Our Global Kitchen

I recently visited the new exhibit at The American Museum of Natural History in New York called Our Global Kitchen, Food, Nature, Culture. As more and more Americans learn about their food, they can now feast on a museum exhibit that attempts to tell the whole story. To tackle food as a broad subject is to launch upon a vast ocean in a small barque amidst thousands of hidden reefs. Topics such as genetic modification of foods lurk beneath the surface of most conversations about food. But this Read more [...]

The Happy Vegan

A few weeks ago, my family challenged me to become a vegan for a week. For an enthusiastic omnivore, a week of what I viewed as deprivation was indeed challenging. As the days passed, I moved from curiosity to resentment to anger and then finally, acceptance. Two unexpected epiphanies came out of this experience. The first was that veganism can feel single-dimensional, like listening to an a cappella group instead of a symphony orchestra. Without meat, or at least dairy products, vegan diets feel Read more [...]