Where the rubber meets the pavement

Ever since environmentalism became a shibboleth of the left, and therefore the Democrats, I have wondered how they would react when the time came to reconcile their actions with their purported beliefs. It appears I will not have to wonder much beyond the DNC in Denver this summer:

Caterers find eco-standards tough to chew

Fried shrimp on a bed of jasmine rice and a side of mango salad, all served on a styrofoam plate. Bottled water to wash it all down.

These trendy catering treats are unlikely to appear on the menu at parties sponsored by the Denver 2008 Host Committee during the Democratic National Convention this summer.

Fried foods are forbidden at the committee's 22 or so events, as is liquid served in individual plastic containers. Plates must be reusable, like china, recyclable or compostable. The food should be local, organic or both.

How are we ever going to make the shift from fossil fuel to vegetable oil power if fried food is forbidden? That's a serious question I keep meaning to ask somebody with a "powered by vegetable oil" sticker proudly displayed on their bumper.

And caterers must provide foods in "at least three of the following five colors: red, green, yellow, blue/purple, and white," garnishes not included, according to a Request for Proposals, or RFP, distributed last week.

...All the pretty colors of the rainbow.
Reading this far I was reminded of the first Burning Man theme camp planning meeting I attended a few years ago. We had settled on a genie-type theme and purchased a used golf cart we intended to turn into an art car. One of my camp mates proposed turning the golf cart into an elaborate motorized genie bottle and she had done some nice sketches to show us what she had in mind. We all agreed that it looked great, then somebody asked her for a list of materials and a rough outline of the building plan so we could get started. Her confusion over the question turned to slight irritation when she realized that not only did she not have any specs, we weren't going to do it all for her. The vision quickly turned to dust.
I imagine the person who was tasked with creating the DNC catering RFP is similar to my idealistic camp mate that year.

The shrimp-and-mango ensemble? All it's got is white, brown and orange, so it may not have the nutritional balance that generally comes from a multihued menu.

"Blue could be a challenge," joked Ed Janos, owner of Cook's Fresh Market in Denver. "All I can think of are blueberries."

Ed nails it. Blueberries being the only exception that immediately springs to mind, every first year culinary student knows that putting blue on a plate is a cardinal sin.

Caterers praise the committee and the city for their green ambitions, but some say they're baffled by parts of the RFP.

"I think it's a great idea for our community and our environment. The question is, how practical is it?" asks Nick Agro, the owner of Whirled Peas Catering in Commerce City. "We all want to source locally, but we're in Colorado. The growing season is short. It's dry here. And I question the feasibility of that."

Agro's biggest worry is price. Using organic and local products hikes the costs.

"There is going to be sticker shock when those bids start coming in," he says. "I'll cook anything, but I've had clients who have approached me about all-organic menus, and then they see the organic stuff pretty much doubles your price."

Mr. Agro,

Please resist the urge to use words like "practical" and "feasibility", for they have no meaning in the eco-lexicon. Just make it happen, and if you're not prepared to put the good of our planet above your personal profits, we will find somebody that does.

Signed, DNC

P.S. we've noted your propensity to question authority, and we're not happy, but we'll address your insouciance after the convention.

The document, which applies only to the host committee's parties, came after months of work that involved discussions with caterers and event planners along the Front Range, says Parry Burnap, Denver's "greening" director.

Months of work filled by many, many hours spent in committee and sub-committee meetings to come up with the RFP. There's nothing bureaucracy loves more than more bureaucracy.

Thousands of other parties hosted by corporations, lobbying groups, individuals, nonprofits and more will happen in Denver during the convention, Burnap says. None of them is subject to the committee's green agenda.

The committee's effort to host eco-friendly events, she says, hinges on its determination not just to put on a smart convention but to transform Denver into a top-shelf green city.

What's a law without a gaping loophole afterall? I hope somebody keeps score of all the non-conforming parties that take place and who hosted them.

"We are hoping that everything we are doing for greening (the convention) has some legacy value," she says.

The RFP, for example, will likely live on after the convention in a brochure the city will distribute widely to help guide local businesses interested in improving their green practices.

It will have legacy value alright. My guess is that the DNC will host a small handful of perfectly "eco-friendly" parties and showcase them as the rule rather than the exception.

Burnap says taking the organic and local route may be more costly, but the committee thinks caterers will find ways to comply and still make a profit.

"It takes some creativity because some of these things are more expensive," she says. "But we're at the front end of a market shift."

One of two things will happen. The caterers will sacrifice a large percentage of their profit margin and "make it happen" for the "greater good" or they will cheat and charge organic prices for non-organic products. Most people are not able to tell when a filet mignon has been replaced with an "eye of round" which is a much cheaper cut of meat, for example. Who will be able to tell if the avocados used in the guacamole are organic or not? Catering is hard work fraught with unforeseen hassles and much pressure in order to put out a quality product that the clients are unlikely to even fully appreciate. I would be shocked if any caterer that was not independently wealthy would sacrifice any part of their already slim profit margin. Cheating would be far easier, especially when the theme is all a pose in the first place.

Joanne Katz, owner of Three Tomatoes Catering in Denver, cheers the committee's environmental aspirations and is eager to get involved with the convention, but she wonders if some of the choices the committee is making are really green.

Compostable products, such as forks and knives made from corn starch, are often imported from Asia, delivered to the U.S. in fuel-consuming ships. But some U.S. products are made from recyclable pressed paper. Which decision is more environmentally sound?

"Customers are beginning to demand these things, and we don't have all of the information," she says. "And we are doing the best we can, one project at a time."

Ms. Katz,

Your wondering is troubling. We will deal with you after the convention, too.

Signed, DNC

Burnap acknowledged that figuring out what is most green can be difficult.

"Maybe in 20 years, there will be better analysis for us to make better choices," she says. "One we are talking about now is, is it better to compost or to recycle? If you are using a cup for a beverage, is it better to be (plastic) and back in the materials stream, or compostable, biodegradable waste and go into the waste stream or compost? There are no definitive answers."

Composting for the convention hasn't been entirely figured out yet, she says.

What a wonderful nation we live in; where the greatest problem of the moment seems to be whether it is better to compost or to recycle? I wonder what a typhoon survivor in Burma, or an earthquake survivor in China, or a Darfur refugee, or, or, or--thinks is the biggest problem of the day?

The committee is working with other groups to develop a carbon-footprint "calculator" that will measure the environmental impact of each event and suggest an "offset" — a fee — that will go toward a fund helping to match carbon losses with carbon gains.

"That's a fun one," Burnap says. "If these event planners will calculate and offset, it will start to get the money flowing into the Colorado Carbon Fund, a fund that will reinvest in renewable energy here in Colorado."

Whoooopppieeeee! Boy I know nothing gets my motor revved quite like carbon-footprint calculations. Next up, a self-administered root canal sans novicane!

I hope they don't plan on encouraging people to walk around Denver during the convention, since it has been proven in the U.K. that walking kills the planet.

The only advice I can give to the caterers of Denver is to get all of your money up front, in cash.

Book Review: The Omnivore's Dilemma

Going to the grocery store can be downright confusing. For a long time now I've felt that there is such a thing as too many choices, especially when it comes to the supermarket. When Michael Pollan touched on the same subject in his book The Omnivore's Dilemma, I was glad to see that I was not alone with this feeling.

The "omnivore's dilemma" revolves around the age old question of, "what's for dinner?" Since we humans have the capacity of memory and speech, we are able to pass along the vast body of accumulated knowledge regarding what tastes good and is healthy, and what tastes bad and can kill us. Koalas, for example, do not have this problem because they know what's on their menu every day for every meal: eucalyptus leaves. Mr. Pollan's thesis is that we've arrived back at the point in time when we are at a loss to know what to eat because we have so many choices, many of which aren't really choices at all, but rather clever re-packaging of the same products. Walking down the supermarket aisle trying to decide what is good and what is bad reasserts the omnivore's dilemma.

When I picked up this book I was skeptical. I did not want to waste my time reading a diatribe against the corporate food structure, the sins of animal protein and the virtues of veganism. For some, eating food is a supremely political act, and these people seem to get published in spades. For me, eating food is just lunch most of the time--unless it's breakfast or dinner. Ultimately though, I believe in eating locally; I prefer to BBQ the flesh of a happily raised, drug-free animal, and I like to know where my food comes from.

Mr. Pollan follows four meals from production to the plate. The first part of the book is devoted to corn, and how it permeates virtually every corner of the supermarket (and beyond) in some form or another. He visits a farmer in Iowa and delves deeply into how subsidies motivate farmers to grow an ever increasing corn yield even when it makes no economic sense. He also highlights exactly how entrenched the military-industrial complex is in our food chain, and the tremendous amounts of toxic waste created from field runoff and industrial scale feedlots. Not much about industrial corn crops and farm subsidies was new to me; and having driven past "Cow-schwitz" on interstate 5 in the Central Valley numerous times, I was familiar with the stench and the layout of a cattle feedlot. The meal derived from this exercise turns out to be lunch from McDonald's for his family eaten in their car while traveling down the highway.

More informative was the section where he shops at his local Whole Foods Market for an organic/free-range meal. After interviewing and visiting a handful of 70's hippies-turned-capitalists farmers, he determines that the whole "organic" craze is basically a clever way of marketing to guilt-ridden mothers trying to do the right thing. Turns out the massive organic farms that cater to Whole Foods are virtually as industrial as "industrial" farms--they just don't use chemical pesticides which brings into play a whole host of other problems; and "free range" hardly lives up to the images the term inspires in the mind's eye.

Mr. Pollan then visits Polyface Farm and spends a week working with the owner, Joe Salatin. Polyface Farm is "beyond organic". It is a perfect example of zero-waste and low impact farming; the way farming used to be. Everything produced is part of a self-perpetuating cycle. Mr. Salatin thinks of himself as a great conductor, orchestrating the natural rhythms of his farm. He believes, correctly, that an animal is happiest when it is free to do its animal "thing". All of his cows, pigs, rabbits and chickens are allowed to live this way before they are slaughtered. Clearly, Polyface farm is the antitheses of industrial farming.

Being an amateur mycologist myself, the last part of the book is what resonated most deeply with me as it was devoted to a "hunter and gatherer" meal. He learned to hunt, shot a wild boar, foraged for morel and chantrelle mushrooms, picked fruit from around his neighborhood, and prepared a wonderful meal from scratch for all the people that assisted him in his quest.

I found the entire book well written, well researched, informative and often humorous, but it is the following paragraph that really stuck with me for some reason:

The fact that you cannot come out of hunting feeling unambiguously good about it is perhaps what should commend the practice to us. You certainly don't come out of it eager to protest your innocence. If I've learned anything about hunting and eating meat, it's that it's even messier than the moralist thinks. Having killed a pig and looked at myself in that picture and now looking forward (if that's the word) to eating that pig, I have to say there is a part of me that envies the moral clarity of the vegetarian, the blamelessness of the tofu eater. Yet part of me pities him too. Dreams of innocence are just that; they usually depend on a denial of reality that can be its own form of hubris. Ortega suggests that there is an immorality in failing to look clearly at reality, or in believing the force of human will can somehow overcome it. "The preoccupation with what should be is estimable only when the respect for what is has been exhausted."

Those last two lines are brilliant; and unfortunate examples of this state of mind can be found far outside the pages of this book.

I'm a foodie at heart and I've always had more than a passing interest in nutrition. If it were not my job to babysit rich people's money every day and I was looking for an alternate career, I might choose to be a nutritionist. Back in my culinary school days, nutrition classes were my favorite, and "you are what you eat" has always resonated with me because it is important to know what you are putting into your body every time you sit down to a meal. None of this is to say I treat my body like a temple, but most of the time I eat right; at least what I view as right. Milk is for cows, processed food is the devil, you cannot eat too many leafy green vegetables, there's no reason to drink soda unless there's bourbon in it, too much fatty meat will clog your arteries, fast food always smells better than it tastes. Those are my general guidelines, but above all I enjoy tasty, well prepared, quality, food; and like the French I believe it's bad manners to not eat "this" or abstain from "that" when in social settings.

Ultimately, good nutrition boils down to the timeless wisdom of grandpa: "moderation is the key". A healthy state of mind is a big component of good overall health. Eat what makes you feel good, just don't eat too much of it and don't eat it everyday. That way, when you choose to eat a chili dog topped with a fried egg, sausage and cheese, know that you should probably forget the regular coke and wash it all down with a diet coke instead.

Dumpster Diving: It's What's for Dinner

Far be it my place to judge others' way of life. I am firmly of the mind that one should live whatever lifestyle one chooses so long as it does not physically or mentally harm others; especially my family or I. There is something I find peculiar in our Western way of life however. There seems to be an increasing number of people who feel tremendous guilt over the society we've collectively built and the way we live. To be sure, it is sometimes decadent, especially when compared to the billions of souls that live hand to mouth or scavenge for their daily bread. There is also much waste in our society--food, materials, energy--you name it. Excessive waste is bound to be prevalent when one lives in a land of plenty. Though a point never discussed by guilt-ridden Westerners is that we have built and enjoy exactly the society we deserve. It is not our failing that others have not prospered as we have. Wealth creation is not a zero-sum game. Abiding by the Rule of Law, and all the stability that follows, is not so complicated that it can only be understood in the West.

It is not difficult to observe movements or lifestyles taken to extremes in this day and age. After all, a by-product of a society where virtually every material comfort is available with little to no effort is ample free-time; and there are as many ways to spend free-time as there are David Hasselhoff albums in a landfill. As I stated before, there is an abundance of waste generated in our society, but we're getting better. Today more items are made from compostable/recyclable materials than yesterday. Tomorrow there will be even more. Happily, it seems the overall consciousness of how much waste we generate has been raised. This means that someday, freegans will have to find another way to spend their ample free-time.

Today, the New York Times brings us the following article that profiles a group of people that are busy going through dumpsters full of cast-offs from recently graduated NYU students:

The site, which provides information and listings for the small but growing subculture of anticonsumerists who call themselves freegans — the term derives from vegans, the vegetarians who forsake all animal products, as many freegans also do — is the closest thing their movement has to an official voice. And for those like Ms. Elia and Ms. Kalish, it serves as a guide to negotiating life, and making a home, in a world they see as hostile to their values.

Freegans are scavengers of the developed world, living off consumer waste in an effort to minimize their support of corporations and their impact on the planet, and to distance themselves from what they see as out-of-control consumerism. They forage through supermarket trash and eat the slightly bruised produce or just-expired canned goods that are routinely thrown out, and negotiate gifts of surplus food from sympathetic stores and restaurants.

Modern day hunters and gathers--a romantic notion indeed. It begs the question though--if not for corporate producers and consumerists, for what would freegans forage?

They dress in castoff clothes and furnish their homes with items found on the street; at freecycle.org, where users post unwanted items; and at so-called freemeets, flea markets where no money is exchanged. Some claim to hold themselves to rigorous standards. “If a person chooses to live an ethical lifestyle it’s not enough to be vegan, they need to absent themselves from capitalism,” said Adam Weissman, 29, who started freegan.info four years ago and is the movement’s de facto spokesman.

Freeganism dates to the mid-’90s, and grew out of the antiglobalization and environmental movements, as well as groups like Food Not Bombs, a network of small organizations that serve free vegetarian and vegan food to the hungry, much of it salvaged from food market trash. It also has echoes of groups like the Diggers, an anarchist street theater troupe based in Haight-Ashbury in San Francisco in the 1960’s, which gave away food and social services.

What turns me off about groups like this is that they inevitably have a political bend. It's not enough to simply live their chosen lifestyle quietly, they have to create a movement and carry a banner.

Many freegans are predictably young and far to the left politically, like Ms. Elia, the 17-year-old, who lives with her father in Manhattan. She said she became a freegan both for environmental reasons and because “I’m not down with capitalism.”

I hope they interview Ms. Elia in 10 years when she's 27 years old--assuming she does not succumb to botulism or salmonella poisoning in the meantime. I'd be curious to see where she is in her life; and if she's still not "down" with capitalism.

It’s not that freeganism doesn’t require serious commitment. For freegans, who believe that the production and transport of every product contributes to economic and social injustice, usually in multiple ways, any interaction with the marketplace is fraught. And for some freegans in particular — for instance, Madeline Nelson, who until recently was living an upper-middle-class Manhattan life with all the attendant conveniences and focus on luxury goods — choosing this way of life involves a considerable, even radical, transformation.

Every product transported and purchased contributes to social injustice--usually in multiple ways. I 'd love to see that cause and effect flowchart.

After a year of progressively scaling back — no more shopping at Eileen Fisher, no more commuting by means other than a bike — Ms. Nelson, who had a two-bedroom apartment with a mortgage in Greenwich Village, quit her job in 2005 to devote herself full-time to political activism and freeganism.

She sold her apartment, put some money into savings, and bought a one-bedroom in Flatbush, Brooklyn, that she owns outright.

“My whole point is not to be paying into corporate America, and I hated paying a big loan to a bank,” she said while fixing lunch in her kitchen one recent afternoon. The meal — potato and watercress soup and crackers and cheese — had been made entirely from refuse left outside various grocery stores in Manhattan and Brooklyn.

I am sure Ms. Nelson gives thanks each day to corporate America for providing the opportunity for her to take out a mortgage on an apartment she was later able to sell at a profit in such a blatantly capitalistic fashion. Certainly she appreciates the stability of the system that allows her to store her money in a savings account earning interest; and even insures that money up to $100,000 against any calamity.

But isn’t she depriving herself unnecessarily? And what’s so bad about buying books, anyway? “I do have some mixed feelings,” Ms. Nelson said. “It’s always hard to give up class privilege. But freegans would argue that the capitalist system is not sustainable. You’re exploiting resources.” She added, “Most people work 40-plus hours a week at jobs they don’t like to buy things they don’t need.”

Class privilege, like living in New York City? And I wouldn't give up on the capitalist system just yet. It's been around since Ahmed discovered if he lit a fire on the sand he could make glass and sell it in the bazaar. And finally, Ms. Nelson's anti-consumerist crystal ball confirms that "most people" hate their jobs but work anyhow so they can waste their money on stuff they really don't need. I know that's why I go to the office every day.

I agree that we live in a hyper-consumer society. I do not need a designer coffee shop on every street corner. I do not require another outlet mall out by the highway. I am not happy to see advertisements plastered in every empty nook and cranny. I grimace when I get a delivery from Pottery Barn and there's a 4'x4' box of packing material protecting a table cloth. So I don't buy coffee on every street corner; I don't stop at that outlet mall out by the highway; I ignore ads that are placed everywhere I look; I recycle the box and packing material and go about my life; and that's all I do. Oh the guilt. I think I'll go play outside until I feel better.

In many parts of the world, the freegan movement would not be recognized as a movement at all; it would simply be called "survival". I wonder how many people in the world would be willing to take up the lives many of these freegans formerly lived before they indulged their spasm of Western guilt? In the end, I am left thinking that the freegan movement, like so many others, is just another form of mental onanism.

IN-N-OUT Blues

Once upon a time I lived on the East Coast. I always knew I'd move back to California eventually so I did not miss too many things Californian--the one exception being the Double-Double cheesburger from In-n-Out Burger. Anybody not raised in Southern California finds it hard to understand the fanatical following that this particular burger joint has inspired over the 58 years it has existed. When I would try to explain the pleasure of eating a Double-Double to my east coast friends, they would inevitably try to one up me by saying something along the lines of, "yeah, we have a place like that too--Whitecastle." It was then that a flash of red would wash over my vision, and I'd take a deep breath and tell myself they simply do not understand.
Once while living in NYC I received a UPS notice at the beginning of a long weekend. I figured whatever it was it could wait until after the weekend. It turned out it couldn't. I trekked deep into Hell's Kitchen to retrieve said package four days later. Apparently one of my California friends had sent me a Double-Double. Unfortunately it did not survive the late summer heat of the UPS werehouse, and I was told it caused quite a stink before they figured out what it was and threw it away--unceremoniously no doubt.
Later that year I got back to my apartment after several cocktails and there was a package on my bed. A different friend had sent me a Double-Double via express mail. Booze compelled me to eat 1/4 of it before I realized it wasn't exactly fresh. Nevertheless, I savored those bites!
I went vegetarian once for 6 months. That is until an apres-ski stop at In-n-Out forced me to reconsider my new diet.
Another time we were returning from Tahoe and a discussion about the best fast food burger broke out. One of the guys in the car who claimed he was a huge fan of In-n-Out convinced us that there was an even better burger to be had. We stopped to try it--some joint called Murder Burger in Davis. Shredded lettuce was the first clue that I'd been had. The only person I wanted to murder after eating there was the guy who suggested the stop.
On several occasions in many parts of the world I've been out running in my In-n-Out t-shirt and heard an approving, "In-n-out, yeaah that's what a hamburger's all about...!" from over my shoulder.

So now that I've established my In-n-Out street cred, I'll point you to a very troubling article from the Washington Post today. It seems that there's some internal strife at the closely held burger chain. The 23 year old grandaughter of the founders who is also the sole heir of the business wants to change the menu. Or if you ask her, the Board of Directors wants to change the menu. Either way that's heresey plain and simple.

Somebody should remind both parties that the best custodian of a successful institution is the person that simply keeps their hands off.

Haitian Zombie Recipe

I just found the Haitian recipe for zombies (just in time for Halloween!) Actually it was passed along to me by a friend on a slow news day here at work.
"The recipe included puffer fish which has a poison called tetrodotoxin which is a potent ion channel blocker. Tetrodotoxin poisoning can kill but at other times it leads to a near death state with such a lowered metabolism that the poisoned person is thought to be dead. Somehow along the line Haitian's discovered this property and may at times have used it nefariously. Poisoning someone with the Zombie recipe caused their seeming death. After they were buried the poisoner would unearth the not quite dead victim. The next step was also one of the slick aspects of this scheme in that the unburied and now resuscitated poison victim would be fed a paste made from a plant that contained atropine and scopalomine. These toxins are potent dissociative hallucinogens. The victim was first "killed", buried, and brought back to life. Then given a heavy duty hallucinogenic drug. The dead had come back to life and was walking the earth. Just like in a movie. These guys were then sold to labor camps to work in the fields."
Enjoy!