Food Culture: Turn Off the TV and Cook!

The most useful thing we can do – if we care about food and where it comes from and how it’s grown and prepared and what’s good for us and what tastes good, and if we want to sift through all the contradictory and overlapping claims about health benefits or environmental degradation or sustainability – is unplug the television set, because for the most part, the food traditions that were gaining a foothold in various regions of the United States have been in steady decline since the growth of TV as the national communications medium at the end of WWII and continue to the present day.

So says my wise blog friend Patrick at Duck Fat and Politics. It's an important, eloquent post, and it's not just about TV. It's about apple pie and sweet potatoes and ginger beer and not allowing our food heritage (not to mention biodiversity) to be lost. Read it all here (on the Eat Local: Just Food blog) or here (on Duck Fat and Politics).