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A review by spacewhombus
Eating to Extinction: The World's Rarest Foods and Why We Need to Save Them by Dan Saladino
adventurous
hopeful
informative
reflective
slow-paced
4.0
A relatively slow read, but I really enjoyed this. The author takes you on a journey to find many different rare foods, across ten different realms: wild foraged foods, cereal crops, vegetables, meat, seafood, fruit, cheese, alcohol, stimulants, and sweets.
I found myself more interested at the beginning, and by the end I felt it was a little boring and repetitive because he had covered already the dangers of monoculture crops to not only our food system but to a cultural and historical sense of place many times. However, the foods he mentions were all interesting to read about, especially those that were a staple to a certain region in the past but have become almost non-existent.
I think if you actually go into this with more of a mindset that it is interesting travel writing where the author tries local foods you never heard of, then you will like this more than if you are expecting an informative book about our food system. He travels to most of the places where these rare foods are coming from, and I found his discussions with local communities about the foods some of the most interesting parts of the book.
It kind of reminded me of the writing style of Color: A Natural History of the Palette by Victoria Finlay, but a little less exciting, so if you liked that then you probably would enjoy this too, and vice versa.
I found myself more interested at the beginning, and by the end I felt it was a little boring and repetitive because he had covered already the dangers of monoculture crops to not only our food system but to a cultural and historical sense of place many times. However, the foods he mentions were all interesting to read about, especially those that were a staple to a certain region in the past but have become almost non-existent.
I think if you actually go into this with more of a mindset that it is interesting travel writing where the author tries local foods you never heard of, then you will like this more than if you are expecting an informative book about our food system. He travels to most of the places where these rare foods are coming from, and I found his discussions with local communities about the foods some of the most interesting parts of the book.
It kind of reminded me of the writing style of Color: A Natural History of the Palette by Victoria Finlay, but a little less exciting, so if you liked that then you probably would enjoy this too, and vice versa.