In Wendell Berry's essay "The Pleasures of Eating," the author persuades his readers to be more conscientious of their eating habits and gives helpful tips for eating foods that will lead us to healthy living.
Berry states that eating should be considered as an "agricultural act" (38), noting that America has passively made eating "a degraded, poor, and paltry thing" (38). He urges us to recreate our eating habits, be aware of what goes into our bodies, and "participate in food production" (40).
While analyzing Berry's list of responsible eating habits, I realized that my family could easily begin to practice some of his healthy eating suggestions. Berry suggests that we "grow something to eat," (40) believing that the food we grow will lead us to appreciate the food we eat.
With a small backyard, my family can't grow our own food. My mother has bought small pots to grow vegetables such as tomatoes or chili peppers. .
Wendell Berry adds that preparing our own food will contribute to proper eating habits. In my house, we try to eat at homemade food as often as possible, this enables us to make certain that foods we eat are portion controlled, from a reliable source and cooked as healthily as possible. My mother is aware of the contents in our food, not only for our health, but because she's diabetic and there are certain foods she shouldn't eat. Berry suggests that we all "learn the origins of the food you buy" (40).
My family often attempts to learn where our food comes from, but living in a city can make that very difficult. There aren't many places where we can obtain direct from the farm produce, but my mother buys the freshest fruits and vegetables that are available. To quote Berry, we should "deal directly with a local farmer, gardener, or orchardist" (40). .
Berry advises that we "learn, in self-defense, as much as you can of the economy and technology of industrial food production" (40).