Food is at the base of all human survival, yet sometimes the processes it goes through are taken for granted.
When most people get a steak at Henry T’s or buy a soda at Dillon’s, they don’t wonder where the food came from or what processes it underwent before arriving in front of them.
Food undergoes a lengthy journey from the farm to the stomach, from the time that the food we eat is grown, raised, or created, it is processed, packaged, shipped, cooked and eventually digested.
Farm:
Up at 5 a.m., asleep after midnight. This was sophomore Chloe Burns’ summer. Sleep-deprived teenagers may find this immensely unappealing, but farming is a necessary chore. A lack of agriculture would crumble the economy and damage the life of average Americans.
One farmer feeds an average of 155 people according to America’s Farmers. Twenty-hour days for these farmers are what keeps citizens’ refrigerators stocked and stomachs filled. Despite this, farming is a job stereotyped for uneducated “rednecks.”
“Some people assume… farming is kind of the thing you don’t do by choice,” Burns said. “You either just end up there, you join because it’s the family business, or you didn’t want to go to college.”
Farmers are anything but lazy, and they hold an important role in society. Whether one acknowledges it or not, farming affects his or her everyday life.
“I think everybody should at least know a little bit about how farming works just to the extent that they understand where their food is coming from,” Burns said.
Processing Plant:
While some people in the processed food industry, such as Pillsbury executive James Behnke, are trying to help solve the obesity problem in the United States, most who work in this industry keep churning out unhealthy products.
According to a New York Times article by Michael Moss, most of the corporate executive officers for processed food companies would rather make tasty food that will sell than try to help with the problem of obesity.
In early 2012 the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) reported that “35.7 percent of adults and 16.9 percent of children age 2 to 19 are obese.”
The public blames obesity on the processed food industries due to their production of unhealthy foods and drinks.
The Wall Street Journal reported on a new New York City law that went into effect on March 12; this law bans “the sale of large sugary-drink” over 16 oz. in several establishments throughout the city.
Mayor Michael Bloomberg believes that this law will help to lower the rising obesity rate within New York City.
Food processing companies are responsible for creating products that the people want, and the people want what tastes good.
Good taste does not mean that the food is healthy. Moss continued to write about processed food being “optimized” to get the best taste possible using salts, sugars, and other flavorings, some artificial and some natural, that are often unhealthy.
Store/Restaurant:
Kansas kiwi trees don’t exist. The impossible Midwest weather results in limited amounts of Kansas produce.
In order to avoid a diet of solely bread and corn, producers ship food across oceans and fly it over mountains. Vast amounts of carbon dioxide gas are emitted through the transportation of food. Fuel consumed for international shipment is not taxed.
Controversy has arisen from the unceasing excess of pollution due to demanding foodies.
Cooking food causes a series of chemical reaction that make the food suitable to eat, but there are possible negative effects. High temperature cooking has been found to create Acrylamide.
High doses of Acrylamide can be harmful, causing nerve damage to humans and cancer in animals. The FDA is currently undergoing studies to determine if the amount of Acrylamide in food poses danger to the public.
Despite possible risks, there are benefits to cooking food. High enough temperatures kill bacteria and therefore reduce the risk of food poisoning. The chemical reactions occurring while cooking actually change the color, taste, and smell of food.
As food travels through the body it undergoes both mechanical and chemical digestion. Mechanical digestion has to do with the physical breakdown of food through processes such as chewing. Chemical digestion is the system through which the nutrients are extracted from the food.
Teeth break up food into smaller pieces. This is known as chewing. Then, the salivary glands turn the food into a bolus. A bolus is basically the state of food that can be swallowed. The bolus falls from the esophagus to the stomach.
Once food enters the stomach it is further broken down by the contracting stomach walls. The stomach walls release a blend of liquid that continue to change the state of the food.
The stomach stage of breakdown turns the bolus into chyme, which is a thick liquid. Once in the chyme state food can travel to the small intestine. The small intestine has its own method of contraction. Cells inside the small intestine extract all nutrients from the food. This gives the body what it needs to function.
