of clever marketing has done to us, we associate these foods to good times.

Michael Pollen in his documentary, Cooked, mentions this one interesting aspect of food that through out history, mankind has had only one question about food, who will cook? And the answer has also remained constant. “NOT ME!”. I see people ordering take out food everyday. While an occasional use for convenience is more than appreciated, doing this regularly has a host of problems. If you eat food without putting the time and effort of making it, you eat more of it. Simple. Nobody who bakes regularly want to eat sweets or desserts a lot, simply because they can quantitatively imagine the amount of sugar and fat that goes into making a particular dessert.

Thousands of years of evolutionary knowledge got thrown out of the window post World War II, when all the factories all over the world that were setup to feed the soldiers were running out of business and needed to way to survive and the only way to do this was get into the kitchens of neighbourhood homes. Around the same time, the feminist movement started inspiring more women to join the work force and until this point, the kitchen was where women spent most of the time, but now they went out and worked. Suddenly women realised the unfairness of the situation and a need for a new division of labour arose, and while there were negotiations going on from both the genders, these factories swooped in as superheroes to ‘solve’ the problems, perfectly catering to both genders where women didn’t have to stuff themselves in the kitchen all day anymore and men didn’t have to help out. It was instant, it was quick and it was better than anything that people could make at home. It was almost too easy.

If you walk into a supermarket, you realise, the centre aisles which occupies your immediate attention is filled with processed food while the fresh produce is hidden in the back or the side aisle. Processing food is much more profitable than serving it whole.Industrial food is mostly a supply driven phenomenon. Most brilliant strategy used by food industry is align their interests with the aspirations of a women and pressure on men with the problem of cooking. What’s the problem you ask? It’s a win-win for both the parties involved. Not quite so.The only reason the food industry is profitable is because it cooks differently than how you cook at home. For example, look at the ingredients on your bread packet, It would have listed about 15 ingredients where as only three ingredients are needed to make bread.

Earlier, before the concept of restaurants, cooking was not optional, i.e you have to cook if you want to eat but now it is, because you spend more hours at work and you eat by just paying that extra money to the food industry.

And we need to stop looking as a chore, ultimately to fill our stomachs is why we do so much. “Mindless cooking tasks are not getting in the way of life but they are life”.

Cooking is gathering together and to harmonise

Images sourced from Kitchens of India for representation only.

The nature of food, the relationship between nature and nutrition, and to take these factors and evolve them into a rich tapestry of taste and flavour is what cooking is all about. The more you cook, the more you realise the cleverness with which cooking has evolved.Don’t forget, time is one of the best ingredients you add to any dish.

And for me the ability to cook for someone and nourish them is unparalleled love and happiness.