The art of indie food

Food is in. Food is it. Of course, it is. We are in the middle of a global food crisis with skyrocketing food prices and supply chain shortages due to the Ukraine-Russia war, the pandemic, and climate-related extreme (maybe now normal?) weather events. But before this crisis bubbled up into the ether, there was a resurgence in food journalism and food craft writing and curating. Of course, there are a whole lot of media outlets, NatGeo, NPR’s Salt, BBC, NYT, Economist, etc., that have highlighted sections, special reports, and special issues dedicated to food politics and other foodisms, but I am talking about dedicated, purist attempts to bring all things food to the everyday reader.

We have the wonderful Civil Eats that provides us the nitty gritty on the American food system. Ensia mainly reports on the environment, but there is some great food reporting. Same with the Fern. The Counter was a fantastic outlet that sadly went away because of a lack of financial support. Hint Hint.

We also have outstanding food writers like Helena Bottemiller Evich (formerly of Politico) and her dedicated site, called Food Fix. Author Bee Wilson, an author, communicates exquisite, often longer pieces for the Guardian. Tamar Haspel, also an author, pens hard-hitting, come-to-jesus pieces on controversies across the food system for WaPo. Kim Severson writes for the NYT on food culture. Kristina Peterson is the new food and ag writer for WSJ. Looking forward to seeing more from her.

We also have a ton of artsy, indie food zines like Whetstone, Fare, and Compound Butter, to name just a teeny tiny few. Here are even more. And no, these mags cannot be compared to your typical monthly rag like Bon Appetit, Saveur, Food & Wine, or Cook’s Illustrated. Each is beautifully crafted and themed, punctuated with high-art photography, illustrations and stories. Down Under is into it. When one flicks through these gems, you can tell a lot of time, effort, labor, and care were undertaken to bring you unique storytelling about food, our food system, and the people that are custodians of food.

While I love all these zines, and I fully support many of them, some would argue that maybe they are just too precious and put food into this category of elitism. There is a grain of truth in that, particularly when our world is faced with almost a billion people who just can’t get enough food to live their full life and potential. Reading about food and its beautiful imagery seems almost irrational, decadent, or even more so, clueless to the larger global challenge. But they are different from say the traditional monthly food mag. When we think about Saveur-type magazines, they seem upper class, crusty, and white. Instead, this renaissance of indie food zines is being led by the next generation of individuals who are trying to put food on a different footing — one that is authentic, more accessible, and more diverse in who it represents and portrays.

These zines are rich in content, but you have to pay for that content in heeps. They are pretty expensive — sometimes 20, 30, 40 bucks a pop. Decadent indeed…Some have already gone under after just a few years in the biz. Publishing is a bitch. There are probably some lessons to be heeded from the now defunct but admired David Chang’s Lucky Peach. So if you are into your food as art and enjoy reading rich stories about all things food, subscribe to one or two and support their noble efforts.

Food bytes: March 21st edition

Food Bytes is a weekly blog post of “nibbles” of information on all things food and nutrition science, policy and culture.

As much as we want to pretend all is normal, it is clearly not. We are in the middle of a global pandemic, with a massive amount of uncertainty, fear, and in some places, complacency. We will be posting another blog entry on the COVID crisis but for now, we will highlight, just a few emerging articles on the growing concern of food insecurity and the food supply, along with our regular updates on all things happening in the food space.

On COVID, we have never been in a situation like this before with talk of it reshaping the global order or social collapse or cohesion. So to predict how markets will continue to react to the future and the health of the global food supply is uncertain. Anyone who postulates how it will go is misleading us. Yes, of course, we can look in real-time on how households and communities are handling the crisis, and we can look to the past, on how other pandemics like the Spanish Flu, impacted food security and supplies. However, times are different. Food supplies are globalized. The population in 1918 was 1.6 billion. We are now at 7.5 billion.

Locusts in east africa (copyright: BBC News)

Rob Vos at IFPRI argues there is no major concern for food insecurity, yet. They came to this conclusion by looking at food prices of staple crops. Huh. As the Brookings Institution rightly pointed out, low-income seniors are already feeling the impacts. In the U.S., with roughly 15% of households being food insecure, some are concerned about their ability to feed themselves in the coming months. A WaPo article quoted: “If coronavirus doesn’t get us, starvation will.” Then there is Africa. Food insecurity and stark hunger could worsen in an already fragile context. East Africa is also reeling from an invasion of locusts which don’t help the already burgeoning food insecurity in the region. This video is pretty insane if you want to see the locust infestation.

The EAT-Lancet Commission report follow ons just keep coming. Did you know that the report has already been cited 790 times since its publication in January 2019? Insane! A few interesting articles are emerging that again test the validity of the Commission’s findings.

The water footprint (blue and green water) of different nut types (shelled) as well as some other food products for comparison, in litre/kg and litre per g of protein. (Vanham et al 2020)

  • One article published by the LIvestock Innovation Lab at the University of Florida shows the importance of animal source foods and explains that raising livestock and eating animal source foods can be compatible with sustainable development.

  • Another article questioned the recommendation in the report to increase nut consumption. The article dissects the water intensity issues in producing trees and ground nuts especially in India, China, Pakistan, the Middle East, Mediterranean, and the U.S. Check out cashews in the figure!!

  • A publication in the Journal of Nutrition argued that the mortality reduction effect of the EAT-Lancet proposed diet in the USA is no greater than the impact of energy consumption changes that would prevent under-weight, over-weight, and obesity alone, calling into question its findings. Authors are funded by the National Cattlemen's Beef Association…

  • Pedro Sanchez, one of the world’s experts on tropical soils and a World Food Prize winner wrote a piece about the land needed to grow the Lancet-EAT diet was oversimplified. He provided some alternative calculations. He argues that current total world food production is estimated at 9.30 billion metric tons of crops and animal-sourced foods, with crops grown in 1.27 billion hectares of land. Implementation of the EAT-Lancet diet for 10 billion people by 2050 would require a lot less, 5.39 billion metric tons of food in 1.10 billion hectares of cropland, assuming no increase in crop yields.

Pedro’s paper was part of a special issue in Food Policy in the Food Policy journal initiated by Editor in Chief Chris Barrett. The issue is about the evolution of the Consultative Group on International Agricultural Research (CGIAR), and the international agricultural research centers (IARCs) that comprise the CGIAR System. Over the past two decades, the CGIAR has undergone a series of reforms with the latest reform being termed “One CGIAR”.  Maybe they should take a lesson from the UN and find out how the One UN worked out…The special issue is out and is meant to “help inform a research strategy for the new One CGIAR.”

Robotics, AI, nano. Will these technologies transform the food system, and eliminate the “human” element from agriculture work? Yet to be seen. This article in the Economist discusses agricultural robots. And they have names: Tom, Dick, and Harry.

In the world of nutrition, meat will remain a controversial topic that is heating up. Nutrition is always accused of having serious conflicts of interest - who pays for the research? Who is biased? Who is paid off? JAMA and Scientific American highlights the controversy with meat-funded research and plant-funded research - and the “bullying” by both sides. Katz responds here. The livestock industry responds here. This debate has left consumers confused, and lacking any trust in science. A few other tidbits on meat. This NYT opinion piece by Alicia Wittmeyer argues that to stop eating meat, can alienate us from our traditions. Meanwhile, the EU is considering a tax on meat.

Speaking of diets, with 2.1 billion overweight and obese adults, and half of the U.S. facing obesity, we need some new strategies. Intermittent fasting seems to be all the rage these days as the best way to lose weight and keep it off. A review in JAMA highlights the evidence, and NYT provided some guidance. We tried it. It is not so hard. Just eat between the hours of noon and 8 pm. Thereafter, no calories should be consumed in solid or liquid forms.

Changes in purchases of high-in beverages, by education level of household head (Tallie Smith et al 2020)

Diet quality matters too. Bee Wilson, an amazing writer of food and its history, wrote a long piece in the Guardian on the contributions of ultra-processed foods on the global obesity crisis. These foods are cheap, attractive and convenient, and we eat them every day. But they are also riddled with sugar, salt, and unhealthy fats. This article is worth the read. Some countries are worried. Take Chile. They instituted a Food Labelling and Advertising which put warning labels on the front of food packages if the food was high in sugar, high in salt or high in fat. Sugary drinks, unhealthy snacks, and packaged foods must carry the front-of-pack labels. These foods are also regulated. These foods cannot be marketed or sold in schools or on TV. Has it worked? Yup. Sales of these foods are down 23%. In college-educated consumers, as you can see in the figure, purchases were done 29%!

Food Bytes: May 6 - May 25

Food Bytes is a weekly blog post of “nibbles” of information on all things food and nutrition science, policy and culture.

The Annual Reviews have just released a special issue on the Future of Food. Presents 20 articles on "Research & efforts to ensure a safe, nutritious, & affordable global food supply, while preserving biodiversity & minimizing environmental damage." Keen to read these by some stellar scientists!

Processed food is having its moment. New research shows that those who eat ultra-processed foods gain more weight than those who ate whole or minimally processed foods. Researchers at the National Institutes of Health, tested this using the randomized, controlled trial approach. Study participants on the ultra-processed diet ate an average of 508 calories more per day and ended up gaining an average of 2 pounds over a two-week period. People on the unprocessed diet ended up losing about 2 pounds on average over a two-week period. Fantastic food writer Bee Wilson has a new book entitled: The Way We Eat Now: How the Food Revolution Has Transformed Our Lives, Our Bodies, and Our World. She writes about how these processed foods, ala junk food, has taken over traditional diets everywhere in the world, and is having impacts on health, at a very alarming pace.

Another study highlighted the impacts of poor diets on health. An estimated 80,110 new cancer cases among adults 20 and older in the United States in 2015 were attributable to eating a poor diet. Other research supports this claim. The study found that decreasing dietary fat and eating more fruits and vegetables may lower a woman’s risk of dying of breast cancer. They tracked 48,835 women ages 50 to 79 without breast cancer since the 1990s.

The way we eat is changing. There is a fantastic piece by the Guardian looking at how more and more people are eating alone, and it has quite dramatic changes on the way we eat, what we eat and why we eat. Netflix is involved in this equation…

Let’s discuss individual foods. Are you obsessed with vanilla? Check this out. Like citrus? You may be disappointed after reading this. With 70% of America consuming bananas, they can’t be that bad right? Think again. Do you dig on swine? This may scare you.

Some places, as we know still are food insecure in the world. The UN FAO reports 815 million people go to bed hungry. Venezuela, sadly is not immune, and is really in a free fall. NYT is reporting that “Butchers have stopped selling meat cuts in favor of offal, fat shavings and cow hooves, the only animal protein many of their customers can afford.” Terrible times for the country. Let’s hope things turn around soon.

On the polar opposite, but strangely, very much on the same side of the coin, it always thought that urbanization is driving the obesity pandemic. A very impactful Nature study has shown that 55% of the global rise in mean body mass index since the mid-1980s—and more than 80% in low- and middle-income regions—was due to increases in body mass index in rural areas. The team of scientists argue that: “There is an urgent need for an integrated approach to rural nutrition that enhances financial and physical access to healthy foods, to avoid replacing the rural undernutrition disadvantage in poor countries with a more general malnutrition disadvantage that entails excessive consumption of low-quality calories.”

The difference between rural and urban mean body mass index in women. Figure A is 1985. Figure B is 2017.

Nature is on a role. They also just published a really important paper nothing related to food, but on HIV. The researchers used a high spatial resolution across the continent to look at HIV prevalence sub-nationally. They already published a similar study examining undernutrition. They show that the epidemic is very unevenly spread. Of the 25 million HIV-positive people in sub-Saharan Africa, one third live in very small, highly concentrated pockets. The remaining two-thirds are spread out more broadly. This work will help hone in on the hotspots and where attention should be drawn to continue progress on halting the spread of HIV.

As for furthering education and building capacity, the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine is starting a new Center on Climate Change & Planetary Health and the University of Washington has a new degree program on Food Systems, Nutrition and Health. Google them if you are interested in these new academic programs!

The Sustainable Development Solutions Network is hosting a 3-day webinar on Nutrition-sensitive agriculture. Sign up! We have three stellar speakers who will be talking about:

  • Smallholder production and Dietary Diversity

  • Market Challenges and Solutions to Nutritious Food Access

  • Women’s Empowerment for Better Nutrition

And on a personal note, I was sad to hear about the passing of Kenyan writer Binyavanga Wainaina. He has some famous stories, including How to Write About Africa. But his most defining moment has been his coming out as a gay man, in a letter to his mum, raising awareness and rights of LGBTQIA throughout the continent.

Food Bytes: Weekly Nibbles from Mar 4 - 24

Food Bytes is a weekly blog post of “nibbles” of information on all things food and nutrition science, policy and culture.

The Chicago Council on Global Affairs released their annual report. This year focuses on water: From Scarcity to Security: Managing Water for a Nutritious Food Future. There are lots of nuggets on the links of water to food and nutrition. Definitely worth a read.

IFPRI has also launched a new book: Agriculture for improved nutrition: Seizing the momentum. I contributed a chapter on biodiversity and its importance for food and nutrition security.

I always like what Bee Wilson writes. She recently wrote a great piece in the Guardian on how modern food is killing us. The grape story is an interesting analogy of how our food system has changed.

I just can’t help myself, but the EAT Lancet continues to get press. This article hones in on how it spurred a global debate. Great. It did its job. Keep debating! The Guardian is going a bit nuts on the diet side. They also published a recent piece on “peak beef.” And the Hopkins HUB, published an article on proteins of the future where they warn us to “get ready for a menu of lab-grown steaks, "bleeding" plant burgers, and cricket smoothies!”

Speaking of animal source foods, eggs seem to be bad for us once again. The nutrition science field is just one big teeter totter. This JAMA study shows that eggs increase cholesterol and cardiovascular mortality.

If Africa doesn’t have it tough enough these days, my heart goes out to Mozambique with the cyclone devastation, the armyworm seems to be eating its way across the continent destroying staple crops like maize. Let’s hope R & D can be ramped up quickly with solutions.

I am a closet Chipotle lover and Tamar Haspel outlines the woes the chain has been dealing with.

Two other interesting papers came out last week. One is unpacking stunting - faltering of linear growth in children. The other is a paper in the journal I edit, Global Food Security, on the use and interpretation of dietary diversity indicators in nutrition-sensitive agriculture literature.

In the world of food ethics, with colleagues at Hopkins and Columbia University, we published two papers. The first is in the Oxford Handbook of Public Health Ethics. The chapter focuses on three key ethical challenges in the nutrition public health sphere: the prioritization of key actions to address the multiple burdens of malnutrition, intergenerational justice issues of nutrition-impacted epigenetics, and the consequences of people’s diet choices, not only for humanity but also for the planet. In the second paper, we unpack the meaning of nutrition and demonstrate that a standalone right to adequate nutrition does indeed exist in international human rights law as a sum of other rights. This right to nutrition is, essentially, the sum of the human rights to food, health, education, water and sanitation, a healthy environment, information, political participation, and social security, along with rights ensuring adequate protection of and nondiscrimination against specific groups, such as women, children, and indigenous peoples.