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34 reviews for:
Pressure Cooker: Why Home Cooking Won't Solve Our Problems and What We Can Do about It
Joslyn Brenton, Sinikka Elliott, Sarah Bowen
3.96 AVERAGE
34 reviews for:
Pressure Cooker: Why Home Cooking Won't Solve Our Problems and What We Can Do about It
Joslyn Brenton, Sinikka Elliott, Sarah Bowen
3.96 AVERAGE
informative
reflective
sad
tense
fast-paced
Those of us who feed other people on a regular basis are familiar with the regular hectoring to get back to the kitchen and cook, and the promises of psychological, social, and nutritional benefits of doing so. If we all just pulled up our bootstraps and got to the frying pans, we would be better, healthier people. And 90% of the women I know look at these articles--often written by men--and say, "Good luck with that. Come into my life and make your perfect family dinners." Pressure Cooker is a study by three sociologists into what really goes into getting that dinner on the table, and why it doesn't look like Michael Pollan's lovingly simmered sugo. (I loved that they highlighted examples of the most noxious writing on the topic; they included a column of Mark Bittman's that I've repeatedly shared with swear words attached.)
The book is structured around the real stories of 9 women and their families. The women represent a cross section of ethnicities and class (ranging from homeless to middle class). The fieldwork and interviews are the heart of the book, but the stories serve as an entry point into the different factors surrounding mealtime in American families. The women all largely share a belief in feeding their families well, but their vision of what that looks like, and their ability to put it into practice, varies. Physical and financial obstacles to obtaining fresh food, time constraints, government programs, culture, family preferences, and equipment all play a role. The constraints have secondary effects; for example, on a tight food budget, parents can't afford to buy things that might go to waste. Familiar foods that will get eaten are a better use of money.
At its root, food crusaders get it wrong because they assume people don't cook because they don't want to. These women do want to eat well--they aren't serving Ho-Hos for dinner because they don't care. They are not meeting the ideals of foodie life because of circumstances that they cannot fully control.
The researchers were clearly sympathetic to their subjects and are generally nonjudgmental. (I did wind up disliking one of them--the middle class white woman whose daughter had never seen M&Ms.) The stories do an excellent job of showing how the constraints on their lives work out in practice for families and the field work is backed by research. The work was all home focused, so the influence of food consumed elsewhere is not looked at--another interesting line of questioning would be whether and how school food programs impact eating habits at home.
One slightly nitpicky point: I felt like a lot of the information in the notes was not just sources, but was valuable information that could have been put in the body text. It seems like they didn't want to disrupt narrative flow, but a lot of important details could be lost. As well, the setup was slightly confusing; the introduction says that the extended observations were done only with the lower class families, but the profiled families do include what I would consider middle class ones.
The solutions section is a little weak; fixing our food problem requires fixing a lot of things about our culture, from the way we begrudge poor people a decent diet, to ad hoc work schedules that make planning difficult, to city planning that leaves shopping inaccessible. There's simply too much to tackle, but I can't fault the authors for it, and they have some good ideas.
I did not find this book to be groundbreaking, but I enjoyed it and feel that the researchers had the correct approach to the topic.
The book is structured around the real stories of 9 women and their families. The women represent a cross section of ethnicities and class (ranging from homeless to middle class). The fieldwork and interviews are the heart of the book, but the stories serve as an entry point into the different factors surrounding mealtime in American families. The women all largely share a belief in feeding their families well, but their vision of what that looks like, and their ability to put it into practice, varies. Physical and financial obstacles to obtaining fresh food, time constraints, government programs, culture, family preferences, and equipment all play a role. The constraints have secondary effects; for example, on a tight food budget, parents can't afford to buy things that might go to waste. Familiar foods that will get eaten are a better use of money.
At its root, food crusaders get it wrong because they assume people don't cook because they don't want to. These women do want to eat well--they aren't serving Ho-Hos for dinner because they don't care. They are not meeting the ideals of foodie life because of circumstances that they cannot fully control.
The researchers were clearly sympathetic to their subjects and are generally nonjudgmental. (I did wind up disliking one of them--the middle class white woman whose daughter had never seen M&Ms.) The stories do an excellent job of showing how the constraints on their lives work out in practice for families and the field work is backed by research. The work was all home focused, so the influence of food consumed elsewhere is not looked at--another interesting line of questioning would be whether and how school food programs impact eating habits at home.
One slightly nitpicky point: I felt like a lot of the information in the notes was not just sources, but was valuable information that could have been put in the body text. It seems like they didn't want to disrupt narrative flow, but a lot of important details could be lost. As well, the setup was slightly confusing; the introduction says that the extended observations were done only with the lower class families, but the profiled families do include what I would consider middle class ones.
The solutions section is a little weak; fixing our food problem requires fixing a lot of things about our culture, from the way we begrudge poor people a decent diet, to ad hoc work schedules that make planning difficult, to city planning that leaves shopping inaccessible. There's simply too much to tackle, but I can't fault the authors for it, and they have some good ideas.
I did not find this book to be groundbreaking, but I enjoyed it and feel that the researchers had the correct approach to the topic.
Excellent ethnographic research illustrating all the ways in which the cultural push for more home cooking fails to help people. (FUND THE SOCIAL SAFETY NET!)
This wasn't exactly what I was expecting - but it wasn't bad. I think I was expecting more persuasive discussion and evidence to support each argument, as the book moved through refuting or agreeing with various bits of wisdom from various food-policy gurus. Instead, despite the format, which does organize the information in response to food policy maxims like 'eat more plants' and 'don't eat things your grandmother wouldn't recognize as food,' the book is essentially a compilation of a long multi-year sociological research project with the result, in total, of illustrating the idea that those ideas might be well-meaning but reality is much more complicated. The work does not do a good job of deconstructing or refuting specific pieces of advice; rather, it argues, by presenting illustration after illustration, that parents and specifically mothers already face a great deal of pressure to feed their families well and that individuals are already exerting a great deal of effort toward that end. If we are not seeing the widespread success that we would like, the work suggests, the fault is not down to laziness and ignorance on the part of people, but rather because the systems of food in America are not optimized to make success a likely outcome.
Despite the general failure of the book to argue specifics about policies or present really comprehensive suggestions of its own in regards to how to improve matters, there is a great deal of valuable information contained within. The glimpses inside the personal lives of low-income families in regards to their relationships with food and food insecurity alone are important for well-meaning middle-class activists. The overall message- that scolding families about their food choices and ignoring systemic inequalities and problems is unworkable as a method for improving nutrition and food systems in America - is a good one. And also to relax the pressure we feel, a little bit. We can't solve these problems as individuals just by trying harder. We need systemic solutions, not just more guilt.
Despite the general failure of the book to argue specifics about policies or present really comprehensive suggestions of its own in regards to how to improve matters, there is a great deal of valuable information contained within. The glimpses inside the personal lives of low-income families in regards to their relationships with food and food insecurity alone are important for well-meaning middle-class activists. The overall message- that scolding families about their food choices and ignoring systemic inequalities and problems is unworkable as a method for improving nutrition and food systems in America - is a good one. And also to relax the pressure we feel, a little bit. We can't solve these problems as individuals just by trying harder. We need systemic solutions, not just more guilt.
This book is a series of 26 essays that summarize the results of a sociology study on home cooking. That makes it sound really dry though. In reality it's a collection of detailed stories about a group of women who are the primary cooks in their household and all the different challenges that go into home cooking. At times the book was depressing because home cooking is something challenging and impacted by one's class and economic situation and a whole host of other things, but I am glad to have read it.
2.5 stars. The authors followed nine families closely to write about the act of cooking and feeding ourselves. The bulk of the book is stories of individual snippets of daily life from these families. Yes, you get an idea of some of the challenges they face, but the book provides very little analysis, and it doesn't deliver on the promise to reveal "What We Can Do about It."
The authors discuss their research process. I would be interested to see actual papers published from this research, because the book itself doesn't appear to include data from that research, simply stories from a handful of the families studied.
The authors discuss their research process. I would be interested to see actual papers published from this research, because the book itself doesn't appear to include data from that research, simply stories from a handful of the families studied.
Man, this book will give you a lot to think about. About our food system, how we care for our families, how we care for those in need. And what a time to be reading this book, during a pandemic, when hundreds of thousands of people in the food service industry have lost their jobs and when food banks are more important than ever. I will think about some of these families for years to come, and am worried about their situations right now with the pandemic. I hope to god they are able to get food and the necessities they need.
It made me realize that I don’t want anyone to have to scrape to get food on the table for themselves and their children. Even if it’s hard to find work, we should always be able to find food. Will be thinking about what this means in terms of giving to local food banks and volunteering in the weeks to come.
It made me realize that I don’t want anyone to have to scrape to get food on the table for themselves and their children. Even if it’s hard to find work, we should always be able to find food. Will be thinking about what this means in terms of giving to local food banks and volunteering in the weeks to come.
If I were to do research, this is the research I like best - personal narrative couched in quantitative data (i.e. time use studies). I think it's useful to read how moms deal with cooking, how it's changed over time, and how it's a universal struggle right now. My new goal is to make it Not a Thing.
Had to read this for ALA 370. I liked it though; made me angry with capitalism, the lack of safety net that poor people/families have, and how food isn't seen as a human right in the US. It also struck me how people will equate the health of a child with how much the mother of that child cares about them. Overall, definitely did not inspire visions of parenthood within me. The scene with Melanie having to get her child weighed and evaluated to continue to qualify for WIC made me think of how my mother had to do that with my siblings and I during the recession. I wonder if she felt the same as Melanie: like she had to grovel to receive meager governmental assistance.
- "One out of every eight people in the United States doesn't have enough to eat."
- "Mothers are expected to be fully invested in protecting their children while also being ethical and informed consumers. The seemingly never-ending job of mothering includes navigating shifting expert advice on how to cultivate children’s healthy eating habits while minimizing their contact with harmful food additives and chemicals."
- "about half of American families report eating dinner together six to seven nights a week, a number that hasn’t changed much in the last three decades."
- "The amount of leisure time that parents enjoy has actually declined since the 1960s."
- "Junk food is advertised to children much more often than other types of food. One study found that four categories accounted for almost 60 percent of food ads viewed by children and youth: breakfast cereals, candy, fast food, and specific restaurants. Fast-food ads accounted for nearly a quarter of these ads."
- "When shopping for food is seen as a sign of good parenting and ethical consumption, it can also become a test of who is, and who is not, caring and thoughtful."
- "Poor people can eat healthfully, they [celebrity chefs and nutrition experts] suggest, if only they’d shop and cook smarter. But poor people already know a lot about getting by on a budget. For many poor mothers, trips to the grocery store are complicated by complex calculations about what they can and can’t buy, judgment about the food in their carts, and constant reminders that they don’t deserve to treat themselves or their children."
- "political debates about who is worthy of food stamps serve to maintain the stigma around receiving public assistance. Studies find that far from motivating people to make positive changes, stigma actually makes people’s lives more difficult."
- "the USDA reports that 53 percent of babies born in the United States participate in WIC."
- "Some people attribute the death of the dinner party to changes in our family and work lives. People are working longer hours and commuting farther and don’t have as much time to socialize."
- "Trying to solve the environmental and social ills of our food system by demanding that we return to our kitchens en masse is unrealistic. At best, it is a weight of responsibility that will most likely be felt by the women who tend to occupy this space already."
It feels a little odd to review this book, as reading it felt like some combination of a textbook and a bunch of magazine articles. The stories themselves were very easy to read, but the (usually interesting and worthwhile) endnotes made it somewhat laborious - especially while reading in bed! I wonder if there might have been some better combination of these two styles.
As far as the content goes, even as a recent MSW graduate I learned quite a bit from this book. From learning how one might cook in a hotel room, as one grandmother does for her grandchildren in this book, fo feeling the judgement of another mother whose daughter’s weight and iron levels are regularly tested at their local WIC - these are aspects of the food system in the US that may be under the radar but are certainly not out of the norm.
It goes far beyond the kitchen and discusses gender inequities and poverty. The concept of “contaminated time” rang especially true to me. Women’s “leisure” time is often not as leisurely as our male counterparts - we spend even our downtime making mental lists, organizing and planning for the future, and doing the often invisible work of running a household.
As far as the content goes, even as a recent MSW graduate I learned quite a bit from this book. From learning how one might cook in a hotel room, as one grandmother does for her grandchildren in this book, fo feeling the judgement of another mother whose daughter’s weight and iron levels are regularly tested at their local WIC - these are aspects of the food system in the US that may be under the radar but are certainly not out of the norm.
It goes far beyond the kitchen and discusses gender inequities and poverty. The concept of “contaminated time” rang especially true to me. Women’s “leisure” time is often not as leisurely as our male counterparts - we spend even our downtime making mental lists, organizing and planning for the future, and doing the often invisible work of running a household.