# I love this quote about Julia Child



## rpooley (Dec 1, 2015)

"Wealthy Victorians served Strawberries Romanoff in December; now we demonstrate our superiority by serving our dewy organic berries only during the two-week period when they can be picked ripe off the vine from the boutique farm down the road from our Hampton bungalow.  People speak of gleaning the green markets for the freshest this, the thinnest that, the greenest or firmest or softest whatever, as if what they're doing is a selfless act of consummate care and good taste, rather than the privileged activity of someone who doesn't have to work for a living.

But Julia Child isn't about that.  Julia wants you - that's right, you, the one living in the tract house in the sprawling suburbia with a dead-end middle management job and nothing but a Stop and Shop for miles around - to know how to make good pastry, also how to make those canned green beans taste all right.  She wants you to remember that you are human, and as such are entitled to that most basic of human rights, the right to eat well and enjoy life.

And that blows heirloom tomatoes and first-press Umbrian olive oil out of the water."

Julie Powell


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## annieskitchen (Sep 18, 2015)

Green this, organic that.

Normal stuff I was buying four or five years ago (nut flours, for example) were moved to the ORGANIC section and the price was hiked up. It is the exact same stuff, same packaging.

"Fresh" is a rip-off.


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## pete (Oct 7, 2001)

Rpooley, I do agree somewhat with what you are saying but I also feel that there is room for both.  I agree that the words, "local", "green", or "organic" have become very trendy and people can get too caught up in that.  Let's face it, we will never do away with canned foods and coinvienence products.  There will always be people that don't have access to, or can afford much of the fresh foods that we often take for granted.  Nor would they know what to do with them.  And I agree that you can make good food out of many of these products with just a bit of know-how.

But I also know that that there is nothing better than fresh from the farm produce.  Heirloom tomatoes or strawberries are a hundred times better when bought from a local source as they can be picked at the peak of ripeness instead of under ripe so that they can survive the thousand mile journey.  And there are plenty of great heirloom vegetables, grown by local farmers, that taste much, much better than most of the store bought stuff that has been bred, not for flavor, but shelf life or to look like what we expect food to look like.


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## rpooley (Dec 1, 2015)

@Pete And I also agree with you. 

I just find sometimes in conversations with chefs or people who like to cook, that sometimes people forget that the vast majority of Earthlings (currently) can't always get/afford the best of the best and have to learn to make do. That is actually something I find fascinating in my own culinary education, that much of the world can create fantastic dishes out of pretty subpar ingredients.


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## flipflopgirl (Jun 27, 2012)

We planted our first seeds at the end of January on a hunch that the winter would be short and sweet.

The tomato plants (and onions) went in as soon as they showed up at the neighborhood farm and ranch supply store in Feb.

I plucked a couple of ripe cherry tomatoes yesterday and if I had to could pull some carrots today.

In fact everything except the peas look great (the plants are a light green and look a bit stunted).

Old seeds?

Our yard is almost completely shaded and available garden space limited but we put in a veg and herb garden every year (using the 4X4 method).

My point?

You don't have to wait around for "local and seasonal" produce to show up at the roadside stands and farmers markets.

Tomatoes for instance will do just fine planted in a pickle bucket.

As will anything that can be trained to grow up a trellis.

In fact if you were very motivated this could be done on a year round basis.

As for out of season imported produce..... the amt of time spent between the farm and grocery does no one any favors....under/over ripe, bruised and sometimes moldy product mixed in with the rest and sold for exorbitant prices is criminal IMO.

I am the person who opens all the cartons and picks thru them....discarding the nasty into a nice little pile and replacing with edible (yes I reweigh lol) because I refuse to pay for pre-packed sub par produce.

The veg guys at all of my usual supermarkets know and are cool with this as I don't leave a huge mess for them to clean up.

Hell sometimes they help me.

Last week it was the strawberries.

Some woman shopper informed me she was going to "turn me in" and I just laughed and told her if I didn't do it an employee would have to.

She got this odd look on her face (eureka moment?) and opened a clamshell of berries and started picking thru them as well.

Stepping off my soapbox now /img/vbsmilies/smilies/lol.gif.

mimi


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## rpooley (Dec 1, 2015)

@flipflopgirl How many hours a week does it require to maintain your garden?


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## flipflopgirl (Jun 27, 2012)

Very little ... at this point mostly just training the plants where to grow and watering in the evenings (an hour or so) but we only planted 4 4x4s and 2 2x4s (herbs) this year.

I make a pass thru in the early morning and pluck off whatever is ripe.

We stagger the planting as well... we add another few plants/seeds 2-3 weeks after the first so not everything is ready at the same time.

mimi


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## rpooley (Dec 1, 2015)

Sounds good, but I would imagine that because you enjoy it, I would have to propose (scientifically) that your time estimation may need to be investigated.  I can spend hours in the kitchen and it feels like nothing.  

Anyway, even starting a garden is extremely difficult for some people.  I just sometimes feel like on many of these threads and forums, there is very little compassion or understanding for people trying to make do with less than optimal food supply/preparation circumstances.

Not trying to be harsh, but after reading many, many threads, people are quick to criticize or slightly demean people just trying to make it work.


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## chefbillyb (Feb 8, 2009)

I always plant a few stalks of corn.




  








corn.jpg




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chefbillyb


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Apr 21, 2016


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## rpooley (Dec 1, 2015)

@ChefBillyB I guess you make a bowl or 2 of chowder. /img/vbsmilies/smilies/rolleyes.gif


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## chefbillyb (Feb 8, 2009)

ChefBillyB said:


> I always plant a few stalks of corn.
> 
> 
> 
> ...


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## chefbillyb (Feb 8, 2009)

rpooley said:


> @ChefBillyB I guess you make a bowl or 2 of chowder. /img/vbsmilies/smilies/rolleyes.gif


rpolleey, we have pigs,cows and chickens so the corn goes along way.


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## rpooley (Dec 1, 2015)

I think people forget that sometimes having choices is a luxury.


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## jake t buds (May 27, 2013)

Gardens are great for people who have access to sunlight and space. The best I can do are herbs. I tried swiss chard and it worked ok, but didn't have enough sunlight to boom. Turned into exactly two side dishes. 

I would also say that the convenience we have in regard to food is mostly corporation/ ideology driven. 

Teach people to cook with average fresh ingredients, create a culture that respects food and meals, and maybe more people would cook instead of just peeling open a can of beans.  Knowledge is power, and we've been culturally conditioned to think meals are just sustenance, taking a back seat to work, or life in general. I have friends that think preparing a meal is a pain in the ass. 

This would be disaster for Big Agribusiness and the Fast Food/ Beverage industry. 

Calling naturally grown produce organic, natural or local "trendy" just plays into the idea that Monsanto and huge government subsidised farms should continue their dominance, pushing out local small farms and businesses, forcing them to overcharge simply to make a profit. Economies of scale, and all that.

I don't have huge issues with convenience per se, it's just that it's taken over and natural/ fresh ingredients have been re-framed as "special (therefore garnering a bigger price tag)," when it should be the other way around. Look at how markets are now selling "damaged" or "not pretty" produce because they are missing out on bucket loads of profits due to waste. This idea that a pretty peach and a not bruised apple or a funny looking carrot wasn't desirable came from advertising and corporations trying to define a need. The same way they say convenience is better than not, and we cannot feed the growing demand without GMO and industrialized food production. Everything in moderation, but capitalism doesn't know what moderation is. 

Things are changing though. For the better.

As an aside, anybody having problems with spell check? Hasn't worked for days.


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## pete (Oct 7, 2001)

> I just sometimes feel like on many of these threads and forums, there is very little compassion or understanding for people trying to make do with less than optimal food supply/preparation circumstances.


That's why I try not to judge around here. Yes, we do have quite a community of foodies and gourmands, but we also have people with little, to no, experience, or the means to eat like some of us. It is my belief that everyone can cook and eat well, even on a budget, and with time constraints. I have also seen a lot of people on here that think that most convienence foods are the pinnacle of dining or think way too highly of fast food and most chain restaurants. I believe that there is room for both and I try and share my passion with others without judging. Besides, its pretty hard to judge when you have as many "guilty" pleasures as I do. Sometimes though I think that some posters come on here with really dumb questions or start posts about fast food just to troll and see what kind of response they get.


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## rpooley (Dec 1, 2015)

@jake t buds You make some excellent points, especially how people don't realize that it is not that much harder to cook from scratch with _average ingredients_ than to buy processed. And of course Big Agribusiness wants to keep people slaves to processed food. I make that point to people all the time. I will cook in the kitchen with friends over and in the time it takes to down a martini, I can have a simple meal on the table. I want them to see it can be done.

But then you get someone who is cooking from scratch and they say they use dried herbs and someone comes down on them. Or maybe regular button mushrooms are a better buy for them than the wild mushroom mix in the adjacent shelf. That kind of thing bugs me.


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## jake t buds (May 27, 2013)

@rpooley Agreed. It's nice to have choices. But I never chastise people for their choices. The idea is to educate, not reprimand. Although once again, if you educate, you're being labeled as elite or uppity because our culture says so.

If brown button mushrooms are in your budget, I have a handful of recipes that will make those mushrooms outstanding, healthy, and filling. On the other hand, I recommend everybody get spices whole, and not buy them ground already. Get a grinder. The difference is exponential, and is probably cheaper, too. Some herbs work fine dried, others not so much. Dried basil is one of them. But if someone wants to use it, to each their own.

I also have to say that most of the people I know that think preparing meals is a chore, didn't come from families where cooking and mealtime were a big deal. Parents that didn't really care to cook, or center a family around meals. Sure, cooking can sometimes be a chore. I understand that, but as you said, it doesn't have to be most of the time if you know what to do. It's meditation for me, and I can see how it might not be that way for others. It's all good.


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## annieskitchen (Sep 18, 2015)

I live in a condo. No garden here.

But I sure wish I had one.

I don't even buy the grocery stores' rock hard cantaloupes, hard tomatoes and hard Georgia peaches anymore. I had to return the last bag of tangelos, too, as they were rock hard.


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## rpooley (Dec 1, 2015)

@AnniesKitchen Tomatoes are a good example. If you only have access to lousy supermarket tomatoes, you can still improve them by salting lightly and letting stand or by roasting them in an oven to concentrate them. Sure, it's not perfect but lemons from lemonade, you know.....

I guess it depends though on how badly you need a tomato, though.

I hope you get a garden soon.


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## chefbillyb (Feb 8, 2009)

rpooley said:


> I think people forget that sometimes having choices is a luxury.


Are you living the life that you choose or are you living the have that you have. I'm not saying we all have the life that we choose everyday. We all have responsibilities that we have to live with that may give us a home life that we choose. Some of us may work two jobs to live a life that e choose. The thing I love about our country is we have choice. I think you have plan and work to be able to have more choices. I'm not talking about people who have illness that have physical conditions that may hamper their ability to have choices. I think most healthy people waste the choices they have in life. I wasted many chances in my younger years to better myself and have more. It was my choice to take the road I took. I made better choices later that lead me to be in the position I am in today. I don't think in most people lives are a dead end. If their life is a dead end it maybe because of the choices they made.


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## jake t buds (May 27, 2013)

@ChefBillyB "Choice" in the modern western lexicon is overrated. In reality, it's the "Illusion of Choice."

For some it's the luxury of choosing between artisanal ingredients 10 or 20 times the cost of industrialized product, to be taken home to an inherited house, in a nice neighborhood.

For others it's either Wendy's or McDonalds. Canned beans or Canned soup dragged home on a bus.

It has been proven that not everybody has the same choices, or the _opportunity_ for those choices, and the choices you make in life play only a small part in how or why you are where you are.

Sometimes stuff happens that is completely out of your control. Even the good stuff, and you won't even know it.

If life were as easy as black and white, we'd have no gray. It's not that simple. In fact, it is very complicated. You aren't as much the driver of your destiny as you might think.

Either way, did you have something to say about food?


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## chefbillyb (Feb 8, 2009)

jake t buds said:


> @ChefBillyB "Choice" in the modern western lexicon is overrated. In reality, it's the "Illusion of Choice."
> 
> For some it's the luxury of choosing between artisanal ingredients 10 or 20 times the cost of industrialized product, to be taken home to an inherited house, in a nice neighborhood.
> 
> ...


Jake, if I lived with your thinking I would have never been successful. You think people are dealt a hand so just play it out. I believe the hand could be changed if you really want to change it. There are no fences around anyone. Life is that simple, people who think your way think the grey area has to last a lifetime.


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## Iceman (Jan 4, 2011)

*Poynter Article*

*Farm to Fable Series*


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## grande (May 14, 2014)

@IceMan I was reading some of those last week. Great, well reasearched article.
In restos I've worked, I've seen lines fudged (e.g. rockfish or snapper) and occasionally yes, wrong things menued when having supplier issues- but briefly - and rarely cynically. I would say largely that the people I've worked for have been willing to back up any claim they make on a menu.


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## brianshaw (Dec 18, 2010)

Sorry, wrong thread. Deleted.


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## jake t buds (May 27, 2013)

@ChefBillyB

I was talking in general philosophical terms, but since you decided to personalize it :

You don't know me or my philosophy at all. Thanks for the judgement. Suggesting you wouldn't be successful (because I don't underestimate the randomness of the universe) just parrots the same nonsense that creates the disparity between the rich and the poor. To say that if you don't succeed, then you made the wrong choices is patently false. That's ideology, not reality. You can be born into poverty, and stand a .01% chance to enter the top 10% no matter what "choices" you make. You can miss opportunities because of someone else's "choices," or simply be passed over because you are hispanic, tall, or are wearing the wrong color glasses. Shit happens. Recognize it. It's called life. Every successful individual interviewed admits and acknowledges the influence of blind luck and happenstance as much as "choice," but the narrative employed by free market proponents (read : america) is that we are in total control of our destiny. Bollocks. Read my post again, though, as it doesn't completely deny individual responsibility or "choice," but I prefer to understand the difference between 'choice' and 'decision.'

You can live an ideological fantasyland if you want. I'm just more pragmatic and understand the realities of life. I also don't pat myself on my back or stand up on a soapbox and tell everyone how wonderful I am over something I had little or nothing to do with. Then turn around and make judgements on other people based on my fantasy and make attempts to impose that fabrication on everybody else.

So again I ask, did you want to talk about food and the Julia Child quote?


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## brianshaw (Dec 18, 2010)

Jake makes a good point by talking about both "choice" and "opportunity". They are very different and sometimes intersect in a way that folks can advance themselves. One without the other, though, may not work so well. Julia didn't will herself into the goddess she became. She recognized an opportunity and made conscious choices to exploit those opportunities. But opportunities aren't necessarily just those "freebee" handout kind of opportunities. Sometimes they are hazy long shots that we make the choice to pursue even though it may not happen without great perserverence... And sometimes we win and sometimes not.


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## jimyra (Jun 23, 2015)

IceMan said:


> *Poynter Article*
> 
> *Farm to Fable Series*


This is a very good article. Our Local "Farmers Market" opens in May. Some of the best sales the first day are "local Watermelons." The are not in season until late July or August. We have one very honest farmer who will supplement what she grows with purchased produce but always has a sign that she did not grow it. Local beef is grown and butchered here sold to Halperns shipped 300 miles to the distribution center. The local restaurants then have to buy from Halperns. The locals had to sign non compete forms. Their are a few small farms that produce local product but because of cost it is prohibitive to most consumers. Good thread.


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## queequeg (Apr 21, 2016)

This conversation reminds me of a series of videos Buzzfeed or similar did where first generation middle class Mexican-American or Chinese-American kids in their early 20's taste tested things like Taco Bell or Panda Express with their parents and in some cases grandparents, most of whom struggled when they first arrived in the US

I always thought it was telling that the young people as a rule made *such* a big deal about how absolutely inedible everything was, as if their very souls were offended by the mere presence of food court orange chicken. Meanwhile, mom and dad and grandma who all grew up in the old country (and experienced actual hardship) were, with few exceptions, like "yeah, I'd eat that. It's not what we cook, but whatever. It's food. I'm eating it."


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## brianshaw (Dec 18, 2010)

... And in many cases the "Americanized" ethic restaurants are owned and operated by the immigrants themselves. They are willing to adapt and sacrifice authenticity to run a business that gives them the means to live in the US.


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## chicagoterry (Apr 3, 2012)

I'm not sure that anyone, anywhere can create "fantastic" food out of "subpar" ingredients. I do think much of the world does create fantastic dishes out of what are, in their particular places, simple or inexpensive ingredients.

I definitely have to watch pennies but I make very good food out of inexpensive ingredients.  I am very lucky, though. If there is something that could be described as the opposite of a food desert, I am living in it. Good, inexpensive produce, grains and legumes at a variety of ethnic markets. Virtually any herb, spice, or condiment that anyone could want within a walk or short bus ride away. I can't afford organic but I can afford fresh. I find that produce in fruit markets and ethnic markets is usually much less expensive and much higher quality than that in supermarkets. I'm lucky to live in an area with both. There are people in vast swathes of this city that do not have this kind of abundance available to them. There are many neighborhoods on the south and west sides where the most --and sometimes only--accessible food purveyors are dollar stores.


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