The Cost of Cooking

With the increasing appearance of fast food over the last century, America has gained a stigma of an obese nation.  According to the CDC, obesity rates of both adults and children doubled between 1980 and 2000; furthermore, the obesity rate in adolescence has tripled. With all of this in mind, is the food America currently enjoys worth it?

Food can be healthy when one has the time to prepare it. Documentaries, including those similar to Food Inc. and Super-Size Me, have attempted to expose some of the health concerns currently abiding on American plates. These and similar documentaries call out large fast-food chains for abandoning health for profit. Such revelations have caused many questions to arise, like should companies allow toys to be sold to in such unhealthy meals.  These revelations have caused some global brands to change how they operate in the United States, like the recent inclusion of apples in a McDonalds Happy Meal. These corporations and even some consumers claim that parents know exactly what their children are eating because the nutrition facts are available online. Furthermore, they claim that the parents have a choice not to eat at certain restaurants; while in fact, circumstances often prevent parents from being able to control every aspect of their children’s diet.

If one is in a rush or traveling, the easiest choice available to eat is fast food. This is where American culture has evolved; the rush of the American daily life does not allow for every meal to be home cooked. This evolution of culture has allowed food to become diverse, as stated in the article, “The Art of Cooking”; but for every quality meal made, there are dozens of others with poor nutrition and hygiene. The average American cannot afford to go to expensive restaurants for every meal, and they are too busy to always cook for themselves. The current solution in America is not the best. Obesity rates in children and adults keep increasing, so obviously something must be done.

At the end of the day, American culture must reflect on itself and ask if fast food is good, not if it is normal. Just because the unhealthy, accessible meals are normal, does not mean they are good for children, good for adults, or good for America.

The Raven

While many shutter at the recent activities of certain NFL players and how they behave themselves in elevators with their spouses, danger and even horror is not unknown to the city of Baltimore. In fact, the very team that Ray Rice belongs to attained its name from a poem by an icon of American literature. The Raven, a poem by the famous Edgar Allan Poe, was the inspiration for the NFL franchise located on the Chesapeake.

Poe’s life was marked by tragedy. Many of the women in Poe’s life died in the same way of tuberculosis. First his mother, then his foster mother, and even his wife contracted this terrible disease. Poe’s relationship between the women he loved and more specifically his wife can be seen in his poem Annabel Lee. During Poe’s last poem, he explains in painful detail the amount of sorrow he will feel after his wife passes (Annabel Lee was written after his wife had contracted tuberculosis but before she had died). While many see only morbid prose and poetry at their first glance of Poe, a second look can often reveal a deeper meaning to his stories. For example, in Annabel Lee, Poe reveals a character that cares so deeply for his beloved one he cannot bare to part with her. His love was so deep that he would weep daily at her tomb. This love is a reason Poe should be viewed as more than just the founder of the modern horror and detective genres: he is an icon.  He personifies the American life in a realistic way that many authors before him would rather ignore by revert to an unrealistic happy ending. Even though his work is revered now, Poe struggled throughout his life as a writer financially and eventually died in Baltimore.

His death was shrouded in mystery; furthermore, some historians believe his death to be a homicide. Perhaps a correlation can be draw between the negative media attention Ray Rice brought to the Baltimore Ravens and the sad life of the author of the team’s namesake. Perhaps Poe’s sad life was never meant to be magnified by his modern success as an author. Perhaps any association with Poe will bring about the misfortune that plagued the life of Edgar Allan Poe. Fortunately, the Baltimore Raven’s Super Bowl championships in 2000 and 2012 disprove any curse-like association to the team. Fortunately, Edgar Allan Poe’s status as an icon of American prose and poetry almost atones for the misfortunes he endured during his own life.

The Art of Cooking

Although their origin is by no means American, the culinary arts have found their place in the United States. The depth and sophistication of a culture can be studied centuries later through paintings, writings, and other fossilized facts; however, cuisine is something near impossible to replicate from a non-existent culture. Modern Culinary America is a sweet treat that only its contemporaries may enjoy.

Sophistication and even focusing on art is difficult to achieve in times of civil unrest. This is why many of the great artistic symphonies, paintings, and sculptures are produced during times of peace. Romans entered an era know in Latin as “Pax Romana” or “time of Roman peace”. During this era, citizens could travel the immense empire of the romans with protection and explore new cultures and ideas. This mixture of ideas and peace led to the beloved art of the Roman period. Flashing forward to modern day America, it is now in a period known as “Pax Americana” or “time of American peace”. America’s identity as a global force for their perceived ideas of truth, justice, and moral good has allowed its homeland to flourish with art forms old and new; the art of cooking has found a prominent place among the American people. This is evidenced by the countless cooking shows, fine dining restaurants, and even an entire network devoted to a love of cooking. Further evidence of the artistic value of cuisine is found in the fact that some restaurants stay in business selling extremely expensive meals. If all food was the same, thus not an art form, Americans would be unwilling to pay exorbitant prices for their meals.

Ironically, the food of America is not very American at all. Much like the term “great America melting pot”, American cuisine is made up of the best dishes from around the globe. Even the food many people attribute as regionally American cuisine is in fact from another country or region. Hamburgers for instance are from Germany; Pizza originated in Italy; Even hot dogs got their start somewhere else (as sausages in Germany). While no food is distinctly American, it is this fact that makes everything Americans eat American food. Since America is a society of Immigrants from all sorts of cultures and backgrounds, it only makes since that its food comes from different countries around the globe.