Food Values

Bryce Rothenberg

Denver Modified Southern Dining

My relationship with food and the food choices I now make is drastically changing due to the completely different food culture I have been placed in being a college student in Denver, Colorado. Growing up in Nashville, Tennessee molded the relationship I had and still moderately have with food to this day because of something called Southern Cooking. The food culture in the South is one of indulgence and leisure, while the food culture I have now been thrown into, as a college student, is one based off fast-paced, healthy snack-size meals that can be eaten 4-5 times a day and on the go. These two eating cultures are polar opposites and have thrown me into a food limbo, unable to completely abandon my Southern roots or completely assimilate into the on-the-go Denver eating culture. To give you a better understanding of what a food limbo is like, limbo itself has been defined as  “a place of oblivion or neglect, a prison” (4), “a state of uncertainty” (4), not something pleasant to be experiencing regarding food. This restraint or confinement of my previous food values developed and rooted in family Southern dining, are not applicable to the situation I have been placed in being a college student in a westernized food culture. I am in a food limbo. Caught in-between two contradicting food cultures in a very important transitional period in my life, but what I am beginning to learn is that I am very capable of mixing the healthy, small portion sized college and western food choices with the enjoyment and richness that comes from my Southern rooted food values.

Grabbing a fruit or vegetable for the road had never been a viable option for me until coming to Denver and being introduced to the plethora of healthy organic snacks the cafeteria and C Store have to offer. The article, ‘Eating on the Edge”, illustrates how food, has become "an additive to a situation, such as a cigarette would be, rather than being definitive."(2) This idea of food becoming an additive to a situation rather than a definitive shows the complete disconnect of the meaning of a meal between dining as a college student in Denver and Southern dining culture. The food choices being made as a college student in Denver are based on the nutrients, availability, efficiency, and utility of the product, while in Nashville choices are based upon how full the food will get you and how much you will enjoy the food:

“Southern cooking at its most traditional tends to be abundant and rich - not a bad thing if you happen to be good and hungry. But the California palate, more often, is wary of food that you can pile on a plate, no matter how tasty and artsy it is. We tend to value beauty over bulk, and freshness over a flavor wallop.”(5)

This California palate that Mott describes is a very good representation of dining in the Western states, especially Denver; more worried about freshness and presentation, than richness and abundance, which is what is expected out of a hearty home-cooked Southern meal.

             Before coming to college my perspective on food was very relaxed and enjoyable. I use to view food as more of leisure in Nashville, eating substantial meals when placed before me and snacking very little in-between these gargantuan feasts. One of the main differences I have seen in the way I consume food in Denver compared to Nashville is that now in Denver I don’t necessarily eat to enjoy the food or to get full as I use to Nashville. Being on the crimson meal plan, I am not allowed to enter the cafeteria before 11 o’clock in the morning, yet after 11 and until 7 o’clock at night I am allowed to get as much food as I want as many times as I want. “Lighter meals are the most popular option for on-campus diners, with sandwiches (61%) leading the pack as most ordered for the on-the-go lifestyle of students.”(3) This being said, my eating patterns and my appreciation for a specific meals such as breakfast, lunch, or dinner have diminished drastically due to my inability to fully experience or indulge in a specific meal, yet I am still trying to keep my “Southern way of thinking” as Blount puts it.

“The way folks were meant to eat is the way my family ate when I was growing up in Georgia. We ate till we got tired. Then we went "Whoo!" and leaned back and wholeheartedly expressed how much we regretted that we couldn't summon up the strength, right then, to eat more. When I moved to the Northeast, I met someone who said she liked to stop eating while she was still just a little bit hungry.”(1)

When I lived in Nashville, food wasn’t about the ingredients or how healthy it was for me, it was about the quality and quantity of the food being consumed. Growing up in a household that was against snacking in-between meals, it has been very difficult for me to acclimate myself to the college student eating culture. I still to this day don’t feel that I have appropriately assimilated, trying to enjoy the richness and abundance of each meal while eating smaller and healthier portions.

            This assimilation into another food culture isn’t going to happen seamlessly because of my predisposition to the richness and abundance of Southern cooking. With this said I temporarily want to through out a word to describe the situation in which I feel trapped and imprisoned, limbo. I defined this word earlier stating that it is “a place of oblivion and neglect, a prison, a state of uncertainty”(4), but I didn’t relate it back to the situation I am facing as a freshman at the University of Denver. Growing up in Nashville I established very Southern food values and followed these food values closely as to fit into the society more comfortably. If this meant I was eating three huge meals a day of very rich, cholesterol packed, fried foods, it didn’t matter because everyone was doing it. Now coming to Denver these food values I have established in Nashville are holding me hostage and not allowing me to comfortably adjust to the different food culture I have been thrown into. Throughout the first three quarters of my college career, I have been struggling to suppress my Southern rooted food values, while learning how to eat smaller portioned healthier meals. The amalgamation of contradicting food practices I have to sift through is a process that has sent me into a state of food value uncertainty, which is to say, a food limbo. This has been an ongoing learning process throughout the year that has been difficult at times, yet rewarding when compatibility between contradictory food choices is found. I am developing a Denver modified, Southern rooted, set of food values that take pieces from both the food choices I made as a first year college student, as well as the food practices I was taught as a child. I can practice eating Southern, enjoying the richness and abundance of the food, while still eating healthy, small sized meals, I just need to learn to accept these food values I have presented, rather than rejecting or fully accepting one set in particular.

            So I’m in food limbo… Who cares? I do, I care. It has been difficult for me to speed up my eating style to fit that of the fast-paced and efficiency-based restaurants that surround the University of Denver. These restaurants draw in college students like bees to honey and come to think of it, ALL MY FRIENDS ARE COLLEGE KIDS. The restaurants that set up shop close to campus have been forced to integrate fast-service food into their layout and management of the store because of the growing demand for fast quality food. Both Chipotle and Illegal Pete’s are Mexican grills that service mostly college students, and in my opinion because of the proximity to the University of Denver and the youthful, fast moving culture, the unique efficient layout of each restaurant allows many different people to eat their meals in many different ways. Being able to eat my meal many different ways? Why would I want to do that? All I want is to sit down and enjoy the meal the way I use to in Nashville, savoring every bite and leaving my plate sparkling clean. But this ideal is impossible in the culture I have been thrown into as a college student. “I grew up eating with people who didn't just take a few of the most obvious bites out of a piece of chicken and decide abstractly, "Well, I have eaten this piece of chicken." They recognized that the institution of fried chicken demands a great deal of chicken, and they felt bound to hold up their end.”(1)

            There are many aspects of my food choices today that originated in Nashville and are not applicable to the life style I am living in Denver as a college student. While these characteristics may not be applicable or usable at this point in my life, it does not mean that I am abandoning these values; I am rather placing these values in the back of mind for some later date. Many of these food values I learned in Nashville have been pushed out of my conscious being due to the contradictory food values I am learning in Denver. I am beginning to look at food more as a utility than as food for the sake of enjoyment and fulfillment. This is a very utilitarian meaning of food I am developing as a college student, eating to be able to have enough energy to do a certain activity or to sustain my hunger for an hour while I go to class. I understand what I need to do to be able to assimilate into the fast-paced college diet, yet it goes against every food value I ever learned growing up. I know that this is a transitional period in my life; not only for my food values but also for me as an individual, and because of this I am taking these food value decisions very seriously as to establish some concrete set of rules that can be applicable in almost every situation.

Being in this state of limbo and transition both geographically and life course wise has placed me in a very interesting position in which I am the soul decision maker, yet am torn between multiple options. While moving to Denver has signified a geographical switch from the South to the West, it has also signified a monumental point in my life being a college freshman at The University of Denver. I have geographically moved away from my Southern roots in Nashville, but the Southern values I established while living in Nashville are values and fundamentals that cannot be uprooted. These food choices that are being made around me by friends and classmates are those based off a Western-styled, college student, health-conscious mentality that I understand, yet do not agree with. The food values and cultures I have experienced my first year away from home are those completely and utterly different from my Southern rooted values, and because of that shed a different light on why people eat the way they do. Experiencing these different food practices for an extended period of time has allowed me to develop and hone my own values, taking practices from each culture and making them one. This will mean making healthier choices both ingredients and portion-size wise, yet still enjoying the richness and abundance of taste in each morsel of food. Let’s begin!

Work Cited

1.     Blount, Roy,Jr. "The Way Folks were Meant to Eat." Southern Living 1996: 84-. ProQuest Central. Web. 30 May 2012 .

2.     Horwitz, Jamie. "Eating at the Edge." University of California Press. Web. 30 Apr. 2012. <http://www.jstor.org/stable/10.1525/gfc.2009.9.3.42 .>.

3.     "Study Examines College Dining Habits. " Food Management  : Online Exclusive 27 Apr. 2012: ABI/INFORM Global, ProQuest. Web.  30 May. 2012.

4.     "limbo 1 or Limbo." Chambers 21st Century Dictionary. London: Chambers Harrap, 2001. Credo Reference. Web. 29 May 2012.

5.     Mott, Patrick. "Great Southern Cooking." OC Metro Business (2004): 126-. ProQuest Central. 29 May 2012 .

This course has opened up my eyes to the way in which I view my own food values. Coming to college has been a huge transition in my life, and just this quarter I realized through this course how much my food practices had changed and adapted to my new environment. I feel as though I need to be aware when the way I eat starts to change because this is something that can really affect me down the road if I don't keep track. Moving into a more healthy smaller portioned sized diet from that of my Southern roots in fried chicken and biscuits, will allow me to live a longer as well as live a healthier life. Moving forward I know that my food values are bound to change but I know that I will be more mindful of how they change and when they begin to change.

Economic Eating Style

With so many choices of what to have for a specific meal or even snack, indecision has become, in today’s society, one of the most complicating contemporary food issues because of the exponentially increasing number of choices. This issue is so complicated because of the multiple economic groups it affects and the different implications for each economic class. As Pollan states, “The sheer novelty and glamour of the Western diet, with its 17,000 new food products introduced every year, and the marketing muscle used to sell these products, has overwhelmed the force of tradition and left us where we now find ourselves” (Pollan 15). With choices between fresh produce, which is expensively priced, and processed produced, which has been synthetically developed in a lab to be made at the lowest possible cost to the company, low income families are forced into positions in which their only choices are unhealthy, potentially dangerous, processed foods. 

These 17,000 choices in the supermarket are only available to a certain portion of the population and those who are not in this economic class that allows them to have all of the choices are forced into a certain style of eating consisting of mostly processed foods. With some people being forced into certain eating styles dependent upon their economic stability, others have given up the ability to think or eat for themselves and are basing their eating styles off of the popular news and or media diets that have flooded our culture today. Although some people are restrained to the type of eating style that their class permits, others who have almost an infinite amount of choices are being drawn in by popular culture and media food propaganda that defines the food that they choose to buy at the supermarket.

Sodium

Looking through my daily food journal I noticed something that I have known about myself for a long time, I love sodium. Sodium manifests itself in anything and everything, and while I may love this habit at the moment, it has the potential to carry me down a destructive path ending in possible hypertension and cardiovascular disease. To give you some perspective into the world of sodium, “Many processed foods contain 1000 mg or more per serving, while typical restaurant meals contain 2300 to 4600 mg of sodium (TABLE).”(JAMA), yet the NHBPEP(National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute’s National high Blood pressure Education Program) recommends a sodium intake of less than 2400mg/d. The disconnect between what people in the United States are recommended to consume and what they actually choose to consume is enormous, and because of this disconnect, a very prevalent issue has arisen in todays society over the risk of prolonged overconsumption of the delicious ingredient sodium. “Both the social and economic burdens of the present high salt intakes are huge, as salt accounts for a big proportion of high blood pressure levels, strokes, and heart attacks in all industrialized communities.”(ScienceDirect), and we the people are the ones facilitating these companies to produce sodium induced items because we are the ones buying and promoting their product.

Personally, I feel as though I am one of sodium’s biggest promoters/supporters, eating at least one bag of snack mix made up of 5 servings each containing 310mg of sodium, I consume 1550mg of sodium as a snack. I don’t think you understand what I just said, 1550mg of sodium AS A SNACK! I am a college student eating “restaurant meals” at least twice a day because of the cafeteria, meaning, I am consuming somewhere from 2300mg to 4600mg times two plus 1550mg of sodium at a MINIMUM. Thinking about how long I have possibly been consuming this much sodium is beginning to disturb me more and more. “Dietary surveys have also indicated that in 1999 to 2000 salt intakes in the United States were remarkably higher than in the late 1970s.¹¹ It is of considerable public health interest that, since the late 1980s and early 1990s, the age-adjusted prevalence of high blood pressure has also shown a turn to a marked increase in the US population aged 20 years and older.”(ScienceDirect) Being so young I have an almost invincible attitude feeling as though no matter what I do to my body, it will have the ability to fix or heal whatever harm I do. This idea is beginning to fade as I learn the truths that the food industry tries to hide from you, like the health consequences associated with high sodium diets/products.

This topic is very interesting for me because of my obsession for any and every sodium induced product, if I try to keep up the pace I am consuming sodium, I will have serious blood pressure as well as hypertension issues. The Finnish initiated “the progressive decrease in salt intake, which has continued in Finland for 25 to 30 years, has played an important role both in the impressive fall in the average blood pressure of the population and in the pronounced 75% to 80% decrease in both stroke and coronary heart disease mortality in the population younger than 65 years.”(ScienceDirect) Personally, being able to see the direct consequences of too much sodium intake shows a great point of view of the situation, yet actually being able to statistically show the advantages of sodium reduction in a certain culture is much more convincing and moving. If I knew that by eating one less bag of Gardetta’s each day “that I could possibly increase my life expectancy 5-6 years like the Finnish population did during the past 25-30 years”(ScienceDirect Paraphrase), I can tell you 100% that I would abandon my obsession with sodium completely. What will you do with the information that has been presented before you? 

Sources:

http://jama.jamanetwork.com/article.aspx?volume=298&issue=12&page=1439

http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0033062006000831

Commonalities

Very few of the Blog Post #8's mentioned eating breakfast or even having anything before 1 in the afternoon. For me, I usually try to eat breakfast on the weekends because my pioneer card allows me to get an omelet, yet during the week I follow much more of the same pattern I am seeing other classmates use in their Blog Posts. As a college student breakfast is a very difficult meal to eat on a consistent basis unless you have an early class or a specific dining plan. The absence of breakfast during the week in my life is due to my meal plan as well as my class schedule and because of that it is very difficult for me to try to work it back into my daily routine. 

It also surprised me how much food was eaten away from the cafeteria and or school affiliation Sodexo food

Food Log

Friday:

·      12 pm – 2 Chicken Breasts, some fries, and carrots – 2 beverages

·      2:30 pm – Bag of Gardettas chips

·      6 pm – Quesadilla with chicken, chips – 1 beverage

·      9 pm – Snack mix consisting of pretzels, oyster crackers, and nuts

·      9 pm-12 am – 8 or so beverages

Saturday:

·      9 am – Omelet with cheese, bell peppers, and onions – 2 beverages

·      1 pm – 1 Chicken Breast, a salad with carrots and bell peppers, a couple saltines – 2 beverages

·      5 pm – 2 nutri-grain bars and a beef jerky stick

·      7:30 pm – A piece of white chicken, mac and cheese, and honeydew – 1 beverage

·      9:30 pm-11 pm – 6 or so beverages

Sunday:

·      11:30 am – Omelet with cheese, bell peppers, and onions – 1 beverage

·      3:45 pm – Chipotle chicken burrito with beans, corn, salsa, cheese, ect – 3 beverages

·      5:00 pm – 1 piece of pizza and carrots

·      5:25 pm – 1 banana

·      9:30 pm – 1 orange

·      12:00 pm – 1 bag of Gardettas chips

The Banana

Yesterday morning I woke up much earlier than normal and decided to treat myself to a nice Sodexo style omelet filled with cheese, onions, and peppers. After enthusiastically indulging the 290-calorie meal Sodexo likes to refer to as an omelet, I grabbed myself a nice looking Fuji apple and began scavenging through the banana basket, searching, for the perfect, unharmed yellow crescent moon fruit. Why I feel the need to get a yellow banana opposed to a yellow and brown or yellow and green banana is historically based in my past as well as in my distrust for Sodexo food, even a harmless fruit like a banana.

Since I can remember, my Dad always had a fresh, cut up piece of fruit in the car while driving my sister and I to school. While I loved this daily routine, I have now noticed that I have become very picky about which fruits I choose to eat, as well as what condition said fruit is in. While looking through the bananas I noticed how many of these yellow fruits were either inedible or covered in bruises and wondered to myself where in the world Sodexo was getting these bananas from. With a little research on my part about the history of the banana I didn’t necessarily find out where exactly Sodexo was getting their bananas, but I was able to find out the origin of the banana as well as where I think these bananas are coming form.

What I learned about the history of the banana in my research was that, “The earliest documentary reference to bananas in Africa is from the sixth century A.D. Historians and archaeologists often thought that bananas were probably introduced to Africa via Madagascar, which was colonized by people from Southeast Asia in the first millennium A.D.”(Robertshaw) These facts interested me, yet as I scoured over the Internet I still couldn’t find where exactly Sodexo was getting their fruit/specifically their bananas. Although I gave up on the search to find where these bananas were coming from, just the fact that I couldn’t find the country, continent, region, even hemisphere where Sodexo was getting their food products, has changed my relationship, not necessarily with the fruit, but with the Sodexo Company all together.

Although I am sitting here writing this paper eating a banana that came from the cafeteria and in about and hour will be going back downstairs to get a nice Sodexo style meal, the way in which I view the meal and its components have changed drastically. This distrust that I now have acquired for the Sodexo Company is not going to force me to stop eating in the cafeteria or to stop eating all Sodexo productions, yet it has made me more aware of what is going into my body and the risk factors of such food being inadequately maintained or prepared. Because of the low risk factors of ill prepared and maintained fruits and vegetables, I have noticed myself migrating towards a more vegetarian lifestyle while eating at the cafeteria.

When researching the production the banana, I came across and interesting source that spoke about the problems of huge supermarkets and mass distributers wanting evenly ripe bananas and how traditional methods of ripening the bananas weren’t efficient enough. The author states, “The problem has been that consumers demand bunches of bananas that have ripened evenly. This was difficult to achieve with their traditional method of hanging bunches from the kitchen ceiling. So farmers were unable to supply quality fruit on a regular basis. One farmer, Juma Mgwane, experimented by putting bunches in an underground pit and using smoke to hasten ripening.”(Anonymous), which ties back to my essay “Faster” about how it now seems that the only thing that the food industry cares about is efficiency. The source goes on to say, “The smoking process takes about 20 minutes. After smoking, the pipe is closed and the pit left for about 24 hours, when it is opened. The banana bunches are evenly ripened and ready for packaging and selling.”(Anonymous), instead of waiting for the natural development of the banana to occur, the farmer chose to speed up the process and in doing so possibly jeopardized the product, all for the sake of efficiency.

Learning about the banana and its production has definitely changed my relationship with the food in a subconscious sense, yet I still love bananas and although there may be some sketchy methods of speeding of the ripening process, I still have a banana every day. For me, even with this new information, the benefits of bananas far outweigh the negatives of the ripening process and mass production. With this in mind, enjoy your next banana and see if your taste buds can detect the smoky nature of the yellow crescent shaped fruit.

Sources:

http://0­-proquest­.umi­.com­.bianca­.penlib­.du­.edu/pqdlink­?did=1659597681­&Fmt=3­&clientId=48347­&RQT=309­&VName=PQD

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=Africa%27s+first+bananas+%28History+of+the+banana+in+Africa%29&rft.jtitle=ARCHAEOLOGY&rft.au=Robertshaw%2C+P&rft.date=2006-09-01&rft.pub=ARCHAEOLOGICAL+INST+AMERICA&rft.issn=0003-8113&rft.volume=59&rft.issue=5&rft.spage=25&rft.epage=29&rft.externalDBID=n%2Fa&rft.externalDocID=000239756000013

National Eating disorder

Pollan points out many problems with the way in which Americans go about picking and choosing which foods they are going to put in their bodies, and says that because of these problems, America is one of the unhealthiest countries in the world. Pollan looks at the changing diet fads that stress one nutritional group over the other, such as the Atkins diet, which stresses a carb free life in order to be “healthy” and look in style. What I thought was most interesting about this article was when Pollan stated, “So we've learned to choose our foods by the numbers (calories, carbs, fats, R.D.A.'s, price, whatever), relying more heavily on our reading and computational skills than upon our senses. Indeed, we've lost all confidence in our senses of taste and smell, which can't detect the invisible macro- and micronutrients science has taught us to worry about, and which food processors have become adept at deceiving anyway.”(Pollan, 4) This statement truly captured to me the American food culture and how people in the United States pick and choose which foods they are going to eat. With the food industry playing perfectly into these changing diet fads, the facilitation of this cultural shift will continue to thrive and allow the food industry to prosper and make money off of carb crazy Americans, due to the fact that the rest of the world doesn’t have to deal with this problem. Pollan’s talk about Europe and the European style of eating interested me due to the fact that I had wrote similarly on the last paper and I was reading to learn facts that I didn’t know. I really enjoyed when he talked about France and Italy having a traditional meal set up and how that set up has not changed for centuries, and because of that, the diversity of the food in their 3-4 hour meal allows them to get all the nutrients out of all the different food gr

Out of Site

I really enjoyed this article because it finally began to look at our relationship to animals and how we treat them in specific situations. These specific situations range from giving our pets like our dogs and cats presents at Christmas time or their birthday’s to clinical testing and animal cruelty. This article was especially interesting due to the fact that right now I am learning about animal testing/animal ethics in my Ethics class and this article plays right into how humans take advantage and exploit animals on the basis that they don’t have the capacity to feel some of the emotions we feel or have the ability to rationalize. What this article did was show exactly why billions of people all over the world are so ok with eating animal meat and why they don’t question it. Just because these animals are being tortured and slaughtered out of our site doesn’t mean that we are not playing a part in those animals being tortured and slaughtered. By buying the food or products that are produced from animal testing/slaughtering we are silently supporting a business that I guarantee none of us would do first hand. Think about actually have to go and find a chicken for yourself, pluck the feathers, slaughter the chicken, drain the blood, cook the chicken, after finishing this process, how appetizing would that meal be knowing you were the one to end another organisms life. This is only half of what the meat industry does, these companies raise animals for the sole purpose of being slaughtered and eaten at a later date, how in the world are we as people ok with other living things being tortured and mutilated as long as we don’t see it?
 

Faster

Bryce Rothenberg

FASTER!

Horwitz’s article about ‘Eating on the Edge” illustrated how food, has become "an additive to a situation, such as a cigarette would be, rather than being definitive"(Horwitz 1).  This idea of eating food or having a meal becoming more of task than a leisurely social activity has resonated with me much more ever since coming to college. Due to how busy I am, I have noticed that I tend to eat much more food on the go and my appreciation for the food that I eat has decreased drastically due to it becoming a more individual experience. This idea is not only shared by me, "In the US, unstructured eating patterns have become more common, while taking time to share food with others is becoming less familiar"(Horwitz 4), many restaurants have now begun to implement fast-service food ideas to the layout of their store, to the way that the store is run, allowing people to get their food efficiently, use their food as a utility if needed, yet also allows them the ability to relax and eat with friends. Both Chipotle and Illegal Pete’s are Mexican grills that service mostly college students, and in my opinion because of the proximity to the University of Denver and the youthful, fast moving culture, the unique efficient layout of each restaurant allows many different people to eat their meals in many different ways. What I mean when I say the restaurant “allows many different people to eat many different ways” is that no matter how a person wants to treat their specific meal at Pete’s or Chipotle that day, either getting it to go and eating it in class or at work, while on the go, sitting alone studying in the restaurant, conversing with your friends sitting at a table, ect., the point I am trying to make is that the accessibility and or utility of the food being produced at these restaurants is absurdly versatile.  This culture that we live in has transformed the meaning of a meal from something that use to be shared with your friends and family, to a means, a utility, that facilitates an ends, being full.

Coming to college I knew that some things would change drastically but I never thought that my appreciation for food or a meal would diminish so substantially. Being on the crimson meal plan, I am not allowed to enter the cafeteria before 11 o’clock in the morning, yet after 11 and until 7 o’clock at night I am allowed to get as much food as I want as many times as I want. This being said, my eating patterns and my appreciation for a specific meals such as breakfast, lunch, or dinner have diminished drastically due to my inability to fully experience or indulge in a specific meal. Due to this change in my eating patterns, I have noticed that I tend to eat much more food on the go and my appreciation for the food that I eat has changed from something I used to completely and utterly love, into a utility. For me this change is something I have come to accept due to the situation that I have been placed in, and the priorities that I have established for myself have put my academics and or my personal success above my enjoyment of specific meals. Don’t get me wrong, I definitely sit down and enjoy my meals every once in a while, but food itself, at this point in time, has become a utility that is essential to my survival and nothing more.

Although this food culture is changing, into a faster paced, efficiently based system, the nice sit down family and friend meals that once were so popular are still present, yet fading into the background. This transition between sitting down and having a meal with your family or friends, to grabbing food on the go, has not only made food a utility, but has changed our culture into a more individualistic society that doesn’t value relationships like they use to. With the introduction of the television as well as the computer our society has changed drastically. While this transition was taking place technologically and culturally, the food industry recognized this significant culture shirt, also known as the “efficiency boom”, and began to make products that suited this emerging generation of fast American youth.

Since the invention of the “TV tray”, the food industry has tailored their products for efficiency and utility, moving farther and farther away from the sit down family meal that use to be the American culture. With the food industry encouraging and advertising, efficient easily accessible meals, the American culture and especially the U.S. youth are being pushed to accept and conform to this fast paced (efficient) utility driven meaning of food. Don’t get me wrong, I’m not saying that the food industry is the reason that Western culture is defined the way it is, what I’m trying to say is that the technological revolution that we are experiencing now, and have been for the past 20 plus years, caused a serious cultural shift, which the food industry recognized and began to cater to. Since the 90’s and the “efficiency boom” (technological revolution), Western culture has become a goal oriented, fast paced, future driven society, much more involved in personal success and business than relationships and leisure. Now as time progresses we are beginning to see restaurants around densely youth populated areas, such as colleges, becoming more fast-service food oriented, rather than sit down, order at the table restaurants, that became so popular in the late 20^th century.

            Being a college student, and living around a college campus allows me to realize the different fast paced culture of the youth, where utility and efficiency are characteristics most sought after. Restaurants who set up shop close to campus have been forced to integrate fast-service food into their layout and management of the store because of the growing demand for fast quality food. “Often, the bottlenecks in service are due to the restaurant’s overall design and setup. ‘Many operations that I have consulted with made all of their mistakes in the design phase,’ Kharasch says. ‘They did not think through every step an employee has to make to get the food out and they did not think about where a guest stands when waiting to order food, or how many registers they may need if the sales are above expectations’”(Brox, Fast Food Fast). For Pete’s I feel that this fast-service food idea was absolutely implemented into the layout of the restaurant, due to the placement of the menu in comparison to where the customers line up, to how checkout and or ordering process goes, Pete’s was tailored for efficiency and the “on the go” college student.

            These “on the go” college students have forced the restaurants surrounding the University of Denver to transform how their food is utilized and appreciated. What I have noticed personally is that these restaurants have changed their layout and or style to accommodate the fast paced youth culture, yet these restaurants have not compromised their ingredients or finished product to allow this service to be faster. Although the food culture maybe changing into an on the go, fast paced system, the integrity of the food and freshness of the ingredients will always be cherished by the provider and the consumer.

            People have become so custom to eating on the go, and because of this, when people are not able to get something quickly and efficiently they will more likely than not to skip the meal than take the time out of their day to sit down and enjoy the meal. In Europe this idea of grabbing a meal to eat while on the go or even skipping a meal is almost unheard of. Food in European cultures is more about the experience than anything else, being able to sit down for 3 hours with your friends and or family and have a leisurely meal is the norm and eating alone is preposterous.

European culture has not been as affected by the “efficiency boom” or technology as the United States and Western culture have, as you can see through the leisurely European approach to food and work and how they intertwine. Work in Europe is seen as just that in itself, work, meaning that people in Europe work to support their family and give themselves the ability to experience leisure, rather than working to be rich, which is seen so much in Western culture. In Europe, during the entire month of August, no matter where you are or what profession you are in, you are on vacation. The way that Europeans view work is that they feel that if their employees are well rested and have time to relax and recuperate that the work that they produce will be much better and a much higher quality. Going along this same line, every day for lunch, European workers get a two-three hour break for lunch during which they can do anything. The importance that companies in Europe are placing on scheduled time for leisure is what is keeping Europe from turning into a more Western based culture. A blog post claiming “I’d Rather Eat at My Desk” launched a massive discussion, “In response to folks writing wistfully about some European countries with their long lunches, Larimore pointed out that, for the working parent, a long lunch is just more time you're not with your kids. Maybe that's the point (they don't seem to be having many kids in Europe these days). But many of us like spending our evenings with our families.”(Vanderkam) For people living in the West in such a goal driven, fast paced society, the idea of long lunches and leisure, as enjoyed by people in Europe, is ridiculous because it is impossible in the society that we live in.                       

With technological advances changing how the Western society we live in operates, the food industry has begun to tailor their products and advertisements to this changing culture, and in doing so are facilitating the fast paced society we have come to know.  As our life becomes more dependent on these fast-service food restaurants, easily accessible, efficient food products, the food industry will continue to make more efficient, utility driven means of food, and the society that we live in will continue to become exponentially faster paced. 

           

             

Works Cited

Brox, Denene. "Fast Food Fast." Quick Fast Food Service Crucial to Success. QSR. Web. 25 Apr. 2012. <http://www.qsrmagazine.com/ordering/fast-food-fast?microsite=5>.

Horwitz, Jamie. "Eating at the Edge." University of California Press. Web. 30 Apr. 2012. <http://www.jstor.org/stable/10.1525/gfc.2009.9.3.42 .>.

Vanderkam, Laura. "Should You Eat at Your Desk?" CBSNews. CBS Interactive, 30 Apr. 2012. Web. 30 Apr. 2012. <http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-500395_162-57423885/should-you-eat-at-your-desk/>.

Utility

Horwitz’s article about ‘Eating on the Edge” illustrated how food, just as many items and utilities, have evolved to fit a specific purpose in today’s culture. This idea of eating food or having a meal becoming more of an individual experience has resonated with me much more ever since coming to college, due to how busy I am just on a day to day basis and how little time I have to eat in between classes and or places I have to go. Because of my specific meal plan, I am not allowed to enter the cafeteria before 11 o’clock in the morning, yet after 11 and until 7 o’clock at night I am allowed to get as much food as I want as many times as I want. This being said, my eating patterns and my appreciation for a specific meals such as breakfast, lunch, or dinner have diminished drastically due to my inability to fully experience or indulge in a specific meal. This idea is not shared only by me, "In the US, unstructured eating patterns have become more common, while taking time to share food with others is becoming less familiar"(Horwitz 4). Due to this change in my eating patterns, I have noticed that I tend to eat much more food on the go and my appreciation for the food that I eat has changed from something I used to completely and utterly love, into a utility, "an additive to a situation, such as a cigarette would be, rather than being definitive"(Horwitz 1). For me this change is something I have come to accept due to the situation that I have been placed in, and the priorities that I have established for myself have put my academics and or my personal success above my enjoyment of specific meals. Don’t get me wrong, I definitely sit down and enjoy my meals every once in a while, but food itself at this point in time has become a utility that is essential to my survival and nothing more.

Pete's

I went to Illegal Pete’s at 12 o’clock on a Sunday afternoon and was treated to a nice crowd packed inside the restaurant due to the miserable weather that day. I ordered some chips and salsa to keep me company during the next hour of observations. The staff as well as many of the customers were one the younger side of the age spectrum, in my opinion, due to the close proximity to the University of Denver, and because of this I felt that the atmosphere and the restaurant itself were catering to the needs of the customers they are use to seeing on a regular basis. With popular music playing throughout the restaurant as well as sports on any and every television, the restaurant exuded an almost barish feel to it. This is understandable because Pete’s has a bar which, in my opinion, seems to be serving alcohol at any and every time of the day.

Another point I wanted to bring up was the accessibility and or efficiency of the way the restaurant is set up and run. With the customer having the ability to see all the ingredients behind a glass shield and their specific taco or burrito being made from start to finish, the process is very quick and easy, and leaves the customer satisfied, having the finish product being the exact combination that they ordered and saw made. While all of the ingredients are already prepared and presented in front of you behind the glass shield, the difference between Pete’s and a Subway is in the quality and or freshness of the ingredients, not necessarily the way in which the ingredients are displayed. Although you may get your food as fast, if not faster than at a fast food restaurant, the quality will never be compromised and the customer will always be satisfied.

This idea of restaurant efficiency really interested me, and so after leaving Illegal Pete’s I looked around campus for other restaurants that used this same fast-service food technique. What I found was that Chipotle about a block down the street has basically the exact same ordering process, “Distinguishing features include non-standardized layouts, unique décor, an open-view kitchen, and an ordering process in which the customers can see the food being assembled.”(1) The advantage for the customer, like I pointed out earlier, in being able to see your food prepared and all of the ingredients going into this amalgamation, is that in the end of the transaction the customer is getting exactly what they ordered and the quality of the ingredients is visible to the customer before the chose to put it into their meal or not to. Both Chipotle and Illegal Pete’s are Mexican grills that service mostly college students, and in my opinion because of the proximity to the University of Denver and the youthful, fast moving culture, the unique efficient layout of each restaurant allows many different people to eat their meals in many different ways.

What I mean when I say the restaurant “allows many different people to eat many different ways” is that no matter how a person wants to treat their specific meal at Pete’s or Chipotle that day, either getting it to go and eating it in class or at work, while on the go, sitting alone studying in the restaurant, conversing with your friends sitting at a table, having a drink at the bar watching the game, the point I am trying to make is that the accessibility and or utility of the food being produced at these restaurants is absurdly versatile. While sitting at a table observing other people’s meals, I wanted to see what the utility of the food they were eating was for that specific person. For some, the utility of the burrito is that it holds well on the go and can be eaten while multitasking due to the fact that all the ingredients are neatly wrapped up in a massive tortilla, for some the meal is used as a way to connect to the person you are sharing your meal with, and for some it is just for the pure enjoyment of Illegal Pete and or Chipotle which they can enjoy sitting by themselves watching television, reading a book or newspaper, doing schoolwork, the options are limitless.

The utility of the food served at Illegal Pete’s is ridiculously versatile, able to satisfy each and every customer in an efficient unique way. The atmosphere of the restaurant is just as adaptable to any situation as the food is, and because of this Pete’s is not only a place to go to eat, but also a place to hang out with your friends and relax, giving you the option every time you walk in their doors to experience something different and unique.

Bibliography

"Chipotle Mexican Grill Inc. Stocks." CMG. Web. 17 Apr. 2012. <http://finapps.forbes.com/finapps/BuyHol

Chipotle

This is a link to basically a connection that I'm trying to make between other restaurants that use the fast-service food technique and restaurant efficiency to make their product more appealing

Social Status

Both articles showed the connection that food can have to a culture and or a certain social status, yet both authors chose very different settings to carry out their research and by doing so have created unique stories that show the importance of certain food in both a prison setting and in Shenzen, China. In the article about Eating in Shenzen it talked how Shenzen’s population had grown over 40 times its previous size of 300,000 and because of this the traditions and or culture of Shenzen was drastically changing. A great way the author found to distinguish between the long time Shenzen citizens and the new comers happened to be the food that each group chose to eat, and in this food came histories of both people from Shenzen and not. The connection I drew from this article to the article about prison food or “Spread” was the way in which class and or social status was determined through the food you ate. In Shenzen the food you ate determined whether or not you were a local Shenzen citizen or just someone from a different part of China looking to be successful, in prison, even having the ability to buy ingredients to make the spread showed that you either had or did not have money and because of this placed you in a certain group. Different ethnic groups made different spreads with different ingredients and because of this it is very easy to see which group certain people belonged to. In jail, “Spread” is a delicacy that only well off inmates, either financially or politically, have access to, and because of this, either the absence of such a delicacy or the presents of it says something about the group that you belong to as well as what your status is in the prison system. 

Coke vs. Pepsi Analysis

Stephen's Essay

When looking at Stephen's essay I found many similar observations about the way in which Coca Cola chooses to advertise their product, such as, detailed and intricate animation, promoting uniqueness, and showing the happiness that their product brings to their customers. These choices made by Coke to promote their product through showing what Coca Cola has to offer instead of what other companies lack compared to their own, in my opinion as well as Stephens, is much more effective in persuading people to buy their product. Coke has chosen to take the high road compared to Pepsi, who chooses to try to make Coke look like an inferior product, by not even considering the competition, and by doing so have created an ad campaign that makes people want to by their product, not by showing why they shouldn't be buying their competitors drinks, but by showing what is so great and unique about the product they are selling.

Coca Cola

From the time that I was little I have been amazed by Coca Cola’s advertising ideas compared to those of other mass companies like Mars or Lays. It always seemed to me that Coca Cola put a little more time and effort into their marketing department than did other companies due to the intricacies of Coke ads I have seen. In class on Friday I showed at least three different Coca Cola ads, all promoting some different slogan or punch lines, yet all with the same intrinsic message.

            First lets take the grand theft auto Coke commercial, where a man drives up who everybody thinks is going to bring harm, buys a coke, and starts spreading love around the city. This commercial, the first time I saw it, made me think about being generally a good person and giving a little back to the world, because of the catchy song “Give a Little Love” and the whole atmosphere of the commercial. This advertisement was promoting “The Coke Side of Life” and in doing so showed a society that most of the viewers would like to be a part of. This commercial showed what affects coke has on a day to day basis, in their opinion, and in doing so promoted a world in which “You’re gunna be remembered for the things that you say and do.” This message of the “Coke Side of Life” ties directly into Coca Cola’s other slogan or catch phrase of “Open Happiness” because of how the portray what the coke side of life is. While in some cases diversifying your ad campaign is a negative and can detract from the consumer’s ability to understand what the company is promoting, Coca Cola’s ability to intertwine different advertisement ideas into one mecca-marketing scheme that is understandable and accessible to all is a feat in itself.

            The Coca Cola Happiness Factory commercial also caught my eye due to the similarities in what this commercial promoted and what the grand theft auto Coke commercial promoted. In this commercial a guy goes up to the Coke machine, puts in his money, and then you as a consumer get to watch the inner workings of the coke machine, until a final product is given to the customer, who starts to walk away, then takes a sip and looks back mystified at the Coke machine. Just to start off, I want to say that the animation in these Coke commercials is ridiculously amazing and intricate and is a reason that I enjoy watching these ads so much. With catchy songs in the background that illustrate a happy, fun, enthusiastic, yet unique day, play perfectly into both of their slogans “The Coke Side of Life” and “Open Happiness”. The uniqueness and quality of coke is something that I feel Coca Cola is trying to promote and distinguish themselves by. At the end of The Coca Cola Happiness Factory, the customer takes a sip of the bottle while walking away, stops, and looks back at the coke machine in awe, making me think that there is something special about this drink that deserves a double take. In my opinion this ending scene says a lot about the quality and uniqueness of Coke because of the way he reacted to the situation. When getting a drink out of a vending machine it’s nothing special, yet while walking away he stops after taking a sip of his Coke and appreciates something unique that doesn’t usually happen. This idea of Coke being a one of a kind drink plays perfectly into their ad campaign of “The Coke Side of Life”, by saying that only this drink will allow you to feel this way, and “Open Happiness”, by showing that there is something special and or different that requires appreciation or at least a double take.

            These advertisements, in my opinion, are not targeting a specific audience; yet appeal more towards the youth of today because of the intricate animation as well as the message that it is promoting. Also I feel that Coca Cola is one of the only companies today actually promoting the product that they are selling and not some hoax just to get the attention of their consumers. Coke is actually putting effort into how their product is perceived by the general public and has a very strong ad campaign to do so. These advertisements are trying to show that coke is a unique drink that has the ability to change one’s day in the happiest of ways, and that this happiness that you felt is not only specific to you but can be given to other people in this tiny little red labeled bottle they like to call Coca Cola. 

Advertising at Its Best

I think this idea of advertising for a specific economic and social class goes on much more than advertisers would like to admit. Personally I really enjoyed the comparisons made in the article between language used to advertise a certain material for upper class versus lower class socioeconomic positions because it brought up something that although I rarely think about happens all the time. Taking the potato chip, especially, and looking at how advertisements on higher priced bags of chips differ from advertisements on lower priced bags of chips was a very good example to look at due to the availability of potato chips as well as the consumption of potato chips. These connections between the advertisements on higher priced bags of chips to socioeconomic class and or culture really intrigued me to look at how nice sit down restaurants advertise themselves compared to fast food restaurants. When looking at advertisements for fast food restaurants, I found that the advertising focused more on what the establishment and or food had rather than what the food or establishment didn’t have. This advertisement strategy came up when looking at potato chip bag advertisement and was called linguistic negation. Using linguistic negation highlights what your product has to offer than other products lack. For example when I was reading advertisements for high-class restaurants I found that what the restaurant promoted was the ambiance and or quality of food that lower class establishments lacked in providing for the customer. These differences in advertising techniques, in my opinion, has altered and will continue to alter the way in which products are advertised, and personally I don’t see the linguistic negation advertisement technique staying around too long due to the ever changing world of advertising. 

Loveless

Living only a short drive down Natchez Trace Road from the best southern food in Nashville Tennessee, I was able, whenever I wanted, to stuff my face with the most seasoned, decadent southern foods imaginable. From the homemade preserves and fried chicken, to the biscuits, whose recipe has remained unaltered to this day, some of my favorite memories have been created in the restaurant’s soothing southern atmosphere, conversing, while savoring every bite of my favorite combination platter.

            This little slice of heaven is located directly off of Highway 100 on the outskirts of Bellevue Tennessee and is famous for being able to put a smile on anyone’s face that walks through their doors. Having the ability, because I lived so close, to go after school, during school, or even before school probably did massive damage to my cholesterol levels, but it also allowed me to appreciate all the different faces and subtleties in the food and restaurant that, in my opinion, make the restaurant so damn unique.

            So let me start off by explaining why my favorite combination platter is the best meal selection possible at this little humble abode. First off there is an urgent need to get a combination platter because in doing so complementary baskets, upon baskets, upon baskets of steamy buttermilk biscuits are placed in front of you with not one, not two, but three choices of freshly made preserves. After ruining your appetite by eating all the biscuits you could ever possibly desire, a fried quarter chicken of white meat with creamed corn and French fries is placed in front of you, and the feast begins.

            With such a hospitable southern waiting staff, the refills of sweet tea and coffee are plentiful, and a friendly face is never that far away. Since I have been going to the Loveless Café with my family for over a decade, I have become very friendly with many of the servers and know many of them by name. While the fried chicken with creamed corn and fries is a great meal, sometimes I stop by the café for a little snack and this gargantuan meal is not suitable. In this scenario a serious evaluation of the menu is in order and at least one if not two baskets of biscuits are needed.

            One of my favorite memories at the Loveless Café was shared with my friend from high school who was on the soccer team with me. After practice one day neither of us really had anything going on and due to the fact that he lived at least 45 minutes away from school we decided to hang out before he went home. We went to the park and ended up throwing the football for a while until a brilliant idea popped into my head. I grabbed the football and headed to the car, he shortly followed grasping the idea that I wanted to leave. With Loveless closing in a half hour it was my job to get us there, and that was exactly what I did. Going one speed the whole way there, fast, we got there just in time to milk the system and get multiple baskets of biscuits for free.

As we sat down in the homey little front room we were the only people in the restaurant and got to experience something very unique. Being one of the largest tourist attractions in Tennessee due to the phenomenal biscuits and or fried chicken, it is usually packed shoulder to shoulder with at least a 45 minute wait time and we got to be the singular table being waited upon. This experience allowed me to really appreciate the unchanged nature of the restaurant, from the porch outside to the walls filled with autographed photos of southern and national celebrities, the true southern roots are very visible and one of my favorite parts of the restaurant. With a big glass of sweet tea and biscuits on biscuits my friend and I tried our best to find something on the menu to eat, but ended up stuffing ourselves with one too many baskets of biscuits. When the waitress who was serving us came over to see if we wanted anything before the chef left we told her all we needed was the check, to which she responded, “Oh ok so y’all don’t want anything to eat besides the biscuits? It’s on the house.” This small act of kindness resulted in a hefty tip for said waitress and a lifetime of support from my buddy and me.

After this experience, every day after practice my friend and I would stop by the Loveless for biscuits and sweet tea, and occasionally, dependent upon my mood, would order my favorite meal consisting of the succulent fried chicken, creamed corn, and French fries. This humble little abode has become and will forever remain my favorite restaurant. 

Connections

These two pieces of reading by Ahn and Nicholson both place significant cultural and personal ties to the foods that these two authors ate growing up in their families. Although they are very different cultural ties, such as Ahn’s ties to Korean through specific spices and or sauces, and Nicholson’s ties to his mother through ascetic appeal and whiteness of the food, the fact that both of these authors are able to draw personal connections to important people in their life through food is extraordinary in my opinion. Looking at myself and trying to think about foods that bring up specific memories about either important people in my life or important cultural ties is very difficult. Although there are foods that can bring me back to a specific moment in my life, the cultural and personal ties to these foods are not nearly as strong each of these authors. It was very apparent in Ahn’s article that he passionate about food and in being passionate about food he allowed himself to make connections between his mother’s passion and his own. This connection manifested itself in the commonalities between him and his mother, which turned out to be their ties to the Korean culture through food. While Ahn’s connection to food tied back to the taste and or smell of the dish, Nicholson’s connection tied back to the ascetic qualities of the food. Nicholson’s connection to food in my opinion is much less significant due to only the personal tie to which he connects it, while on the other hand Ahn places significance on the cultural as well as personal. Although I have not established my own connections to cultural and or people through food, there are some dishes that will always carry some significance in my life.

My Meal Between Meals

Before coming to my Writ 1133 class today, I stopped by Nagel to grab a bit to eat. Although I had already eaten previous to my French class earlier today, I felt the need to get a little something extra. As I scoped out the choices I decided on having spicy rotisserie chicken with a side of mac and cheese and two, I repeat two slices of watermelon. As I opened my to go box I realized that my watermelon was touching my spicy chicken and that was just not ok. I sat down at a little three-person table and engulfed the spicy breast of chicken, with each bit being accented by a cheesy macaroni taste. As I got towards the end of the breast I lost interest and decided to discard the rest of it and take my watermelon to go. While walking to class I was preoccupied by the delicious succulent taste of the watermelon and lost track of time. When I looked back at my watch after finishing the two pieces of watermelon I was already five minutes behind schedule and had to book it to my Writing Class. Although I didn’t get to fully enjoy the leisurely walk to Sturm from Nagel, the taste of the two ripe cut pieces of watermelon still lingers in my mind.