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4.1 AVERAGE
4.1 AVERAGE
adventurous
challenging
funny
hopeful
informative
inspiring
lighthearted
reflective
medium-paced
Extremely thought-provoking. She tends to focus on some issues and totally ignore others, but still challenges you to consider aspects of your lifestyle. I did feel a bit preached at, especially since I disagree with some of her convictions. It seemed I was getting a force-feed of her ideas, while she comments that "no one likes to be told what to believe." I also plan to double-check some of her facts.
As a long-time veggie gardener, it was a little off-putting that she assumed we are all dummies when it comes to agriculture. Our family kept laying hens in Cupertino, just down the street from HP and Apple headquarters. I don't know anyone who doesn't know where our food comes from.
Also, we now live in Colorado, and if I wanted to eat truly locally, it would be extremely difficult. There are no farms within 100 miles of here. Within 100 miles, we have meat and (homegrown) eggs, but the weather is too extreme, the soil too awful, and the water too scarce to grow crops on any sort of commercial basis. "Local" for us would have to include the neighboring states.
As a long-time veggie gardener, it was a little off-putting that she assumed we are all dummies when it comes to agriculture. Our family kept laying hens in Cupertino, just down the street from HP and Apple headquarters. I don't know anyone who doesn't know where our food comes from.
Also, we now live in Colorado, and if I wanted to eat truly locally, it would be extremely difficult. There are no farms within 100 miles of here. Within 100 miles, we have meat and (homegrown) eggs, but the weather is too extreme, the soil too awful, and the water too scarce to grow crops on any sort of commercial basis. "Local" for us would have to include the neighboring states.
Well, Barbara, you did it. You said you were going to eat local and grow your own food and you did it. I'll try to eat one local food or some local vegetables, because I have to go to work and can't figure out things so far ahead of time. But it was nice to read how you did it.
This book changed forever how I think about the food I eat. It is great to have Southern perspective on the local foods movement.
this will definitely be fuel for my blog (www.eco-guides.us/blog) with many thoughts for foodies, food/agriculture policy makers, parents, world citizens....
Whoa, I'm back to reviewing every book I read until I die. That was a silly few year hiatus. Anyway, I'm now fully into food and sustainability and I've loved Kingsolver since my mom suggested Bean Trees to me when I was a preteen. So this book was perfect for me (my mom and I both read it and she is now trying to shop at farmers markets). I want to have the time and space to do exactly what she did. It sounds like a dream.
This book is about how Kingsolver and family decide to live a year on "only food raised in their own neighborhood, grow it themselves, or learn to live without it." I love her as a writer, so 5 stars for voice. She's clever, witty and poetic, and political (a plus if you agree with her politics, perhaps a tad preachy if you don't).
I had to minus one star for her choice to go idealist instead of realist. She has such a romantic view of gardening, cooking and farm life. The only mishaps she mentions are a spilled pumpkin soup at Thanksgiving and unexpected turkey mating behavior. I would have appreciated an unexpected frost, a child crying over slaughtering turkeys, cursing during the vegetable preservation process that seems like unending chopping, blanching, freezing, drying, canning, dehydrating -- anything that would make this experience closer to what living like this would be like for my family.
Kudos for the recipes, though. My kids only half-heartedly complained about the "Eggs in a Nest" recipe on page 61 which requires a "really large bunch of chard," and was easy and quick to make. (The only other time they ate chard without complaining, besides as tiny ribbons in soup or something, is when I made homemade ravioli filled with chard, bacon, and ricotta cheese. There was nothing romantic, relaxing, or satisfying about that experience, however, with three young children needing attention, bacon grease splatters, spilled flour, every dirty dish . . .) I'm more likely to agree with her when she explains, "most people find the idea of making cheese at home to be preposterous. If the delivery guy happens to come to the door when I'm cutting and draining curd, I feel like a Wiccan. What kind of weirdo makes cheese?" Well, Kingsolver, for one. She also slaughters turkeys and swoons over seed catalogs. This book is a primer on food issues and also a great read.
I had to minus one star for her choice to go idealist instead of realist. She has such a romantic view of gardening, cooking and farm life. The only mishaps she mentions are a spilled pumpkin soup at Thanksgiving and unexpected turkey mating behavior. I would have appreciated an unexpected frost, a child crying over slaughtering turkeys, cursing during the vegetable preservation process that seems like unending chopping, blanching, freezing, drying, canning, dehydrating -- anything that would make this experience closer to what living like this would be like for my family.
Kudos for the recipes, though. My kids only half-heartedly complained about the "Eggs in a Nest" recipe on page 61 which requires a "really large bunch of chard," and was easy and quick to make. (The only other time they ate chard without complaining, besides as tiny ribbons in soup or something, is when I made homemade ravioli filled with chard, bacon, and ricotta cheese. There was nothing romantic, relaxing, or satisfying about that experience, however, with three young children needing attention, bacon grease splatters, spilled flour, every dirty dish . . .) I'm more likely to agree with her when she explains, "most people find the idea of making cheese at home to be preposterous. If the delivery guy happens to come to the door when I'm cutting and draining curd, I feel like a Wiccan. What kind of weirdo makes cheese?" Well, Kingsolver, for one. She also slaughters turkeys and swoons over seed catalogs. This book is a primer on food issues and also a great read.
A little self-righteous white lady, but a solid message about local eating.
challenging
emotional
informative
lighthearted
reflective
medium-paced